The way we write

Quote:

---

Originally posted by: KitKat
Cyberdude, what region of Scotland are you from? And why is your accent unique? From isolation or from outside influences? (This is assuming your accent is regional. If it's just you or your family that speaks that way, then that's different.) It still might be considered 'Scottish', but placed on the edge of the dialect continuum.

---

First, I'm from Edinburgh. Secondly, well I'm not sure really. Some of my family think that I watched too much American TV when I was young and hence developed one closer to that. You could call it isolation because I never really went out and socialised with many people. Personally I think it's different because it's very clear, for example I never use and am not used to using dialect specific words such as "dinnae" for "don't".

When I was in Scotland at times I didn't even understand strong Scottish accents, so that reduces the chance of me speaking in one too =P

Anyway I know that's a crap (or even biased) explaination, so apologies =P. I'll be happy to answer further.

Wtf feminist? I tried to defend males you fucktards [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-tongue.gif[/img]

Quote:

---

Originally posted by: Terracosmo
Wtf feminist? I tried to defend males you fucktards [img][/img]

---

Whatever. I still worked you over good, ya dirty girl.

lol cunning linguist cunnilingus

Quote:

---

Originally posted by: KitKat
complich8, you get the prize for worst pun at the forum [img][/img]

ChibiYali, it's fascinating, isn't it? Here's another interesting fact that all of you may be less familiar with...

In conversations between two men, or conversations between two women, interruptions are evenly distributed. That is, each person is responsible for about half of the interruptions in the conversation. However, in mixed gender conversations, when a man and a woman are talking, the man is responsible for more of the interruptions. And not just a little bit more either, but an average of 90% of the interruptions. Some sociolinguists explain this based on the typical differences in reasons why men and women engage in conversation (women primarily use conversation to build relationships whereas men use conversation to establish social status). They theorise that men use interruptions as a way of exercising power over female speakers and establishing dominance. Personally, I think that it's probably more likely due to the fact that women talk so much that men have to interrupt to get a word in edgewise. [img][/img]

---

As a Soc major I feel obligated to reply. I personally would say the men tend to want straightforward conversation instead of walking around a subject. As you said most women use language both verbal and body" to convey feeling. Men use physical gestures "fixing stuff, presents, and touching The interruptions may spawn for a need to ensure everyone involved understands the point. The man feels no need to elongate the conversation.

Back to the issue of literacy on the Internet and more specifically in this forum, I personally do check what I write in "Word" before I post. I also give it a quick read before I post. Is it too much? It might be but at least I can be sure what I post is what I wanted everyone to read. I'd be the first to say I have the worst English skills, but if you want to make it in this Country you need to know how to work on your weaknesses.
About a year ago when I was posting in like 10+ forums, talking in chat rooms, gaming, and stopped reading every night. I noticed the quality of my school reports was going down, and I was getting lower grades. Thats when I really noticed the bad grammar and spelling I would use online. Instead of stopping my use of the Internet I began to take my time and type clear phrases and use the best possible spelling. My grades began to rise again. I know it sounds cliché and lame but it really helped. While I do still make a lot of errors but grammatically and in spelling, the simple extra care I put into my typing has helped.

Quote:

---

Originally posted by: Souryusen

Quote:

---

Originally posted by: Terracosmo
Wtf feminist? I tried to defend males you fucktards

---

Whatever. I still worked you over good, ya dirty girl.

---

haha......good thing someone bumped this back up......i almost missed these little nuggets of quality posting [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-tongue.gif[/img]

Quote:

---

Originally posted by: Astronopolis
lol cunning linguist cunnilingus

---

And the last horse crosses the finish line

Quote:

---

Originally posted by: Def_X
About a year ago when I was posting in like 10+ forums, talking in chat rooms, gaming, and stopped reading every night. I noticed the quality of my school reports was going down, and I was getting lower grades. Thats when I really noticed the bad grammar and spelling I would use online. Instead of stopping my use of the Internet I began to take my time and type clear phrases and use the best possible spelling. My grades began to rise again. I know it sounds cliché and lame but it really helped. While I do still make a lot of errors but grammatically and in spelling, the simple extra care I put into my typing has helped.

---

that's what _I'm_ saying ...

or rather, what I've said in the past. All of these people who post terrible, TERRIBLE content with no flow, no spelling, in "look at me, I'm in the 7th grade now" mode don't realize how destructive it is to their own minds to let themselves live in that mode of operation.

