Social and Class Stratification in George Orwell`s Animal Farm, Analyzed by Meilan Prawesti

George Orwell is an English author who is commonly known to write about political issues. Orwell has been highly acclaimed and criticized for his novels, including one of his most famous, Animal Farm. In a satirical form, he uses personified farm animals to express his views on politics in Soviet as reflected in the novel Animal Farm.

Animal Farm tells about the development of class tyranny and the human tendency to maintain and reestablish class structures even in societies that allegedly stand for total equality for everyone. The novel illustrates how classes that are initially unified in the face of a common enemy, as the animals are against the humans, may become internally divided when that enemy is eliminated.

Marxist literary theories tend to focus on the representation of class conflict as well as the reinforcement of class distinctions through the medium of literature. Marxist theorists use traditional techniques of literary analysis but subordinate aesthetic concerns to the final social and political meanings of literature. Marxist theorist often shows authors sympathetic to the working classes and authors whose work challenges economic equalities found in capitalist societies. www.zeroland.co.nz/literary_theory.html

The area of social stratification in Animal Farm begins when individuals point out that they are from one class and others from different class. Some groups within society will inform other groups that they are in an especially disadvantaged position because of all the other groups’ advantaged position. For Marxists, class is a matter of economics, which means how the individual fits into the pattern of modern capitalist society. There are two main classes: the bourgeoisie and the proletariat (Bressler, page 210).

The bourgeoisie consist of those individuals who own the means of production, property, factories, and etc, and exploit the proletariat who only own, or can sell their labor to the bourgeoisie. The bourgeoisie gain profit from the proletariat by extracting surplus value, that is, by paying them less than the product is worth. The proletariat is the class of a capitalist society that does not have ownership of the means of production and whose only means of subsistence is to sell their labor power.

Throughout the inevitability of class and social stratification and the problems of the working classes, especially in terms of their relationship to power structures and it is proper to analyze Animal Farm from a Marxist perspective. The lower animals in Animal Farm who comprise the working class are hard workers and do not complain about unfairness created by Napoleon, even though they seem to realize that something foul is going on around them. Still, these lower classes in Animal Farm do not rise up, that is why it is named as the major reason why the failed utopian social experiment of Animalism never worked.

In Animal Farm, Animalism is a reflection of a farm ruled by pigs that symbolize a tyrannical government. It is invented by the highly respected pig Old Major. The pigs Snowball, Napoleon, and Squealer adapt Old Major's ideas into an actual philosophy, which they formally name Animalism. Napoleon and Squealer indulge in the vices of humans (drinking alcohol, sleeping in beds, trading). And Squealer is employed to alter the Seven Commandments to account for his humanization, which represents the Soviet government's tweaking of communist theory to make it more a reformation of capitalism than a replacement.

There are several relations between Animalism and Marxism.  The first similarity is the base of the economy.  Both are formed upon the belief that if everyone works, and rations are given equally, then there is no need for money and social class.  Another similarity is the way that the government started.  Both Animalism and Marxism started after a revolution from the middle class majority of residents.  The majority of the farm was made up of the animals on the farm. A final similarity between Animalism and Marxism is the fact that Old major, a well-respected pig, brought about the idea for Animalism after having a dream about it and Karl Marx was the soul creator of the idea for Marxism. 

Animal Farm focuses on class stratification with the separation of the animals from the humans. The class stratification issues play a significant role before and after the rebellion part. The class issues are a constant part of this novel from the beginning to the end. The animals are ruled by human.

The expulsion of Mr. Jones creates a power vacuum, and it is only so long before the next oppressor assumes totalitarian control. The natural division between intellectual and physical labor quickly comes to express itself as a new set of class divisions, with the “brainworkers” as the pigs claim to be using their superior intelligence to manipulate society to their own benefit.

Mr. Jones is a totally drinker he often ignores the animal needs and pursues the animals cruelly to fulfill his needs. Once the animals are in charge, a power struggle develops between the smartest of the animals. In this case, the pigs are the smartest animals. A power struggle develops between the two smartest and best known pigs, Napoleon and Snowball.

While Snowball struggles to achieve an egalitarian utopia and works heavily towards this goal, but Napoleon has other plan. After all, once Napoleon had his way, he basically stratified the society through force and coercion, and then he made the laws suit his will, all the while causing those who helped bring about the revolution to suffer greater social injustices under the animals then under the human beings.

Animal Farm is expressing the view that there must be a class of workers who are useful only when producing what the higher class society needs. Boxer is the farm's most hard-working and loyal worker. He serves as an allegory for the animal working class who helped the Mr. Jones and establish the Animal Farm, but were eventually betrayed. Boxer serves as the greatest example because he was the most loyal to the ideas of the “revolution” and the end was proven to be unnecessary to its existence or survival.

Boxer and Clover (Boxer's female counterpart) are used by Orwell to represent the proletariat, or unskilled labor class in Soviet society.  This lower class makes Napoleon happy because it seems as though they will benefit most from his new system. Since Boxer and the other low animals are not accustomed to the "good life," they can't really compare Napoleon's government to the life they had before under Mr. Jones. Usually the lowest class has the lowest intelligence; it is not difficult to persuade them into thinking they are getting a good deal.

The proletariat is also quite good at convincing each other that communism is a good idea.  Orwell supports this contention when he narrates, “Their most faithful disciples were the two carthorses, Boxer and Clover. Those two had great difficulty in thinking anything out for themselves, but having once accepted the pigs as their teachers, they absorbed everything that they were told, and passed it on to the other animals by simple arguments.”

Later, the importance of the proletariat is shown when Boxer suddenly falls and there is suddenly a drastic decrease in work productivity.  But still he is taken for granted by the pigs, which send him away in a glue truck. 

George Orwell actually made the novel Animal Farm to show that systems of government such as communism, socialism, and Marxism would begin as governments that brought equality, but that corruption in leadership would bring about oppression.  In essence, Animal Farm was written about Marxism. Orwell does an excellent job of describing the oppression caused by Marxism and communism. The novel was written by Orwell to make such tyranny known to the public. The similarities between the two governments are uncanny.  This novel shows that only true democracy can bring about the equality of people's worth.  Though there are still social classes, every human being counts as one vote, and only one.  There is no oppression by the government, because the people elect their government officials.

 References:

·         www.zeroland.co.nz/literary_theory.html

·         Bressler, Charles E. Literary Criticism, an Introduction to Theory and Practice. New Jersey: Prentice    Hall, 1994.