doublespeak

English

Etymology

From double +‎ -speak. Coined in the 1950s in the vein of George Orwell's Newspeak as used in his book Nineteen Eighty-Four. The word doublespeak does not appear in the book, although newspeak, oldspeak, and doublethink do.

Noun

doublespeak (uncountable)

1. Any language deliberately constructed to disguise or distort its actual meaning, often by employing euphemism or ambiguity.

   Synonym: double talk

   The report was riddled with so much corporate doublespeak that it was impossible to interpret.

   • 1976, Brent D. Ruben, “The Coming of the Information Age”, in Brent D. Ruben, editor, Information and Behavior, page 7:

     The popular and convergent use of information seems to represent something beyond the mere cosmetics of doublespeak, of a "garbage collector" turned "sanitary engineer" or a "strike" turned "work stoppage."

Translations

language deliberately constructed to disguise or distort its actual meaning

• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 雙言巧語／双言巧语 (shuāngyánqiǎoyǔ)

• Finnish: kaksoispuhe
• French: double langage (fr) m, double discours (fr) m
• Greek: διγλωσσία (el) f (diglossía)
• Hungarian: mellébeszélés (hu), kettős beszéd
• Russian: please add this translation if you can
• Spanish: doble lenguaje
• Swedish: skenspråk n