If you want to become strong, you work out. If you want to become mentally strong, you think a lot. If you want to be passable at writing, you make an effort to write clearly and sensibly.

Back when I was screening editor and qc applicants for animeone (yikes .... it's already been almost 2 years since I dumped that drudge-work), I spent a lot of time talking with the people applying. As you'd expect, everyone believed they'd make a good editor or a reliable quality checker. And I'd say maybe one in thirty actually would. But what was interesting was that in five minutes of conversation with a person, I could almost always tell right away whether the person was going to pass or fail the test. Without even looking at it,

At first I wasn't sure there was a correlation. But there definitely is. People who were writing "u" instead of "you", missing simple stuff like apostrophes in contractions, and generally opting for low-return shortcuts over the extra two or three keystrokes per line it would take to take the "long road" would miss the same stuff in their tests, and generally give worse quality results. Conversely, people who were spelling words out, writing complete sentences, taking the long road in general and doing so consistently were giving much, much better tests back, usually in less time, with higher correct detection rates and much, MUCH fewer false detections.

Our thoughts are bound by our language. Dull, imprecise language is the expression of dull, imprecise thoughts. And if you fall into the habit of using either side of the coin, you'll end up getting the other side, whether you wanted it or not.

(Sort of rings of the eightfold path though ...)

but lol ppl rite taht way b/c they kan, not b/c tehy dont no how!

aone gives out tests for QC? o.O

used to .... and I used to be one of the screeners for them.

They still use a test for basic qc skills. I am pretty sure they're using different tests than the ones I used to deal with though.

You shouldnt judge people by there typeing its dumb. i may mispell in the web like hell but in real life when i am writeing in print i never misspell. but the keyboard is gay imo lol.

i say f*** the way people type as long as u can undertsand it.

If i wanted to reminded or be taught how to type i would go to school.

But. the ultimate counter-attack for what i have stated above ^^^^^..

is....
-If your not going to spend your time writeing ur posts right why should i waist my fucking time reading them?-

Yay i owned myself.

anyway instead of flaming them correct them? if your not going to correct them but flame them. then F**** off.

Yeah, no one buys that bullshit, if you can't type with a little thought put into it then you shouldn't be allowed on a damn computer at all.

Quote:

---

Originally posted by: hiddenpookie
-If your not going to spend your time writeing ur posts right why should i waist my fucking time reading them?-

---

waist -
The part of the human trunk between the bottom of the rib cage and the pelvis.
The narrow part of the abdomen of an insect.

The part of a garment that encircles the waist of the body.
The upper part of a garment, extending from the shoulders to the waistline, especially the bodice of a woman's dress.
A blouse.
A child's undershirt.
The middle section or part of an object, especially when narrower than the rest.
Nautical. The middle part of the upper deck of a ship between the forecastle and the quarterdeck.


waste-
To use, consume, spend, or expend thoughtlessly or carelessly.
To cause to lose energy, strength, or vigor; exhaust, tire, or enfeeble: Disease wasted his body.
To fail to take advantage of or use for profit; lose: waste an opportunity.

To destroy completely.
Slang. To kill; murder.

v. intr.
To lose energy, strength, weight, or vigor; become weak or enfeebled: wasting away from an illness.
To pass without being put to use: Time is wasting.

n.
The act or an instance of wasting or the condition of being wasted: a waste of talent; gone to waste.
A place, region, or land that is uninhabited or uncultivated; a desert or wilderness.
A devastated or destroyed region, town, or building; a ruin.

An unusable or unwanted substance or material, such as a waste product.
Something, such as steam, that escapes without being used.
Garbage; trash.
The undigested residue of food eliminated from the body; excrement.

adj.
Regarded or discarded as worthless or useless: waste trimmings.
Used as a conveyance or container for refuse: a waste bin.
Excreted from the body: waste matter.

Idiom:
waste (one's) breath
To gain or accomplish nothing by speaking.

Sorry I had to use the open invite. ^_^
It's not that I want to flame anyone who makes a mistake on their post, it's just the time and effort to at least read over each post once would be greatly appreciated. Just make sure you can understand yourself before you post. Maybe if people spent that extra time most forum users wouldn't just skip to the last page and re-post something that has been said a million times already on a thread.

