Friends,
I saw this TED Talk a while ago. Linguistic expert John McWhorter differentiates texting from writing, classifying texting as a form of speech, not writing. During his talk, he states, "Casual speech is something quite different. Linguists have actually shown that when we're speaking casually in an unmonitored way, we tend to speak in word packets of maybe seven to 10 words.You'll notice this if you ever have occasion to record yourself or a group of people talking. That's what speech is like. Speech is much looser. It's much more telegraphic. It's much less reflective -- very different from writing. So we naturally tend to think, because we see language written so often, that that's what language is, but actually what language is, is speech. They are two things."
I am curious about your thoughts. Is texting (and other forms of immediate forms of communication such as snap chat and use of emojis) writing or do you agree with this TED Talk, that it's something different?
I read an article (Wood, Kemp and Waldron, 2014, “Exploring the longitudinal relationships between the use of grammar in text messaging and performance on grammatical tasks”, British Journal of Developmental Psychology (2014), 32, 415–429) a while back about texting and the impact on children's literacy development. It appears that the use of texting slang may benefit children's literacy outcomes. The research examined the relationship between texting and children and young people's understanding of grammar. Their conclusions indicated the link wasn't straight forward but they finish by stating that there isn't a need to panic about the effects of texting on the lit skills of children, young people and adults.
This makes sense to me - that texting is a form of speech - not writing. The thought processes are very different between texting and writing. Also, texting is generally a conversation, so even if you tried to write as though you were texting it wouldn't work without the back and forth.
I found this Ted Talk (and the entire subject) to be fascinating, probably because my my undergrad degree was linguistics, with a heavy emphasis on socio-linguistics. I decided to look at my own texts to determine if they are writing or speech. What I found, in just a brief look is that I have two different texting styles. For example, when I write to my children, most times it is in the form of casual speech. However, when my son was out of town and needed to have some banking done, all of the texts pertaining to the banking transactions were very formal - complete sentences, correct punctuation, etc. Likewise, I work with a local adult education program in a PD capacity. When the director and I text about work related issues, once again the texts are more formal. But she and I are also friends with unusual TV viewing habits, so our texts about the Walking Dead (TWD) or Sharknado are anything but formal.
You ask, "Is texting writing or a form of speech?" It can be either, and you have identified an important issue in both speech and text: degree of formality or informality. The misunderstanding about text messaging is that it is often informal, but not always, and doesn't have to be informal. The same is true of other writing and speech that it can be formal or informal. The key question is not the medium but is instead the audience and the purpose for the communication. Thanks for for bringing out this important distinction.
We should be teaching students that there are different registers of both speech and writing ranging from very informal to very formal, and we should be teaching them how to handle that range in both speech and writing.
I love the thoughts that have been shared in this discussion so far. I had a few thoughts that came to mind as I read many of the posts. I offered a few questions and had some discussions with students and the thoughts below are a distillation of some of the discussion results.
Language changes, but it changes at different rates. In that "real life" world, new means of communicating orally, textually and with images are being introduced at an increasing rate. In contrast, it seems that in academics, the rate of change has always been much more lethargic. A quick look through the list of so many languages that have died out over time is impressive. Scholars and academics fought for so many years to not let go of Latin and an example. Journalist still get a bit sentimental and weepy eyed over the passing of shorthand. There is a war or sorts still waging on the death of cursive. Why does the constant struggle between a society's changing language and the academic preservation of past practice persist? Some find it amusing that we can add a word like "Doh!" into our language (a made up exclamation from Homer Simpson of The Simpsons; a prime time cartoon) and yet we still struggle to standardize simple spelling of our words like "soap" and "rope" We have heard many arguments about preserving the history and origins of words, but you need to click on each of those words (scroll down in each link to see their Etymology section) to find that their current spelling is from the 1600s and that spelling was changed 6 or more times before we started using the words. For hundreds of years we have stuck with the sixth or seventh spelling of these words and we still have the urge to complain that students today just can't spell correctly? It seems that past practice can not be let go in much of our formal literacy efforts. We lack the ability to re-examine what literacy conventions fit today as our world continues to change around us.
The ability to communicate informally and in formal ways is important for so many reasons. It appears that academics need to value the informal methods of the day more as a valid form of communication while also working to clearly define what makes the more formal communication fit within our changing world. A great example of the latter is cursive handwriting. There are many schools today that spend incredible amounts of time forcing students to learn a language that is no longer required in any part of our society (outside of an educational institution). Some schools have swapped cursive out and inserted typing in it's place and that shows some flexibility to change and is encouraging.
