It's taking over our lives. We can do it almost anywhere. What is it? It's texting! Texting is a reliable, easy and convenient form of communication that is most commonly used by, but not limited to millenials and those in the workforce. Many people use it as a way to express themselves as well. In Michaela Cullington’s article, “Does Texting Affect Writing?” she targets two different attitudes in relation to texting. Cullington explains that there is often an assumption that students who use abbreviations when they text, will bring those same abbreviations over to their formal writing pieces. Cullington then adds that the other attitude in relation to writing skills and texting insists that texting is harming student’s writing capabilities. Because of her research as well as experiments done by other colleagues of hers, it shows that …show more content…
According to the National Center for Education Statistics, it is reported, "25% of high school seniors are proficient writers" (Cullington, 362). Jacquie Ream, a former teacher and author for K.I.S.S. expands on this statistic by stating, "we have a whole generation being raised without communication" (Cullington, 362). By this, Ream means that we as people are not physically socializing with each other, but yet using devices to replace the way we talk and express our feelings to one another instead. Ream then goes on to blame the use of acronyms and shorthand in text messages as the downfall of writing skills. Here, Ream means that because of lack of proper language we have become careless when writing. Naomi Baron, a professor at American University, states that America as a whole has become sloppy with the mechanics of writing due to texting. Both teachers in Michaela's article agree that the essence of texting is responsible for the oversight of punctuation, lack of emotion, and lastly a rise in grammatical errors in formal
This is where she uses ethos to provide the reader with an understanding that she is a credible writer. First she uses the National Center for Education Statistics information to provide a strong base of knowledge regarding the topic that is already available. The article from the National Center for Education Statistics includes a quote from a teacher stating “the use of acronyms and shorthand in text messages for students’ inability to spell and ultimately to write well” (pg. 2). She goes on to explain teacher’s viewpoints and their beliefs on the topic after seeing a decrease in writing abilities. There is a quote included by Naomi Baron, a professor at American University, in which states “so much of American society has become sloppy and laissez faire about the mechanics of writing” (pg.2). This quote provides evidence that everyone should be concerned about the effects because our society is facing the issues as well not only students. As she continues to provide a foundation for others ideas regarding the topic, she changes viewpoints to those who see the positives in texting. Cullington uses an author to elaborate on the positives that increased texting can have on individuals. David Crystal explains that students “sharpen their diplomatic skills . . . [because] it allows more time to formulate their thoughts and express them carefully” (pg.4). This is something that is important in today’s day and age where people want the short and sweet version, not something drawn out that can be hard to understand. In her background information regarding the positive aspects of texting, she uses emotions to connect with the reader when she discusses children who struggle with writing. Texting can help students “overcome their awkwardness and develop their social and communication skills” Crystal states (pg. 5). The use of emotion is key to capturing
To ensure that formal written language is preserved, a clear distinction must be made between formal writing and texting. Students -as well as adults- must also be given sufficient practice in both areas if they are to clearly communicate their thoughts to others through either means. As quoted from Nicole Wood and Becky Wang in their presentation “Is Texting Killing the English Language”, “the most common misuses by students are ... using only the letter ‘u’ … [and] using the letter ‘r’...” These errors in formal essays are often -and in most cases- caused by confusion of the distinction between texting and formal writing, leading to an overlap between the two. The value of formal written language is its ability to clearly and distinctly communicate one’s ideas to another -and because of its overall consistency regardless of time- even those in the future. Texting, in some cases however, loses this ability to clearly communicate thoughts and ideas, and exclusively texting at home could lead to a decline in one’s ability to clearly communicate with others through writing.
As time passes society goes through numerous changes and many go unnoticed. However, there is an apparent difference in relationships now versus relationships in the past. This is because of the use of technology, specifically social media and texting. These changes are seen in almost every aspect of relationships, from how they form, develop and sometimes even end. But the important idea here is not just the fact they have changed, it is the notion that the use of social media and texting is actually harming relationships more than it is helping them. It is important to look at the causes and what exactly is happening within the relationships that is harmful. From there, one can start to discover what they need to change in order to not let technology affect their relationships in a negative way. Though there are some positives about the use of social media and texting, it is absolutely vital that this generation starts to recognize the damage being done to their relationships.
Kluger admits, “When I absolutely must, I take the call, but I don’t do a very good job of concealing my displeasure,” This is an example of how older generations are becoming less and less inept to the use of technology but rather embracing it a little too much. For example, if you are to call a microwave Jenna ration person they are as likely to pick up the phone as a generation X. But if you were to text a generation X they are more likely to call you back instead of texting back. This is because the microwave generation has both personal and technological skills whereas generation X mainly has interpersonal skills rather than the technological skills then you have the flipside where the millennial has neither of these because they grew up attached to technology.
