The Power of Language in Orwell’s Animal Farm: An Analysis of Speech Acts

This study aims to pragmatically analyze the power of language and its impact on people, with a focus on George Orwell’s British novel Animal Farm. This research adopts Austin and Searle’s speech act theory as its theoretical framework to examine how different types of speech acts function in the language manipulation. Four key extracts are selected in chronological order from the novel and subjected to contextual and pragmatic analysis. The findings indicate that the performative function of language can imperceptibly influence individuals’ minds and reshape social dynamics. Based on Searle’s classification of illocutionary acts, the research also finds that the pigs’ manipulation of language relies mainly on representatives, which construct ideology, and directives, which control behavior, with less dependence on commissive and expressive.