*snipped from UKP* The Joys of Language
So there’s a discussion going on about language. Ironically someone has managed to get right up my nose by twisting what I have said and putting their own slant on it to serve their own purposes. They combine this with interpreting things that I don’t say as some sort of form of ignorance. However that is not what this blog is about, That’s just an ( Read more... )
The thing with the English language is that it is already made up of lots of elements from other cultures and countreis and owes alot to Latin. We were give a set of instructions in English, Italian, French etc and asked to decide which one we could best understand. Almost everyone in the group found the Italian one the most understandable.
And one of our essays was on language/literature as a social concept and I argued that even text speak is an evolution of language. In some ways it is taking us back to the more iconic forms of language used wayyyyy back. It even created a topic for debate when we got the assignements back as one of the class tutors was very 'old school' and the other was much more forward thinking, and it led to a very interesting discussion. I mean, if you see language simplistically as a way of communicating, text speak still does the job!!
Maybe I should pop over to UKP to see the debate. Trouble is my brain is so foggy these days I doubt I could do myself justice in a reply, and probably no-one will remember me anyway :(
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You make some very interesting points too. Personally I have a real aversion to txt spk unless it is anywhere but a text message, and even then I struggle. I dont mind things like "ur" instead of your but hate things like l8r... but you are right, I suppose it is a form of evolving language. Hmmmmm more to ponder!
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The thing that annoys me most, and this is going slightly off topic is when I get texts from my own daughters that sound like they are 'boyz from da hood" - along the lines of "a got da stuf ya wntd an i gunna get me sum of da...." AARGGHHHH!!!
You will have noticed I use minimal txt speak in my txt msgs - LOL, but most of my friends will not only spell almost everything correctly in a text message, but its all beautifully punctuated as well. Different generations showing different levels of influence, I think.
ps - my most loathed abbreiations are cum instead of come (for obvious reasons, I think) m8 for mate, and da for the - I mean WHY ???? But I quite like 2mrw because its just so much quicker :)
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I use predictive text and most of my text messages are complete words with the odd abbreviation to allow for messages to fit into one or two texts to save on the pennies. As for the folks that seem to go from being a white 20 year old girl to a black guy from the bronx... like you.. I'm not only unimpressed, I'm mostly stunned and frankly usually at a loss as to what they are acutally saying.
Poor spelling left in to make you feel better! lmao!
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