Technology is not killing our ability to write, but it is reviving it and pushing our literacy to new directions. Andrea Lunsford, from Stanford University, conducted an experiment to scrutinize college students way of writing. Her results were alarming, "I think we are in the midst of a literacy revolution the likes of which we haven't seen since Greek civilization." Lunsford discovered that only 38% of students writing occurred within the classroom, the rest was written in their own free time. Most of our socializing now takes place online and always involves text or writing. Before the Internet, most of our communication was verbal. The only time Americans wrote was for a school assignment and if their job required writing. Otherwise most people didn't write another paragraph once they left
The fastest growing form of communication in America’s society is texting. David Mercer brings up a valid argument about how the appearance of texting was not a slow process, parents never had an opportunity to experience texting so they have no way of teaching their children how to use it responsibly (Carter). Texting is so common it carries over into our everyday lives easily and at times becomes controlling. America’s society thrives on the conveniences texting provides us. While texting is fast and convenient it has numerous faults that affect our society mentally and socially. Texting can be beneficial as it simplifies our lives at times; however, there are numerous negative effects texting has on our society.
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.
“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.
In the article, “Does Texting Affect Writing?”, the author Michaela Cullington conveys her speculation that texting does not correlate to how students write formal essays. At the beginning of the article Cullington introduces the term texting and the convenience texting brings. Later expressing her concern that the texting language “Textspeak” is actually affecting students writing; then contradicts these views by using primary and secondary sources (news articles, books, her own surveys and research). In addition, she uses an anecdote to tell of her own experience with texting and writing. Together with other evidences and research put together, she uncovers the debate between textspeak and formal writing. On the basis of her research, she concludes that the state of texting does not interfere with writing or writing abilities.
How often do we text? Text messaging is a very useful way to communicate; but, there are occasions where texting is unnecessary, for example in meetings, watching movies, interacting with family, and even in the shower. However, while texting can be overused, it can also help us get to know one another in easier and faster ways. In Natalie Y. Moore’s article “The Rule of Thumbs: Love in the Age of Texting," she explains how the use of texting it is slowly destroying the love between two people (Moore, 1). Although, some people might agree with Moore points of view, when she argues that texting is killing romance and it should be reserved for some notifications, such as “I’m running late;” others might disagree with this idea
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.
The use inventive spelling, abbreviations. As high school students start to use short texting, some of their grades dropped due to the spelling errors they make. So many teens get used to wing abbreviating that they just begin to write that that way. Some teenagers writing skills have turned into sentence fragments, because of the limited space they put into text sentence. In my research how does texting affect teen literacy the percentage was 64 percent of students who say they incorporated text language in their writing, 25 percent said they did so to convey have used text shortcuts a lot of students, vocabulary and grammar is also affecting their literacy. The outlook of the teachers is that. Text plus recently released results of its own survey of 1,214 teens that use their services. 43 percent of which have texted in class, they seem to pay more attention to their phone than what the teacher is teaching. They seem to have the phones that will spell the word for them so they have to worry about spelling. In the age of text message, where words are reduce to no stand abbreviating, symbols, But in my research I pointed out that technology has put new emphasis on reading and
The question of young people and cell phone use and texting causing young people to be less able to concentrate and focus has always been a difficult one to answer. Technology gives teenagers so much but includes many drawbacks. Cell phone use and texting has it’s advantages such as teachers embracing tech,uses for educational purposes, and easy to use;however,some drawbacks are as socializing,time away from homework,and bad communication skills.
With only “160 characters per message. To increase the amount of information they could cram into each message and save time on tapping them out, people started inserting abbreviations, skipping punctuation and using phonetic spelling” (“How Cell Phones”). When writing formal papers we all know that we have to spell out words, but some of the texting language have become a habit that slips into our writing every once and a while, and we have started talking and writing in this texting language as well. This has made our talking and writing informal and we are beginning to lose the original language. Another downfall to texting found by the Virginia Tech Transportation Institute, “the risk of being involved in a car accident rises dramatically when cell phones are involved; the lives of drivers, pedestrians, and cyclists are endangered daily by irresponsible people who are too distracted by their phone to pay attention to the road” (“How Cell Phones”). It really is sad that we continue to look at our phones even though we know we risk not only ending our lives but the lives of others as
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.