Are there ways we, as educators can focus on the effectiveness of the informal methods we see changing every day? Imagine texters learning to more efficiently communicate their intent within that medium instead of demonizing or putting that medium down. Facebook posts and Snapchats can be powerful ways for learners to share their stories, ideals, hopes, dreams and lessons if given guidance in those forms of communication. Just scroll through your walls to see what the results are without that guidance.
Likewise, can we become more efficient in how we adapt our formal communications? A quick google search will share that there are many different formal writing styles (APA, MLA, Chicago, IEEE ...) and most students looking at all these conventions scratch their head wondering why we can't just standardize all this to one format. We hear "why" each format was established (the history) but we rarely get any rational for why we still need so many different formats or conventions. Science wants this format and publishers want this other format. It harkens to a bunch of kids standing around a merry-go-round arguing about which way the thing should spin while the ride sits motionless during the arguments. This is just one example students share with me of their frustration that "the way things are" have no rhyme or reason with "the real world" they live in. Can this lethargy or lack of standardization of formal language be improved? How so? If it can not, how does it stay valid in a changing world? If it should not, what are your justifications?
Would love to hear discussion on any of the questions shared above. I will be sure to share the responses with my students that have shared the above thoughts with me.
Digital technology has collapsed the walls between oral and written communication.
Is texting oral or written? It's both, especially since software can read text out loud; one could argue that with text-to-speech software all written text in digital form is now also oral.
The definition of "reading" text is changing too, although many seeing/hearing this post may not be aware of the change, or agree with it. For people who are blind, sight-challenged or who have severe reading disabilities, aural reading is now possible, and especially important for those who cannot decode text well or at all. "Auding" is not new, but technology now makes it extremely easy and efficient for someone who chooses to read in this way to have text read out loud. Also, people who can read text well in traditional ways now also sometimes prefer instead to "aud" text because they can read even faster. It might be a surprise to some that there are "excellent readers" who, with proper training, can aud text faster than they can read in traditional ways by decoding text.
The differences between written and oral language are not that oral language is always informal and written language is formal. I have heard conference presentations, and recently some webinars, that hardly could be described as using informal oral language. Although we are all familiar with examples in our daily lives of informal oral language use, written language can be informal, too; think about a note left on the refrigerator, a child's sign that says "Lemonade 25 cents", a note left for the next shift at work, and now, of course, text messages.
The distinction between written and oral language is less useful in our digital age, and it is increasingly confusing and not helpful.
Both written and oral language can be guided by good standards. Think about the brilliant speeches of Lincoln, Roosevelt and JFK. They were all originally delivered orally, and were also available in writing. They all followed rules of rhetoric and style.
What is needed in both written and oral expository writing is clarity in communication. If the listener's/reader's understanding of the content of the oral or written communication is the same as that of the speaker/writer, then the communication is effective, if not always elegant. If what is heard or read is not the same as what was intended, the communication has failed, unless of course the purpose of the originator of the utterance or text was to confuse, mislead or distract. This, of course, is a danger we can easily see in both oral and written communication.
Clearly, this discussion has raised excellent points for further reflection as we consider how to best approach serving and supporting our adult learners who might text as a favorite, if not nearly exclusive, form of self expression.
Kathy said, "Linguistic expert John McWhorter differentiates texting from writing, classifying texting as a form of speech, not writing."
David said, "The definition of "reading" text is changing too, although many seeing/hearing this post may not be aware of the change, or agree with it.
Jan quoted research. "It appears that the use of texting slang may benefit children's literacy outcomes." That would bring us back to considering texting as supporting writing.
Ed noted, "It appears that academics need to value the informal methods of the day more as a valid form of communication while also working to clearly define what makes the more formal communication fit within our changing world."
So the jury is still out among us on whether texting contributes to eventual academic writing or not.