Quote:

---

Originally posted by: hiddenpookie
You shouldn't judge people by their typing, it's dumb. I may misspell on the web like hell, but in real life when I am writing <snip, redundant> I never misspell anything. But the keyboard is gay, imo lol.

I say f*** the way people type, as long as you can undertsand it.

If i wanted to be reminded or <snip> taught how to type i would go to school.

But. the ultimate counter-attack for what i have stated above ^^^^^..

is....
-If you're not going to spend your time writing your posts right why should I waste my fucking time reading them?-

Yay, i owned myself.

anyway instead of flaming them, correct them. if you're not going to correct them but flame them. then F**** off.

---

I disagree, both with the concept that you shouldn't judge people by their writing style, and that you should take time correcting people. And I'll explain why.

First of all, like I already said, when you get into a certain mode, used to the same shortcuts, etc, you tend to continue using them. When you're writing, you don't painstakingly select every word. Many elements of language are automatic. Things like selection of prepositions, word arrangements, common words. When you're writing these things, you tend to write them the same way, no matter what the medium is. If you're a terrible writer, who has otherwise good mastery of spoken language, then what's stopping you from just writing the way you'd speak? This particularly applies to grammatical constructs.

If you're writing grammatically correct but horribly misspelled sentences, that's one thing. But if you're writing badly formed sentences (as opposed to badly spelled ones), it really IS a good indicator that you don't know how to compose well-formed ones.

Either way, it's particularly obvious that you don't want people who can't spell and can't compose clear and correct sentences to be editing the work of other people who can't spell or compose clear and correct sentences. It's like throwing fuel on a fire... it only makes things worse.

For your second point, that forum-goers should correct people when they screw up ... see how irritating it can be? I even omitted stylistic errors, just opting for basic spelling, grammar and punctuation.

It's a good way to completely derail a conversation. Particularly when there's a lot of people screwing up little things. The conversation can still go on, or it can go completely off-topic, as people who absolutely don't care about how they're butchering their own language continue to do so, and people who're obsessed with correcting them do so. What's the point? I'd rather see someone belch a quick flame and get back on topic than see that sort of endless, irritating digression, you know?

On the same point complich was running on: When you mix up words that sound similar (ex. waist, waste, to, too, ect.) there is little chance it was simply because it is an internet forum. So it is possible to establish an idea of the abilities a person has based on their messages on a forum.

Guys... stop not using capitals and stop using stupid internet substitutions for words. It's really fucking annoying to see a whole paragraph or even a small sentence written without any capitalization. On top of that, a lot of you are using substitutions for "you", "why", "to", and etc.

FUCKING STOP.

Quote:

---

Originally posted by: Mut@chi
Guys... stop not using capitals and stop using stupid internet substitutions for words. It's really fucking annoying to see a whole paragraph or even a small sentence written without any capitalization. On top of that, a lot of you are using substitutions for "you", "why", "to", and etc.

FUCKING STOP.

---

y shud i stop? internet substitutions are meant 2 b used on the internet. if u'r so annoyed, then get off teh net n00b >_> lololo!!!!1

rofl!!! jus jking!! ^_^

This thread used to be intellectual and interesting, now its deteriorated into something completey retarded and gay. Thanks guys, you're all assholes.

No problem..

When I find something that you've actually contributed to this thread, I'll take your allegations more seriously... all I see from you is a:

"lol cunning linguist cunnilingus"

Way to make this thread more intellectual and interesting...

I'm not generally bothered by internet short forms, but when they are used excessively in a single post, I admit that I get annoyed trying to read it. Just on a side note, I've been playing a lot of Guild Wars lately. Internet short forms are rampant there. When I need to find some random people to do a quest with me, I look at the way they type first. I only quest with people who type in complete sentences and have good spelling and grammar. People who take the time to communicate clearly in regular conversation are more likely to communicate clearly in a mission and will show good teamwork and strategy skills. I'm sure there are lots of people who use internet short forms and are fabulous players, but it's always a gamble because I never know if they're going to be an asset or a hindrance to the team. However, I've never had a bad experience playing with someone who types well.

