What do linguists think about chat/texting language?
A lot of people observing texting/chatting/tweeting are interested/worried about the fact that lots of abbreviations are included (e.g. LOL, :), c u l8tr), however the heavy use of abbreviations in writing is not unique to texting. Medieval manuscript writers (and almost all manuscript professionals in any culture) are notorious for creating symbols and abbreviations (e.g. , &,#, e.g., i.e., …). The reasons for abbreviating in manuscripts and texting are essentially the same – it saves space and is less effort. Manuscript writers were worried about writers cramp, but texters are worried about blackberry thumb. As Txting, the Gr8 Db8 points out, typing text on a numeric phone pad is very much a PITN. What is unique about social media language is how informal language is being recorded in a written medium. Traditional writing genres tend to be very formal and very carefully crafted for a public audience. In the past, it would be rare that a document potentially accessible to billions o