I'll add another ingredient to this pot: communication through social medial, which we haven't really discussed in depth here although Ed mentioned FB and Snapchat. Those of you who are in touch with how students who use Facebook,Twitter, and similar social tools, how do you perceive the language that they use to communicate with their peers there? (I'm not referring to how students communicate with teachers and students in a classroom, instructional environment, with its own teacher-defined parameters.) I know that we've talked about audience as being central to the type of communication that takes place. Does the language used informally in those two and other social medial venues more closely resemble what you would call "writing practice" or is it another form of oral communication put into English symbols? Leecy
Comments
Friends,
I saw this TED Talk a while ago. Linguistic expert John McWhorter differentiates texting from writing, classifying texting as a form of speech, not writing. During his talk, he states, "Casual speech is something quite different. Linguists have actually shown that when we're speaking casually in an unmonitored way, we tend to speak in word packets of maybe seven to 10 words.You'll notice this if you ever have occasion to record yourself or a group of people talking. That's what speech is like. Speech is much looser. It's much more telegraphic. It's much less reflective -- very different from writing. So we naturally tend to think, because we see language written so often, that that's what language is, but actually what language is, is speech. They are two things."
I am curious about your thoughts. Is texting (and other forms of immediate forms of communication such as snap chat and use of emojis) writing or do you agree with this TED Talk, that it's something different?
Kathy Tracey
Fascinating.
I read an article (Wood, Kemp and Waldron, 2014, “Exploring the longitudinal relationships between the use of grammar in text messaging and performance on grammatical tasks”, British Journal of Developmental Psychology (2014), 32, 415–429) a while back about texting and the impact on children's literacy development. It appears that the use of texting slang may benefit children's literacy outcomes. The research examined the relationship between texting and children and young people's understanding of grammar. Their conclusions indicated the link wasn't straight forward but they finish by stating that there isn't a need to panic about the effects of texting on the lit skills of children, young people and adults.
Jan
This makes sense to me - that texting is a form of speech - not writing. The thought processes are very different between texting and writing. Also, texting is generally a conversation, so even if you tried to write as though you were texting it wouldn't work without the back and forth.
Kathy,
I found this Ted Talk (and the entire subject) to be fascinating, probably because my my undergrad degree was linguistics, with a heavy emphasis on socio-linguistics. I decided to look at my own texts to determine if they are writing or speech. What I found, in just a brief look is that I have two different texting styles. For example, when I write to my children, most times it is in the form of casual speech. However, when my son was out of town and needed to have some banking done, all of the texts pertaining to the banking transactions were very formal - complete sentences, correct punctuation, etc. Likewise, I work with a local adult education program in a PD capacity. When the director and I text about work related issues, once again the texts are more formal. But she and I are also friends with unusual TV viewing habits, so our texts about the Walking Dead (TWD) or Sharknado are anything but formal.
Has anyone else experienced this?
Sue,
You ask, "Is texting writing or a form of speech?" It can be either, and you have identified an important issue in both speech and text: degree of formality or informality. The misunderstanding about text messaging is that it is often informal, but not always, and doesn't have to be informal. The same is true of other writing and speech that it can be formal or informal. The key question is not the medium but is instead the audience and the purpose for the communication. Thanks for for bringing out this important distinction.
We should be teaching students that there are different registers of both speech and writing ranging from very informal to very formal, and we should be teaching them how to handle that range in both speech and writing.
David J. Rosen
djrosen123@gmail.com
I love the thoughts that have been shared in this discussion so far. I had a few thoughts that came to mind as I read many of the posts. I offered a few questions and had some discussions with students and the thoughts below are a distillation of some of the discussion results.
Language changes, but it changes at different rates. In that "real life" world, new means of communicating orally, textually and with images are being introduced at an increasing rate. In contrast, it seems that in academics, the rate of change has always been much more lethargic. A quick look through the list of so many languages that have died out over time is impressive. Scholars and academics fought for so many years to not let go of Latin and an example. Journalist still get a bit sentimental and weepy eyed over the passing of shorthand. There is a war or sorts still waging on the death of cursive. Why does the constant struggle between a society's changing language and the academic preservation of past practice persist? Some find it amusing that we can add a word like "Doh!" into our language (a made up exclamation from Homer Simpson of The Simpsons; a prime time cartoon) and yet we still struggle to standardize simple spelling of our words like "soap" and "rope" We have heard many arguments about preserving the history and origins of words, but you need to click on each of those words (scroll down in each link to see their Etymology section) to find that their current spelling is from the 1600s and that spelling was changed 6 or more times before we started using the words. For hundreds of years we have stuck with the sixth or seventh spelling of these words and we still have the urge to complain that students today just can't spell correctly? It seems that past practice can not be let go in much of our formal literacy efforts. We lack the ability to re-examine what literacy conventions fit today as our world continues to change around us.