In reference to using short forms/ Abbreviations/Acronyms... I recently started an internship at CMS ( centers for medicare & medicaid services) inside the the HIGLAS ( Healthcare Integrated General Ledger Accounting
System) department on the TCG ( Technical Configuration Group) working with UID (User Identification) entry and orginization. From my experience in my brief stay here, the IT (information technology ) industry has become detached from the real world due to overuse of Acornyms and the like. Sentences become cluttered with that jargon as you try to pronounce and decipher these terms all at the same time. I am just glad that the online world is not at this level of uselessness.. Hope no IT people on the forums take offense but it is rediculous..
Kit: Nice topic, Id enjoy someone to breakdown my horrid typing.. see what insight into my persona I could get but no rush, I can bug you later [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-happy.gif[/img]...
P.S. POST 100 [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-happy.gif[/img] w00t w00t >> << .>>

I'm usually bothered by people using "AOL" shortcuts like u, 2, 4, but what really gets me is when really simple contractions are ignored ("im" instead of "I'm") for example. grrr

On the other hand, I think whole sentences in leet are impressive (albeit a little immature), hehe. I can't read that shit at all.

in regards to misspelling, has anyone else read that thing where every word is misspelled, but you can still read it? It has something to do with the fact that we can recognize a word by the first and last letters, and as long as most of the letters are correct, it doesn't matter what order they're in. Becuase we dn't reed snetences adn wrds letler for letter, adn usually only llok at the frist nd laest ltters, our braines pck up the meagnings automtcially. I think that's cool.

But people who generally ignore spelling/grammar rules and speak in "omfg-runon-sentences" piss me off.

umm xanbcoo...

Quote:

---

Originally posted by: xanbcoo
I was afraid my compy was screwin' up

---

ironic no? [img]i/expressions/beer.gif[/img]

Quote:

---

Originally posted by: Chaoskiddo
umm xanbcoo...

Quote:

---

Originally posted by: xanbcoo
I was afraid my compy was screwin' up

---

ironic no? [img][/img]

---

Quote:

---

Originally posted by: KitKat
Second example is one of our newer members, Chaoskiddo, who's been hassled for his grammar and spelling recently. The question that was posed to him was why would he use 'wuz' in the place of 'was' since they both have the same amount of letters and hence it's not saving him any time. I think the answer to this lies in fact that language is often used not just to convey information but also to build solidarity between people. One of the ways that this is done, is by having a certain dialect that you use with your friends, with which you relate to each other, but don't necessarily use with outsiders. In my opinion, Chaoskiddo's use of 'wuz' and such, words that he normally uses with his friends, signifies that he regards us as his peers, and is relating to us on that level.

---

So in response, No. Not really.
And in case you're wondering, I say "compy" in real life - it's not a shortcut.

03/21/2005 09:57 PM <---the date and time of kitkat's post. To clear it up i use "was" now. [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-happy.gif[/img]

my question really should've been "was that sarcasm?"

Quote:

---

Originally posted by: KitKat
I'm not generally bothered by internet short forms, but when they are used excessively in a single post, I admit that I get annoyed trying to read it. Just on a side note, I've been playing a lot of Guild Wars lately. Internet short forms are rampant there. When I need to find some random people to do a quest with me, I look at the way they type first. I only quest with people who type in complete sentences and have good spelling and grammar. People who take the time to communicate clearly in regular conversation are more likely to communicate clearly in a mission and will show good teamwork and strategy skills. I'm sure there are lots of people who use internet short forms and are fabulous players, but it's always a gamble because I never know if they're going to be an asset or a hindrance to the team. However, I've never had a bad experience playing with someone who types well.

---

hmm with daoc (dark age of camelot) there was kind of a whole lingo we used there while playing, and used a lot of shortened words etc. like fotm, irl, inc, df, ding, and normal stuff like brb etc. the reason being is daoc is all about rvr, (realm vs realm, team based pvp, player vs player) and when youre fighting you dont really have time to right out everything. another point you made about using the lingo you use with friends here i thought was interesting. i noticed here i talk differently for a couple reasons mostly being so people will understand me and not ask what "this" means. anyway i suppose i write in this way, without capitilization and punctuation, because it feels more laid back to me, and im usually here to chill (relax.)

Quote:

---

Originally posted by: Chaoskiddo
03/21/2005 09:57 PM <---the date and time of kitkat's post. To clear it up i use "was" now. [img][/img]

my question really should've been "was that sarcasm?"

