Text Talk: Why is it used?

By Chloe Burkill

Idk if u've seen dis b4 when txtng m8s. Probs. Text talk isn't unusual; it's a common influence among a large majority of people, despite the fact that it may be used in plenty of different ways. It's used in a multitude of ways, but the most common reason it's used is because it's easier and quicker, and because it's a way for people to express themselves through a written interactive medium.

In 'text talk' the lexeme 'gr8' is equal to 'great', this is due to both words being phonetically spelt and pronounced the same (/ɡreɪt/) albeit their spelling. The morphemes '8' and 'eat' are both equal in the way they're phonetically constructed. When you add the morphemes 'gr' onto the other sets of morphemes ('8' and 'eat') you get the same result despite the spelling. Although 'gr8' and 'great' may be the same contextually and phonetically, 'gr8' is deemed as far more informal than 'great' when used in written form due to its descent as it derives from 'text talk' and internet linguistics. People may also use 'b', '2' or '@' representing 'be/bee' 'to/too' or 'at'. These are called logograms; where you replace a word with a letter sign or symbol so that letter, sign or symbol represents a phrase, or most commonly, a word.

Professor David Crystal (OBE, FBA, FLSW) pointed out in his book 'Txtng: The Gr8 Db8' that through modern technology and the progression of mobile phones across the years, we've seen handhelds go from having 9 useable buttons used to write text which made abbreviations, acronyms, initialisms and text talk more popular due to the ease of awkwardness and how it reduces time, to going to a full 26 letter QWERTY keyboard which is ultimately easier to compile a text message with. As a result, the evolution of text talk has slowed down, due to the increasing numbers of people with the ability to simply write correctly without use of abbreviations, acronyms, initialisms or 'text talk' on modern day mobile phones or PDA's.

Due to this fact, 'text talk' is increasingly being used as a method of expression rather than abbreviation due to  its speed and simplicity It is now used as a means of communication between certain groups of people to interact with one another on a more personal level as it's something that they or the people around them can share.

On the other hand, text talk is increasingly used as a method of humour between individuals. People whom are normally well-spoken and literate and who use appropriate and precise grammar and spelling may use abbreviations, acronyms, initialisms and text talk as a way to convey humour and make jokes. Although this may not be a conventional way to 'get a laugh' out of people, it's the juxtaposition between their 'normal' use of written language and the 'text talk' they use that creates a shock and is therefore deemed funny.

References:

'Txtng: The Gr8 Db8' - David Crystal; honorary professor of linguistics at University of Wales, Bangor., 9^th July 2009, OUP Oxford.

A Corpus Linguistics Study of SMS Text Messaging by Caroline Tagg (PDF). March 2009. A thesis submitted to The University of Birmingham for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy.