Writing, according to an article in Times Magazine titled “Is Texting Killing the English Language” by John McWhorter, is an art that has been around for about 5,500 years. Since writing is deliberate and takes more time to compose, it’s usually better thought out and sounds more sophisticated. Speech, on the other hand, is more of an “unconscious” practice. A few years back, there was some concern over the fact that texting may be affecting the writing composition of teenagers. John McWhorter from Times Magazine wrote, “Is Texting Killing the English Language” on this very phenomenon, with the rhetorical aim to persuade people that this wasn’t the case. In the article, McWhorter refers to historical texts to persuade his audience, middle-aged …show more content…
He uses this generalization twice throughout his article, "Is Texting Killing the English Language?" At the beginning of the article, McWhorter says, "No one talks like that casually - or should" (McWhorter), when discussing how nowadays, the way that people speak is different from the way that they write. McWhorter uses the "No one" phrase a second time when he discusses how the meaning of LOL has changed from it's original meaning of "Laughing Out Loud" to a signal of basic empathy. McWhorter says: "Of course no one thinks about that consciously." (McWhorter).The simple reason as to why it diminishes logos is because there is almost never 100% of anything. There is a very minute chance that there will be a particular act that has a 100% consensus. The fact is everybody is different and has different things that they do that make them different. Someone reading "Is Texting Killing the English Language" who does talk the way that they write, will be more inclined to look at the article with distrust and stop reading, rather than continue reading and give McWhorter a second chance. What the generalizations also do is make McWhorter look like an individual who believes that just because he or the people he knows believe something, everyone else follows the beat of the same
Michaela Cullington, a student, wrote a paper “Does Texting Affect Writing?” in 2010 for an English class. The paper is an examination of texting and the belief that it negative effective student’s writing. Cullington goes into detail about textspeak- “language created by these abbreviations”- and their use in formal writings. She organizes the paper in a way that is confusing to understand at first (pg. 1). At the end of the paper, she discusses her finding in her own research which comes to show that texting does not affect writing. But this is contradicting to the information she received from the teachers. The students and the teachers were seeing differences in the use of textspeak in formal writing. Cullington has good support for her
Pathos is the most effective appeal used in Food, Inc. because many strong visual images evoke the viewer’s emotions. The food industry’s maltreatment of farm animals provides several examples of pathos. A particularly disturbing scene of a close up of a dying chicken lying on his back, bleeding and gasping for air appears early in the film when a farmer allows cameras into her chicken houses. A farmer, Carole Morrison, explains quite candidly that the chickens are grown too quickly and that their bodies cannot support the rapidly growing internal organs and oversized breasts. The crowded filthy conditions in which the chickens live are deplorable. Later sick cows, unable to walk and mistreated by workers, further illustrates the deplorable treatment of farm animals. The filmmaker reinforces his point that the industry is inhumane to the animals prior to slaughtering them for food, while visually appealing to the viewer’s emotions.
Clive Thompson asserts in his essay, The New Literacy, that people today are writing more than ever as they socialize online. Nowadays, almost everybody uses social media, but it is more popular amongst younger people. Teenagers text and tweet every little thought that pops up in their head. However, numerous scholars can argue that texting and tweeting defiles the serious academic writing with slang and “text speak.” By way of contrast, Thompson claims that using shortened language and smileys online does not degrade a person’s abilities to write well in an academic paper. Furthermore, composing texts and tweets online can help an individual with their writing. By communicating online, we are able to learn grammar and writing through our own
The “they say” is that texting and the language that it is created from, is actually hindering the writing abilities of students, while other say that texting has a positive effect on writing. Cullington’s “I say” is that texting has no serious effect on student writing. Cullington supports her argument by conducting her own research into this controversy by performing a survey on both high school and college students as well as two teachers. According to Cullington, “texting actually has a minimal effect on student writing.” Cullington’s point is that, she believes that the students are aware when to use formal writing and when not to. She notices that the writing that the students turned in had no texting abbreviations being used. Perhaps
Sherry Turkle’s article in The New York Times “The Flight From Conversation”, she disputes that we need to put down the technology and rehabilitate our ability to converse with other human beings because we are replacing deep relationships with actual people for casual encounters on technology. Turkle tries to convince young and middle age individuals who are so enthralled by the technology that they are losing the ability to communicate in a public setting. Sherry Turkle unsuccessfully persuades her audience to put down the technology and engage with others in public through her strong logos appeal that overpowers her weak logos and doesn’t reliably represent herself and her research.
While preparing for one of his college lectures, Dennis Baron, a professor and linguistics at the University of Illinois, began playing with the idea of how writing has changed the world we lived in and materials and tools we use in everyday life. This lecture slowly transitioned into “Should Everybody Write?” An article that has made many wonder if technology has made writing too easy for anyone to use or strengthens a writer's ability to learn and communicate their ideas. Baron uses rhetorical strategies in his article to portray to his audience his positive tone, the contrast and comparison of context and his logical purpose.
John Horvat II, from “Five Ways Technology Is Taking Over Your Life,” is an illustrator, researcher, international speaker, and a contributor to “The Blaze” website, and also an author of books. The main point from this article is that technology is a bigger problem now, technology is supposed to be a beneficial resource but not to the point that we get handled by it. The author strongest asset is the use of pathos to get to the audience emotions and make them believe that he’s right. The audience of this article are people who use technology in an excessive way, which is majority of the people, so he is basically referring to everyone who have a relationship with technology.