---

Hey, I usually respond with well thought out posts (or at least I like to think so, [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-tongue.gif[/img]). That was a dumb topic, so I wasn't really being serious anyway. My point is still that there were no "grammatical errors" and the diction I used was reflective of how I'd usually respond to that sort of thing (using "screwin'" instead of "screwing").
If I had I meant to sound sarcastic I would have said something along the lines of: "OMFG THERE IS HAX0R ON T3H LOSE"

Quote:

---

Originally posted by: xanbcoo
"OMFG THERE IS HAX0R ON T3H LOSE"

---

0//\/\\6z!1!!1!!oneone!! WHREE [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-blush.gif[/img]

P.S (Post.. something) Why is this thread not being pposted on.. it was such an interesting topic. Has it lost its flare already?

Aha! I have found my thread again! Partly, I just want it to be archived and searchable in the new system. Also, I thought you guys might find this interesting:

We've been learning in my linguistics class about 'empty' or contentless words and phrases. Things that you say, but that don't really mean anything at all. I find it fascinating how accepted the practice of using these words has become in academic fields. Take, for example, the winner of the 1998 Bad Academic Writing Awards, Judith Butler, with her winning sentence:

"The move from a structuralist account in which capital is understood to structure social relations in relatively homologous ways to a view of hegemony in which power relations are subject to repetition, convergence, and rearticulation brought the question of temporality into the thinking of structure, and marked a shift from a form of Althusserian theory that takes structural totalities as theoretical objects to one in which the insights into the contingent possibility of structure inaugurate a renewed conception of hegemony as bound up with the contingent sites and strategies of the rearticulation of power."

I know that I'm often guilty of this, especially if I'm writing a late night lab report, and really have no idea what I'm talking about. I have the advantage of having TA's who don't speak English as a native language, so often I try to confuse them with my verbiage and hope they give me a good mark because they can't be bothered to look up all the words to check to see if I actually know what I'm talking about.

My favourite story though, is of Allan Sokal, a physicist who wrote a paper as a joke and submitted it to a social science academic journal. The paper had no content, but was filled with so much jargon and buzzwords that it managed to get fairly good reviews. It was entitled "Transgressing the Boundaries: Toward a Transformative Hermeneutics of Quantum Gravity," and can be found here: http://www.drizzle.com/~jwalsh/sokal/

And for you comp sci kids, ever wanted to get published but didn't want to go through the trouble of actually writing a paper? Look no farther, SCIgen has come to your rescue! It will generate a random academic paper complete with references, graphs, tables, anything you could ask for in a paper. Check it out! http://pdos.csail.mit.edu/scigen/

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by KitKat

"The move from a structuralist account in which capital is understood to structure social relations in relatively homologous ways to a view of hegemony in which power relations are subject to repetition, convergence, and rearticulation brought the question of temporality into the thinking of structure, and marked a shift from a form of Althusserian theory that takes structural totalities as theoretical objects to one in which the insights into the contingent possibility of structure inaugurate a renewed conception of hegemony as bound up with the contingent sites and strategies of the rearticulation of power."

---

No human beings with a statistically normal brain and thought pattern would remember how that sentence began, or what was the idea of the whole thing, when they reach the end (if they manage to reach the end, that is).

It needs to be remembered, though, that only a minority of researchers actually research linguistics or anything related to that like literature and such. The rest study some other, specific subjects and it's not their highest priority to be concerned about the shape and beauty of the language they write. Ideally published articles will aid other researchers / research groups. If an article is very badly written, it fails to deliver the information, and it will be forgotten faster than its more nicely written competitors.

ah yes, the first thread revolving around me when i first joined. :)

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Chaoskiddo

ah yes, the first thread revolving around me when i first joined. :)

---

Yeah, you were even more annoying back then.



*evil laugh*

:( i like to feel important. You suck terra.

Hey now, let's try to stay on topic here.

If any of you felt a little overwhelmed by the academic paper generator, there are a lot of smaller variations on that theme. In particular, check out the sloganizer: http://www.sloganizer.net/en/
Just input a name, or any noun, and see how much commercial opportunity you have!
Also, I'm a big fan of Dilbert's mission statement generator: http://www.dilbert.com/comics/dilber...eer/bin/ms.cgi

Fun for everyone!

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by KitKat

Hey now, let's try to stay on topic here.

If any of you felt a little overwhelmed by the academic paper generator, there are a lot of smaller variations on that theme. In particular, check out the sloganizer: http://www.sloganizer.net/en/

---

"Naughty little xDarkMaster."

LOL

"Terracosmo - Just like heaven"

LMAO destiny

"Ifinghatetonton inside you."

WTF???? That sounds more like porn title than a slogan if you ask me.

"Deblas- You see this name, you think dirty"......I like these slogans!

"for the love of chaoskiddo."

??

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by KitKat

Hey now, let's try to stay on topic here.

If any of you felt a little overwhelmed by the academic paper generator, there are a lot of smaller variations on that theme. In particular, check out the sloganizer: http://www.sloganizer.net/en/

---

"Kraco nonstop."

Hmm... I wonder if this refers to how I can have so many posts in so little time. Or something totally different...

But this sounds very much like the truth:
"With a name like KitKat, it has to be good."

"All you need is Mr Squiggles."
nuff said

«Masamuneehs on the outside, tasty on the inside.»
What?
«The original Masamuneehs.»
No shit! Who else would have a fucking name like that?
«I want Masamuneehs and I want it now.»
Now we're talking! :D

«There is no life without Phoenix.»

LMAO, this is so true :)

sloganizer.net
«Suck it dry makes your day.»
you bet i do baby

I thought I'd bring this thread back, because I read a news article today that reminded me about an issue I've been thinking about for a while.

When I started university (ack, that's nearly 6 years ago now x_X) I wrote a paper on the effect of text forms and IM standards on how people speak and write the English language. At the time, there was much alarm from people who believed the language was degrading due to overused short forms and increased reliance on spell checkers. There hadn't been any studies done, so at that point it was mainly speculation. Now we're seeing the results of a generation who has grown up on instant messaging of all sorts. Those people who argued, "Kids use text speak, but it's only a dialect, and they know how to write properly when they need to," are finding that more and more kids can't use standard English when asked to. And it's not just spelling and grammar that are suffering.
This article details the result of a study done in Ireland.
The interesting thing to note is that the whole way that they write is being affected. Sentence structure and vocabulary are narrowing, becoming simpler and shorter. It will be interesting to see how the academic community chooses to deal with this. There are schools in Australia that are allowing students to use certain texting short forms on their exams. As much as a linguist I can objectively look at this and call it the natural evolution of the language, it makes me sad to see so much richness and expressiveness being lost. Sometimes, an emoticon just can't covey how you feel like a 10 letter word can.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by KitKat

As much as a linguist I can objectively look at this and call it the natural evolution of the language, it makes me sad to see so much richness and expressiveness being lost. Sometimes, an emoticon just can't covey how you feel like a 10 letter word can.

---

I was seriously interested to see what you thought about this. It's pretty popular to bash on anyone even mildly supportive of prescriptive grammar, I'm finding.

Also, I'm not surprised by that news in the least. I guess it's harder to enforce "proper" writing skills in a classroom when the kids are using AIM shortcuts and texting-slang on a day-to-day basis among their peers. Actually, I don't know whether to think of it as "slang" or not...and although there is probably some level of mutual intelligibility between kids and text messages and netspeak, it honestly pains me to have to read things like this nearly every single day:

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Facebook Group Profile

Group Info Name: girls who are jealous:)
Type: Common Interest - Age
Description: This is for the girls that start krapp about girls being whores okay listen here you need too stop this krapp when you are pretty you are going too dresss up & wear short skirts thats if you have the body & these chicks that started this krapp needs too be hit with a little reality you need too get over it okay & you need to learn the definition of whore kk got it & if you want too talk krapp about us go ahead you are just making girls that are pretty more famous you should just live life the way you got it god blessed you with a life so live it & stay out of other people's life:) ok ! you all just need too learn that yeah im going too admit some girls in this world are but 12 year olds please ! okay im 12 & im pretty surei have too deal with this quite a bit & i think it's stupid & some girls need too grow up & stop acting like immiture girls about it you just need too learn who is a whore before you go calling them it because i think it's going too be funny when someone jumps you girls for making comments that arent true :) well i just think yall need too stop trying too bring us down when you are just making yourself look bad :) if girls want too dress like that let them okay & im not saying it's a good thing either it's just girls need too get over being jealous of girls that like too dress up flirt & have a good time just because we do that doesn't mean your a whore ok so you just need too stop all of this krapp :)

---

I wonder after reading this, how many people actually could read through that and understand it clearly? Perhaps there are even different "dialects" of internet writing?

honestly, i stopped reading after 4 lines. it causes me physical pain trying to read stuff like that.

I got a brain tumor and lost my ability to read after one third through.

I consider myself lucky as it spared me from the rest of it.

