The Introduction is a chapter-length outline of the of the book which does more than simply summarise. Though not exhaustive, it includes both explanation and discussion of the historical context of Brexit and Brexitspeak, combined with a description of the linguistic tools of analysis. The starting point is that without language politics could not happen, so it is essential to understand how language works in general and how it is strategically deployed by politicians. In this chapter populism is discussed as an unwritten ideology best characterised by its demagogic appeal to an idea of ‘the people’ within a nationalist notion of ‘the British people’, at the same time promoting a friend-foe antithesis, stirring up emotion and avoiding reasoned argument. Demagoguery is a little used term in political science but highly relevant to the present state of democracy. Indeed, demagoguery exploits and undermines democracy. It is both an effect and a cause of post-truth politics, where truthfulness and facts are overridden. The final section takes a closer look at the fundamentals of language and language use that are at issue in examining the discourse of Brexit.

The assassination of the False Smerdis in Book 3 and the ensuing constitutional uncertainty offer Herodotus an inflection point to pause and consider the institution of monarchy in Persia in terms of its strengths and weaknesses. This chapter reexamines the speeches given by the conspirators in advance of the coup and its aftermath. In these episodes, Darius undermines a key nomos held by the Persians, their abhorrence of falsehood. Darius does so as a private citizen but given his subsequent rise to the throne, this invites comparison with the Great Kings. Darius’ disregard for nomos opens a philosophical debate on human motivation and self-interest. In a speech to the Persian conspirators, the future monarch defends "egoism," the philosophy that all action is performed to maximize the individual’s self-interest. This view is set alongside orations by the Persians Otanes and Prexaspes, exponents of cooperative action and altruism, respectively. The chapter argues that fifth-century intellectual culture engaged in a spirited interrogation of the individual in relation to self-interest, often in terms of the social contract. The clash between motivation on behalf of the one versus the many will illustrate the complex negotiation in Persia of ruler and ruled, self and society.

Chen compares Chinese politeness with English politeness in this chapter, focusing on what has been called a “East-West Divide” debate. To advance the position that East and West are fundamentally different, the author argues that Chinese politeness has its own characteristics but not unique; that the speech act of request in Chinese is conducted under similar principles and are subjected to similar constraints as seen English; that persistence in benefit offering occurs in English, too; that speech acts that are assumed to carry high levels of face threat (e.g., criticizing and disagreeing) also offers evidence that there is no East-West Divide in politeness; and that – finally – even the drastic differences in the speech act of lying between English and Chinese can be shown to be motivated by similar considerations. Culture differences are often times differences on the surface: the different symptoms of similar underlying principles. With a set of principles on which cultures may converge and a set of parameters on which cultures are likely to vary, Chen believes that B&L-E meets the challenge of being a universal theory that captures the commonalities between cultures, commonalities that transcend, and therefore account for, differences.

This Introduction discusses why dissembling one’s faith in order to avoid religious persecution was, despite its ubiquity, such a contentious practice for the early moderns and how the controversies surrounding such dissimulation were informed by early modern views on lying. It further provides an account of the various points of contact between debates on the legitimacy of religious dissimulation and theatrical dissimulation, respectively, both of which were indebted to shared theological concerns. Plays that stage religious dissimulation as their subject matter are therefore also legible as meta-theatrical reflections on the political and religious implications of their medium. Finally, this Introduction provides an overview of scholarship on the early modern stage and its position vis-à-vis contemporary debates on conformity and nonconformity, which has frequently been thematised in the supposedly antagonistic relationship between the theatre and the Puritans. Arguably, however, the relationship between the stage and various contemporary positions on the question of religious dissimulation was more dynamic and unstable than previous scholarship has often suggested.

This stage of the journey moves to ‘things speakers do with language’ in communication, covering a broad area from the literal-non-literal distinction and approaches to metaphor, through speech acts, ending with the ‘crossroads’ with ethical and social debates, such as those to do with negotiation and joint construction of meaning, questions of accountability and commitment (also in the case of lying and misleading), as well as politeness and appropriateness, including the use of taboo and offensive language. It offers a glimpse of how these topics benefit from an interdisciplinary manner of research and pauses with ample ‘food for thought’ questions on the way.

While populism is understood in this book in an institutional rather than rhetorical way, populist rhetoric is nevertheless important because it creates and strengthens polarization - a populists' favorite habitat. Populist rhetoric is imbued with paranoia, understood in a political sense (Hofstadter), leading to exaggerations, wild accusations, and conspiracy theories. These conspiracy theories are exemplified by a "Smolensk theory" (Poland) or seeing George Soros lurking around every corner (Hungary). In all political regimes, the "enemies of the people" are identified, and blamed with various offenses against the people. Populists often use lies, not so much to deceive the population but to create bases for mobilization and identification. When communicating directly with their electorates, usually through social media, populist leaders present themselves as simultaneously heroic and simple, insiders and outsiders. Their rhetoric aims at placing their opponents beyond the pale of the community.

In Massachusetts, the elite solidified their identity and legitimated their claims to rule by linking veracity, and all the social perquisites that entailed, to gentlemanliness and whiteness. Laws against deceptive speech practices, and prosecutions of them, concretized and reinforced cultural associations between gentility and credibility. These prosecutions also had larger political significance. In naming defendants as false speakers, presentments and prosecutions formally defined them as ineligible for participation in a community of shared civil discourse. In perjury prosecutions, this process meant that certain men were much more likely to be believed in institutional and legal contexts, thus endowing them with greater power in those contexts. In false news prosecutions, the process enabled a small coterie to control sanctioned versions of public information. The outrage manifested over mumpers reveals elite anxieties about the strength and resilience of these still-emerging ideologies of truth-telling. But these tricksters and their interventions in polite society nevertheless managed to expose the inherent deceptiveness of the polite ethos itself.

Disinformation in politics has exploded in recent years. With the rise of social media, the availability of disinformation is compounded and is easier than ever to disseminate. Research shows false political news spreads more rapidly than factually correct information, often through negative campaigns. Among efforts to fight this scourge, media organisations have turned to fact-checks to correct the record. In this chapter, we examine if voters pay attention to fact-checks in negative campaigns and to what degree fact-checks can hold candidates to account. We show that citizens find political attacks on opponents salient for voting decisions, but voters are also likely to seek fact-checks on negativity when available. Showing motivated biases, attacks by preferred candidates on less-liked opponents are sought more than the other way around, while fact-checks about a political opponent’s attacks are examined more often. Importantly, when fact-checks indicate a candidate is lying, voters are more likely to avoid that candidate, suggesting fact-checking may be able to play a role in reducing voters’ acceptance of candidates who spread disinformation.

On one understanding of the concept, publicity deems it impermissible for public officials to hide the reasons and moral theories that inform their policy choices. As just one example of this, publicity forbids the utilitarian from cloaking her policy recommendations in terms of a moral theory other than utilitarianism. While this might seem like a compelling requirement at first, its proponents have offered little argument for it, as defenders of utilitarianism have been quick to point out. To remedy this, I try to rehabilitate the blanket ban on false rationales demanded by this understanding of publicity, relying on the work of Bernard Williams (himself a fierce critic of esoteric utilitarianism). None of the arguments recovered from Williams successfully rule out secret rationales on the part of public officials. This understanding of publicity, I conclude, lacks compelling justification.