THE DANGER OF TOTALITARIANISM

ABSTRACT

This study examines the dangers of totalitarianism and the consequences of systemic terror, which are the loss of humanity, chaos and disorder, loss of sense of self, and the inevitability of war, ultimately leading to the end of the world. The primary source of data employed in this research is George Orwell’s 1984 and Sophia Akhuemokan’s “King of Africa”. More data on interviews and reviews were sourced from Wikipedia, Google Books, Google Scholar, ResearchGate, Youtube, and Quora. The researches underwent thematic and content analysis. The study finds that by employing Lesley Jeffries’ Critical Stylistic tools of naming, verbalisation, exemplifying and enumeration, implying and assumption, and hypothesising, one can see the ideologies embedded in the text through the authors’ choice of words. Further study uncovers these ideologies as the gruesome consequences of a tyrannical system characterised by extreme scrutiny and dehumanising torture of the citizenry. The findings reveal that this systemic terror is transferable from the state to its people, that humans are instruments of this terror, and that war is a tool used by these tyrants to keep the people in check through fear. The study concludes that language is used by text producers to deduce these ideologies and affirms that language and ideology need to sync to realise a text successfully.