If these girls are 12 they shouldn't be on facebook (I strongly doubt they have parental permission, considering the kind of groups that exist on facebook). Anyway, that article has brought a very interesting issue to my attention. With the proliferation of eEverything younger and younger people are now able to reach out and interact further from home than ever before. Now where this becomes interesting is in commmunication skills. One of the many reasons you can't get a job or go off on your own at that young an age (in most Western countries at least) is because most kids don't know how to communicate properly by that time. This girl is twelve and apparently from Maryland (my state :( ), which means she's had probably 6-7 years of formal education at best, with at least two of those being 'building years' where they just rehashed old stuff. When you look at her writing it's not surprising that she writes like a middle schooler...because she is one.

I think part of this problem is on the majority of people online who are old enough to know a little bit. I think we tend to hold all users to a standard which coincides with about an average 16-18 year old in a developed country with mandatory schooling for all children. The way this affects comunication is still unknown, but I think it's highly possible that what Kitkat is worried about may come to pass. Bolstered by their ability to communicate effectively online with limited knowledge kids might be harder to train in proper language because they can use their pseudo language so effectively amongst themselves and others online. Practice makes perfect, and with the medium of communication shifting from verbal to typed it's possible that languages will be forced to adapt to more keyboard friendly forms.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Yukimura

Bolstered by their ability to communicate effectively online with limited knowledge kids might be harder to train in proper language because they can use their pseudo language so effectively amongst themselves and others online. Practice makes perfect, and with the medium of communication shifting from verbal to typed it's possible that languages will be forced to adapt to more keyboard friendly forms.

---

Yeah, this pretty much what I was said as well, and clearly it's the case. It's gotten to the point where when I talk to some of my cousins on MSN who text-message all the time, they substitute words and phrases for text-slang when it's not even necessary to shorten the word. They've just gotten used to it, and they're regular writing has changed to fit that.

Pity, because like my example above, the result is pretty incomprehensible.

Quote:

---

This girl is twelve and apparently from Maryland (my state ), which means she's had probably 6-7 years of formal education at best, with at least two of those being 'building years' where they just rehashed old stuff. When you look at her writing it's not surprising that she writes like a middle schooler...because she is one.

---

Here is where I disagree with you. When I was at least 10, I could write more clearly than that. Think of all the essays you had to write in between 5th and 8th grade. The problem is not because she hasn't been taught how to write properly, it's because her everyday conversation (online, or texting, or whatever) interferes with the teaching. I mean, the article KitKat posted is pretty sparse on details (it might just be a bunch of bad English teachers playing the blame-game), but apparently kids are having trouble separating their formal and informal writing.

What pisses me off is that it doesn't even have any regularity to it, so it's not like slang. It's just jumbled. For every 10 kids who write like that, you have to go through and (painstakingly) figure out what they're trying to say. Or maybe I'm coming down too hard and just need to accept the change. I dunno.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by XanBcoo

What pisses me off is that it doesn't even have any regularity to it, so it's not like slang. It's just jumbled. For every 10 kids who write like that, you have to go through and (painstakingly) figure out what they're trying to say. Or maybe I'm coming down too hard and just need to accept the change. I dunno.

---

"Accept the change," huh?

In this case, I find it extremely difficult to take in the perspective of the "other side," simply because it is clearly not progress.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by bagandscalpel

"Accept the change," huh?

In this case, I find it extremely difficult to take in the perspective of the "other side," simply because it is clearly not progress.

---

Dunno. While I would never want to accept a change that huge, still the written language changes. My favorite example is Lord of the Rings. If you compare it to modern fantasy novels, there's quite a difference. Now, it has been said Tolkien didn't write exactly main stream language, but nevertheless he was a professor of the English language and literature.

Still, I highly doubt any of us will live to see a day when that manner of AIM and miserable teenager blog language will appear on the pages of newspapers, books, magazines, operation manuals and such. In the end, most people never need to write official publications. People of higher education inevitably need to create articles, presentations, and papers during education and later work, but even so their particular language only needs to be good enough to be perfectly understandable and clear and able to convey the message (except for those specializing in literature, which might have totally different requirements).

So, even if those problematic people never learn to write properly, they can still read properly as much as they need, and above all, they can keep communicating with their brethren using their new, broken language.

I agree with the whole chat language thing, but I also think that less and less kids are reading books is also a factor. People get their vocabulary from there. They also improve their style of writing too.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by gr3atfull

I agree with the whole chat language thing, but I also think that less and less kids are reading books is also a factor. People get their vocabulary from there. They also improve their style of writing too.