The ability to communicate informally and in formal ways is important for so many reasons. It appears that academics need to value the informal methods of the day more as a valid form of communication while also working to clearly define what makes the more formal communication fit within our changing world. A great example of the latter is cursive handwriting. There are many schools today that spend incredible amounts of time forcing students to learn a language that is no longer required in any part of our society (outside of an educational institution). Some schools have swapped cursive out and inserted typing in it's place and that shows some flexibility to change and is encouraging.
Are there ways we, as educators can focus on the effectiveness of the informal methods we see changing every day? Imagine texters learning to more efficiently communicate their intent within that medium instead of demonizing or putting that medium down. Facebook posts and Snapchats can be powerful ways for learners to share their stories, ideals, hopes, dreams and lessons if given guidance in those forms of communication. Just scroll through your walls to see what the results are without that guidance.
Likewise, can we become more efficient in how we adapt our formal communications? A quick google search will share that there are many different formal writing styles (APA, MLA, Chicago, IEEE ...) and most students looking at all these conventions scratch their head wondering why we can't just standardize all this to one format. We hear "why" each format was established (the history) but we rarely get any rational for why we still need so many different formats or conventions. Science wants this format and publishers want this other format. It harkens to a bunch of kids standing around a merry-go-round arguing about which way the thing should spin while the ride sits motionless during the arguments. This is just one example students share with me of their frustration that "the way things are" have no rhyme or reason with "the real world" they live in. Can this lethargy or lack of standardization of formal language be improved? How so? If it can not, how does it stay valid in a changing world? If it should not, what are your justifications?
Would love to hear discussion on any of the questions shared above. I will be sure to share the responses with my students that have shared the above thoughts with me.
Hello Jan, Leah, Ed and others
Digital technology has collapsed the walls between oral and written communication.
Is texting oral or written? It's both, especially since software can read text out loud; one could argue that with text-to-speech software all written text in digital form is now also oral.
The definition of "reading" text is changing too, although many seeing/hearing this post may not be aware of the change, or agree with it. For people who are blind, sight-challenged or who have severe reading disabilities, aural reading is now possible, and especially important for those who cannot decode text well or at all. "Auding" is not new, but technology now makes it extremely easy and efficient for someone who chooses to read in this way to have text read out loud. Also, people who can read text well in traditional ways now also sometimes prefer instead to "aud" text because they can read even faster. It might be a surprise to some that there are "excellent readers" who, with proper training, can aud text faster than they can read in traditional ways by decoding text.
The differences between written and oral language are not that oral language is always informal and written language is formal. I have heard conference presentations, and recently some webinars, that hardly could be described as using informal oral language. Although we are all familiar with examples in our daily lives of informal oral language use, written language can be informal, too; think about a note left on the refrigerator, a child's sign that says "Lemonade 25 cents", a note left for the next shift at work, and now, of course, text messages.
The distinction between written and oral language is less useful in our digital age, and it is increasingly confusing and not helpful.
Both written and oral language can be guided by good standards. Think about the brilliant speeches of Lincoln, Roosevelt and JFK. They were all originally delivered orally, and were also available in writing. They all followed rules of rhetoric and style.
What is needed in both written and oral expository writing is clarity in communication. If the listener's/reader's understanding of the content of the oral or written communication is the same as that of the speaker/writer, then the communication is effective, if not always elegant. If what is heard or read is not the same as what was intended, the communication has failed, unless of course the purpose of the originator of the utterance or text was to confuse, mislead or distract. This, of course, is a danger we can easily see in both oral and written communication.
David J. Rosen
djrosen123@gmail.com
Clearly, this discussion has raised excellent points for further reflection as we consider how to best approach serving and supporting our adult learners who might text as a favorite, if not nearly exclusive, form of self expression.
So the jury is still out among us on whether texting contributes to eventual academic writing or not.
I'll add another ingredient to this pot: communication through social medial, which we haven't really discussed in depth here although Ed mentioned FB and Snapchat. Those of you who are in touch with how students who use Facebook,Twitter, and similar social tools, how do you perceive the language that they use to communicate with their peers there? (I'm not referring to how students communicate with teachers and students in a classroom, instructional environment, with its own teacher-defined parameters.) I know that we've talked about audience as being central to the type of communication that takes place. Does the language used informally in those two and other social medial venues more closely resemble what you would call "writing practice" or is it another form of oral communication put into English symbols? Leecy