George Orwell’s nineteen eighty-four between fiction and reality : an inquiry inside the surveillance society

Abstract

The present dissertation explores the different aspects of surveillance as a pervasive and intensifying aspect in contemporary society using George Orwell’s novel, Nineteen Eighty- Four, as a point of reference where surveillance society is taken to extreme limits. The constant and ubiquitous watching in the novel is symbolized through the figure of “Big Brother” and the slogan “Big Brother is watching you” as a method of mind control and a reminder that the citizens are put under constant scrutiny. In the real world, the phrase has come to symbolize the abuse of government power in regard of civil liberties and as an instance of surveillance. Nineteen Eighty-Four shows how much of a visionary George Orwell was, his prophetic depictions of a distant future have come to materialize in the world we live in. People have increasingly given their personal freedoms and right to privacy, and therefore unwittingly allowed governmental surveillance to grow...