---

I completely agree with this post. I used to read a book a week or two and now I have not read a book in a few months. The main reason is I have not found one that really captures my interest since Ender's Game. I need to get back into reading, I believe my vocabulary and conversational skills are suffering greatly from the lack of books. I have found that the movie and anime versions of a lot of todays reading materials have become more dominant and less ancillary (Thank you to todays vocabulary lesson in school) to the reading material in my day to day life. I guess the next step in my process is to ask if anyone could recommend a book for me. Figure it will be comparable to Ender's Game and just as capturing.

If you liked the existential aspects of Ender's Game (the stuff in the game, the question of whether it's okay to wipe out an entire species) read the next three books of the Ender series (Speaker for the Dead, Xenocide, and Children of the Mind). If you like the wits and strategy aspect read the Bean books (Ender's Shadow, Shadow of the Hegemon, Shadow Puppets, and Shadow of the Giant).

I remember distinctly starting Ender's Shadow, but I never got into it. I might go out and try Speaker for the Dead or that line of books next time I am out near the bookstore.

Xan, you're right about the inconsistency, I hadn't thought about that before. It also seems to me that each online or regional community spawns its own written dialects that people will go and use elsewhere, but will mean nothing to their readers. As an example, I once used the word 'Hax' as a joke in a powerpoint presentation, and one of the questions I got at the end was, "What is hax?" No one in my class knew. In the past, dialects developed only within physical regions, so as language changed, it changed as a whole for villages, provinces, or countries. With global communication possible, we're seeing dialects among people with similar interests, but who live physically very far apart, which could cause confusion and fragmentation of regional language.

As for the Facebook example Xan posted, one of the things that makes it so hard to read is that there are no sentences. Even when I was in Grade 1 I could write in sentences. I never saw any writing that wasn't sentences, so it never even occurred to me to write otherwise. When communication becomes conversational, as in IM and texts, sentences get blurred out. Although the paragraph might make sense when read aloud, it's horrific to attempt to read. This is definitely a new development in writing from when we were that age.

Oh, and I agree wholeheartedly with gr3atfull. Books are so important, and the level of writing online rarely compares to that of good published literature. When I went to university I didn't have time to read anymore, and the difference was blatantly obvious in my writing as a result, even over such a relatively short time period. *shakes fist at engineering*

I think it's a good point that you bring up Ender's game specifically. If you read the chapter where he returns to Earth to visit with Valentine, or any of the books in the Shadow series, all the trainees in Battle School developed their own slang, to the point that most people on Earth had difficulty understanding them. It was a multilingual slang, jeesh, the exclusive use of "bugger" over "Formics" and a lot of simple words taken from Japanese, Spanish (Bonso's influence) a lot of Portuguese, and middle eastern/southeast asian dialects, the last one especially in the Shadow series. Then reading the last 3 of the Ender saga (Speaker, Xenocide, Children of the Mind), a couple of the terms were incorporated for millennia.

It's always been the same. The English language, (and presumably others as well) has been under a long chain of compressions and simplifications. We all use a lot more contractions than people did in the 18th century. We use more than the people in the 1950's for that matter. Just compare a Shakespearian insult to an equivalent one. "Beauty starv'd with [your] severity Cuts beauty off from all posterity." and "You're ugly and your kids will be." Granted, Shakespeare is not exactly colloquial language of that time, but it is a fairly good indicator. Our words have always gotten progressively shorter, and we can convey our ideas in fewer words.

Yes, it does tend to grant less specific meanings to any idea, and it sure as hell doesn't sound as good, but it is just development. Consider American English to Oxford English. Since Webster rewrote our dictionary, the two variants have become considerably divergent. Beyond not spelling color with a 'u', the colloquial languages use dramatically different subsets of words. It's the same for Australian English. It's not hard (typically) for well read and educated people to perfectly understand what is being said, but I can't understand heavy British slang when it's covered with a thick accent unless I concentrate really hard. It's the same in Japanese, with thick Hiroshima and Kansai dialects compared to the Kanto dialect.

Overall, there is a bit of a dumbing down, but it's not much more than the slow infection of pop culture, as it has always been over the years.

I always make time to read something, even with my engineering workload. I can thank a strong case of bibliophilia for that. Manga and online literature takes the place when I don't have time for a physical book.