“Our generation doesn't ring the doorbell. They text or call to say they're outside,” this line is from one of the well-known social networks, Tweeter, which shows how the way of communication has change in this modern life. According to 2013 statistics by Business Insider, in United States alone, smartphone owners aged 18 to 24 send 2,022 texts per month on average — 67 texts on a daily basis — and receive another 1,831 texts (Cocotas). Nowadays, technology such as text messaging has practically replaced traditional face to face communication among the society primarily in young generations because texting allows messages to be sent fast and effortless. In order to quickly type what they are trying to say in text messaging, people are frequently using textspeak; the language created by using abbreviation rather than complete words. Based on this phenomenon, David Crystal, an honorary professor of linguistics at the University of Wales has published an article entitled ‘2b or not 2b?’ in the Guardian on July 5, 2008 comes out with the research and studies that state texting can actually improve the literacy of children and create creativity of writing. However, by observing more critically, texting do decrease a person’s ability to switch between textspeak and the normal rules of grammar and adversely affect formal writing and conversational skills.
Text messaging has become a norm in our generation, as technology rapidly advances and gives way to more efficient forms of communication in a fast-paced world; and many are skeptical about the influence this new form of interaction is having on our society, especially with our younger generation. David Crystal, a professor at the University of Wales, writes “2b or Not 2b?” in support of text messaging. He insists, despite those who underestimate or negate the beneficial influence text messaging has on language proficiency, that “there is increasing evidence that [texting] helps rather than hinders literacy” and that the fairly recent form of communication has actually been around for a while and “is merely the latest manifestation of the human ability to be linguistically creative and to adopt language to suit the demands of diverse settings. In contrast, Jeffery Kluger argues in “We Never Talk Anymore: The Problem with Text Messaging” that text messaging is rapidly becoming a substitute for more genuine forms of communication and is resulting in difficulty among young peoples of our generation to hold a face-to-face conversation, engage in significant nonverbal expression, and ultimately build effective relationships with family, friends and co-workers. Both writers’ present valid arguments, however, my personal experience with text messaging has led me to agree more with Crystal’s view on the matter. Text messaging is indeed having a positive effect on society by making frequent texters primarily aware of the need to be understood, as well as offering betterment of spelling and writing through practice, and reinventing and expanding on a bygone dimension of our language through the use of rebuses and abbreviations.
In 1999, people could start sending text messages to other people. With different networks to their own, life became easier because of text messaging users. Soon later, English language became known as ‘text speak’, a way we write now by abbreviating long and big words. This is causing teens to lose the ability to learn how to spell and read. Now that text messaging allows kids to abbreviate, kids are now failing school classes by abbreviating in their school work (Cooke).
You can say that overuse in texting is determination the way teens, students write formally in the classroom. Teens that spend most of their eyes on their phone has already created their own texting style. Now I am able to answer the question, how does texting affect teen literacy? Texting affects teen literacy because, text messaging does affect our grammar because, teens text like for example; “ttyl”, “gtg”, “wyd”. They find an easy way of texting rather than using the correct way. In order to get what they want done, we wanted to see and learn about the damage that texting can cause on teens and we did learn, we learned that it can affect our grammar, grades, and even your future in trying to get a job, your skills in so much more. I wanted to inform the teens about the damage that texting in short terms can do to you. Encourage them not to write in short term because, they are too
Around the years 2001 to 2004, more text capable cellular telephones became available to the general public. When these types of cellular telephones became available, the text messaging phenomenon began. More and more people decided that text based communication was the most efficient way to communicate. Due to this phenomenon, educators are becoming more aware of the effects of text based communication on the developmental learning of literacy. Text messaging is dumbing down literacy for future generations. The newer generations have not had the privilege of experiencing a society that is not wrapped up in text based communication, such as instant messaging, chatting, and text messaging.
We often hear news stories report on the possible negative effects texting has on students’ formal writing. These stories usually flash a picture of some student’s formal essay or class assignment containing a text-speak abbreviation in place of a formal word. For example, “u” in place of “you”. Stories like this cause educators and parents to worry that the use of texting is impairing students’ ability to write in a formal setting and is thus becoming detrimental to literacy altogether. However, do these news stories actually hold any merit or are they simply media hype? How often does textspeak actually appear in students’ writing? According to literary scholar David Crystal, “all the evidence suggests that belief in an impending linguistic disaster is a conseq...
With the uprising of unique and different forms of communication that technology has popularized comes a debatable controversy on what effect these new digital mediums have on literacy and our daily lives. Texting can lead to declining language and grammar skills, according to researchers. Text messaging has also begun to have an inimical effect on people’s writing skills, and also an indispensable part of our lives; it has developed very expeditiously throughout the world, it is also one of the world’s primary sources of communication. Texting can cause various complications in a student's ability: to conjure proper vocabulary, spell, write and socialize.
Language is a form of verbal communication via words and its pronunciation that is used and comprehended by various people of the same nation, culture, or geographical background. It has been said to be dated back as far as one thousand years ago before writing. Like culture, language is passed on through the process of enculturation. Meaning that it is something that is learned (Kottak, 101). In the video, “TED TALK: Texting is killing language,” Ted starts off the video by saying that “The idea is that texting spells the decline and fall of any kind of serious literacy, or at least writing ability, among young people in the United States and now the whole world today (Ted, 2013). Throughout the film discussion, what stuck out to me the most was how drastic language has changed via technology. Although Ted disagrees with the above statement, in my opinion, I believe that a language can be altered if it is changed by enough speakers and writers. With the constant use of various forms of technology, communication via texting has become a very popular leisure activity for people all o...