How to Use Orwellian in a Sentence

Orwellian

adjective
  • But many people consider the phrase to be an Orwellian oxymoron.
    — Robert Hackett, Fortune, 2020-08-10
  • Increasingly, the world started to feel more and more Orwellian over the course of filming.
    — Harrison Richlin, IndieWire, 2025-03-29
  • For now, the OAA and its vital programs are caught up in an Orwellian paradox.
    — Howard Gleckman, Forbes, 2024-12-23
  • The book was published in 1984, the Orwellian year that had once seemed so impossibly far off.
    — Megan Marshall, The New Yorker, 2025-02-08
  • This Orwellian language mirrors the terms of the Equality Act.
    — John Hagen, Star Tribune, 2021-06-29
  • Warzel and Peterson are particularly good on the Orwellian language that chips away at good will.
    — Christopher Borrelli, chicagotribune.com, 2022-01-13
  • Hiding the truth is not the way forward but a deep dive into an Orwellian totalitarian nightmare.
    — Chicago Tribune, 2025-03-07
  • Labeling natural gas as green energy is a little bit Orwellian.
    — Laura Johnston, cleveland, 2023-01-09
  • The year may be 1984, but any hint of Orwellian gloom here is dissolved in a wave of merry capitalist brinkmanship.
    — Justin Chang, Los Angeles Times, 2023-04-05
  • Despite the technology’s potential for good, of course, there is a clear Orwellian thread in the idea of a future where bad actors can wiretap your brain.
    — Cody Cottier, Discover Magazine, 2023-05-26
  • Right-wing pundits and politicians falsely portrayed her group as part of an Orwellian bid to control the speech and thought of ordinary Americans.
    — Steven Lee Myers, New York Times, 2023-05-10
  • Ahmed stars as Ash, an anonymous broker who dodges that Orwellian surveillance to help sketchy companies and whistleblowers come to an agreement.
    — Meredith G. White, AZCentral.com, 27 Aug. 2025
  • This is Orwellian, and everyone in Europe and the U.S. must reject this lunacy.
    — Josh Hammer, Newsweek, 2025-02-17
  • But even as their polished facades come undone in the workplace, and their office goes dystopian and Orwellian real quick, their impeccable style persists.
    — Christian Allaire, Vogue, 2025-02-18
  • Of course, that beauty transformation is driven by something Orwellian, rather than the betterment of society.
    — Tomris Laffly, Variety, 2024-09-12
  • The order is so blatant in its attempt to rewrite history that to call it Orwellian would be something of an insult to Big Brother.
    — Megan Garber, The Atlantic, 2025-04-29
  • The new dictatorship’s Orwellian tactics forced musicians and young people into hiding.
    — Matthew Dursum, SPIN, 2023-11-20
  • If all of this sounds creepy or Orwellian, think about this analogy: AI-interviews may be the recruitment equivalent of self-driving cars.
    — Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic, Forbes.com, 2025-05-25
  • The result is alarming to those who recognize a dangerously Orwellian attempt to whitewash recent history.
    — Lisa Mascaro, Anchorage Daily News, 2023-03-25
  • Fox News aired allegations by right-wing commentators and politicians that the board was part of an Orwellian effort to control what Americans say and think.
    — Harold Maass, The Week, 2023-05-11
  • An expert who works with hundreds of election officials from around the nation described the moment as Orwellian, with those who spent years attacking democratic institutions now warning of the dangers of extreme rhetoric.
    — Patrick Marley, Washington Post, 2024-07-19
  • Amazon’s warehouses, already known for their dangerous conditions, low pay, and Orwellian surveillance, have now become vectors of disease; dozens of workers have fallen ill with the coronavirus.
    — Alex Shephard, The New Republic, 2020-06-10
  • Such piecemeal militarization is the defining feature of wartime Putinism, which is repressive but only episodically Orwellian.
    — Michael Kimmage, Foreign Affairs, 2024-03-13
  • Maybe understanding the economy’s mixed signals doesn’t require Fitzgeraldian intelligence or Orwellian indoctrination.
    — Andy Kessler, WSJ, 2022-09-11

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'Orwellian.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

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