How Technology, Texting Have Affected Our Language - Research Paper Example

How Technology (texting) has Affected our Language And How if Affects the Way we Process Information. Summary New technologies such as texting havebrought us greater opportunities to communicate speedily over long distances. This focus on speed and ease of use has led to the emergence of abbreviated forms, known as textspeak which some have seen as a threat to the purity of written English and a harmful influence on learners’ ability to produce correct written forms. This danger is, however, overrated, and instant messaging is both a necessary adaptation to computer-mediated virtual environments, and an enrichment of the English language. Crystal (2006, pp. 28-29) describes how spoken language and written language have traditionally been seen as entirely different variations, each with their own set of rules. He explains that speech is “time-bound, dynamic and transient”, and most often occurs in face to face situations where there is both the chance to use non-verbal means like facial expressions and gestures, and the opportunity for speakers to modify their output depending on reactions coming from the listener. Written language, on the other hand, is “space-bound, static and permanent” and it is more formal because the writer does not always the person or persons who will be reading it, and must make more effort to clarify the context and anticipate what the reader might be thinking. This traditional view of language sees spoken language as more suited to emotional expressions in a social context, and written language more suited to factual purposes such as recording information or learning about something. When we look at examples of spoken language it is clear that grammar rules are used less rigorously, and there is more tolerance of errors, contractions, imperfect sentence structures, for example someone might say Think it’ll work? and the answer might be No way! The full written version of these sentences would be Do you think it will work? and No, there is no way that this could work! or No, I can think of no way in which this would work! The subject of the sentence is obvious in the spoken context, and the tone of voice conveys that there is a question and answer routine going on here, whereas in a written text these elements need to be made clear for the reader. An interesting study by Barron (2000) looks at the way all language develops and changes as new technologies arrive, for example when manuscripts gave way to printing in fifteenth century England there was immediately a much greater volume of written material available, and also a need for standardization. (Barron, 2000, p.57) Through books, the rules of written language became fixed, and rather conservative, while spoken language developed more regional and social variations. In the late twentieth century with the arrival of personal computers, and high speed media such as email arrived, which seem to share elements of spoken language (dynamic and transient, for example) but also elements of written language (static and permanent), depending on the context of each particular message. Businesses use email for factual communications such as ordering materials or issuing company instructions to their teams, for example, and these documents can be legally binding, and they are usually stored in archives in case they need to be used in some later situation. On the other hand people also send very personal and emotional emails about relationships and all the details of their daily lives and they usually delete their old messages from time to time to create space in their inbox. Barron examines this problem and comes to the conclusion that we should see the relationship between spoken and written language, not as “oppositional” but rather as a “continuum” (Barron: 2000, p. 249). This spoken/written continuum is very evident in new technologies which encourage us to use language flexibly, taking and adapting all kinds of features from both spoken and written traditions to help the communication process. Very recent developments such as instant messaging (often called “texting”) are obvious illustrations of this trend. Systems such as Yahoo messenger facilitate one to one and also group communication in real time using typed-in text. People can use computers, laptops and also very small devices such as hand-held telephones, blackberries, and now i-phones and i-pads to communicate with each other via typed-in text. Thiel Stern points out the unique opportunity that instant messaging (IM) provides for studying intimate messages which are typed out by teenage girls on their computers or on their mobile phones: “IM, which is practiced most often in complete privacy, creates a subcultural space in which the identity process is enacted among adolescent girls”. (Thiel Stern: 2000, p. 14). In this particular application of the technology, the exchanges are long, one to one conversations, in which all the usual joys and woes of growing up are discussed between peers. It is written, but also social, language use in real time. The IM medium sets down quite a few limitations which can be very extreme. If telephone keypads are used, each individual message must be short, so that it fits into the character limit defined by the model of phone, and the process of typing on a tiny keypad necessitates a lot of very deft finger movements. The users find as many shortcuts as they can, so as to cut down the number of keystrokes needed to form the message. Over time conventions have developed in computer mediated communication too, and nowadays there is an entire dialect of English called “textspeak”, or sometimes “netspeak”, or in extreme forms “geekspeak” which uses various means to reduce the number of characters (and consequently the amount of keystrokes and time) needed to convey the message. Teenagers have no difficulty deciphering a message such as C U l8er b4 7 (I will see you later, before 7pm) or even BCNU (I will be seeing you) and take pleasure in using this short hand language which adults often find hard to follow. Stern notes that text messaging is essentially a “written form that emulates conversation” (2000, p. 116). The sound of the typed characters is often more important than the surface meaning, as in the example l8er which relates to the sound “ate” and not the number eight. Some teachers have been concerned that this tendency to deviate from the prescriptive spelling “norm” might negatively influences learners’ ability to correctly write formal texts in standard English, but this hypothesis is not proven. (Shaw et al, 2007). It may be, in fact, that a more creative, playful and experimental approach to language, such as is used in text messaging, may increase people’s awareness of language, and encourage closer attention to all of its different potential forms. One of the most striking features of instant messaging, or texting, using such systems as Yahoo messenger, is that it allows both one-to-one conversations, and also group conversations, and, unlike normal spoken conversations, lends itself supremely well to the conducting of two or more conversations at the same time. Most regular IM users have had the experience of typing to one person in one textbox, and also typing to another person in another text box, both on the same computer screen at the same time. This is very common, and also, unfortunately, it is common for people to send a message to the wrong box by mistake, resulting in amusing or sometimes embarrassing revelations, not least the fact that one partner is not giving his or her full attention to the other. Instant messaging is a social activity, with its own unspoken rules, or, as some would call it “netiquette”, and this too, is similar to the way we see spoken language activities being bound by social conventions. There have been studies of the way that texting attempts to make up for the lack of face to face clues in communication through the use of emoticons, upper and lower case, (equivalent to shouting and normal pitch in spoken language) and flaming (i.e. the use of sustained emotional outbursts) (Carter, 2003) Tone of voice can be represented by “smilies” which depict various emotions in tiny cartoonish shapes, or expressions like lol (laughs out loud), omg (Oh my gosh/god). There are even animated files which can act out gestures like waving goodbye, drinking coffee or kissing. Most studies of the phenomenon of text messaging concentrate on its social aspects and the linguistic forms of the messages but there are also some quite significant implications for the way that we actually read the outputs and process the fragmentary information contained in them. Mackay, in a study about the text processing abilities of primary school in Alberta, uses the verb “playing” to describe how children interact with the “prismatic and multi-faceted qualities” (Mackay, 2002, p. 192) of all kinds of modern computer mediated texts. She contends that “connections among layers of text and among assorted related texts are a strong feature of the contemporary popular culture” (p. 198) and that children learn, along with basic reading skills, also “strategies for directing the scarce resource of their attention” (p. 201). Children learn to decipher the fast-changing trends in computer mediated communication and they need to do this because the internet, and instant messaging are media which exist in a context of massive information overload. Text messaging may be conducted while listening to music, answering emails, replying to tweets on Twitter or wall postings on Facebook and the user is able to switch from one to the other, often with cross references to the different media so that partners in conversation can switch too. Businesses and politicians are also now beginning to see the potential of these systems to exploit the “viral” nature of the text messaging networks and they have adopted the idioms and the contracted sizes of textspeak to reach this new generation of potential customers via banners and popups, for example, which resemble instant messenger text boxes. These phenomena add to the conventional paper-based forms of English and produce sophisticated artefacts and users who are playful, creative and comfortable with high speed switching from text to text and from one style of communication to another. Reference List. Barron, N. (2000) Alphabet to Email: How Written English Evolved and Where It’s Heading. London, New York: Routledge. Carter, K. A. (2003) “Type me How you Feel: Quasi non-verbal Cues in Computer Mediated Communication”. ETC: A Review of General Semantics. 60/1, pp. 29ff. Crystal, D. (2006) Language and The Internet. Cambridge, New York: Cambridge University Press. Mackay, M. (2002) Literacies Across Media: Playing the Text. New York: Routledge. Shaw, D.M., Carlson, C., Waxman, M. (2007) “An exploratory investigation into the relationship between Text Messaging and Spelling”. New England Reading Association Journal 43/1 p. 57 ff. Thiel Stern, S. (2007) Instant Identity: Adolescent Girls and the World of Instant Messaging. New York: Peter Lang. Read More