Posted on 05/16/2008 1:01:23 PM PDT by Fractal Trader
LOL, OMG and TTYL: parents and teachers worry that teenagers' use of these and other forms of online shorthand is harming their language skills. Perhaps they will take comfort from a study suggesting that instant messaging (IM) actually represents "an expansive new linguistic renaissance". "Instant messaging represents an expansive new linguistic renaissance"
Sali Tagliamonte and Derek Denis at the University of Toronto, Canada, say teenagers risk the disapproval of their elders if they use slang, and the scorn of their friends if they sound too buttoned-up. But instant messaging allows them to deploy a "robust mix" of colloquial and formal language. In a paper to be published in the spring 2008 issue of American Speech, the researchers argue that far from ruining teenagers' ability to communicate, IM lets teenagers show off what they can do with language.
"IM is interactive discourse among friends that is conducive to informal language," says Denis, "but at the same time, it is a written interface which tends to be more formal than speech."
He and Tagliamonte analysed more than a million words of IM communications and a quarter of a million spoken words produced by 72 people aged between 15 and 20. They found that although IM shared some of the patterns used in speech, its vocabulary and grammar tended to be relatively conservative. For example, teenagers are more likely to use the phrase "He was like, 'What's up?'" than "He said, 'What's up?'" when speaking - but the opposite is true when they are instant-messaging. This supports the idea that IM represents a hybrid form of communication.
(Excerpt) Read more at technology.newscientist.com ...
No, it’s not a linguistic renaissance for teens. It’s a way of spending a lot of time sending endless messages that are either dirty or inane or both.
omg srsly? wtf? lol
kthxbai
}:-)4
IDKIYGKT,BITTTWISIAS. F,IDTTKSBATDIIC.
Renaissance!
TTISWWOP
How is it a ‘renaissance’ when they are just using terms invented before some of them were BORN in the early days of online chatting?
w111 w3 h4v3 13375p33k 11k3 th3 0th3r thr54d?
That is AWESOME. Everytime I see that commercial, I think about how I would slap my kid if she ever spoke to me like that.
Now I don’t have to use my imagination anymore!
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
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