Posted on 02/09/2011 8:35:25 AM PST by MNDude
NEW YORK (AP) - "ILY!" Susan Maushart's 16-year-old daughter often calls out over her shoulder as she leaves the house. Sure, actual words would be better. But Mom knows not to complain.
"A mother of teenagers is pathetically grateful for an 'I love you' no matter what form it takes," she observes.
Then there are the various forms of "LOL" that her teens use in regular parlance - it's become a conjugable verb by now. And of course, there's the saltier acronym used by son Bill: "WTF, Mom?!" But before you judge, note that former VP candidate Sarah Palin just used that one in a TV interview. And CNN's Anderson Cooper used it on his show the other night.
Acronyms have been around for years. But with the advent of text and Twitter-language, it certainly feels like we're speaking in groups of capital letters a lot more. It's a question that intrigues linguists and other language aficionados - even though they'll tell you they have absolutely no concrete research on it.
"It's fascinating," says Scott Kiesling, a socio-linguist and professor at the University of Pittsburgh. "What's interesting to me as a linguist is figuring out which words get picked up, and why. What is it that makes OMG and WTF and LOL so useful that they spread from the written to the spoken form?"
(Excerpt) Read more at apnews.myway.com ...
L8R Dude..............
Ebonics? Pidgin English?.....
OMGLOLWTFBBQ!!!!!!!!1111one
;)
PMSL
One could argue that much of the English Language is a result of the butchering of other languages.
IDK, IDC, SIUYA.
“I suspect that Win the Future is now defunct.”
Maybe now Obama will start an organization calles Save The Future United.
I thought ILY meant “i like yogurt”.
A better argument is that every army that ever conquered Britain integrated their own vocabulary into what was already there. It wasn't an act of butchering by the natives.
English is a mongrel language, but it became so through acts of violence.
“Laziness is at the root of all changes in language.”
Not true:
“WTF?” — Five syllables
“What The F***?” — Three syllables
“Huh?” — One
Back in the late 70’s I was big into CB radio. I would always get a chuckle when some of the people I would meet would talk in the same slang as they did on the air - “Got that, good buddy?” or “that’s a big 10-4.”
I guess txt talking is the successor to that.
By the way, many of you would probably enjoy this Facebook group:
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Correct-Spelling-Punctuation-and-Apostrophe-Use/74280614587
Exactly, we expect our grandchildren to speak properly, they're not allowed to sit there and text while visiting, they are to DO things and visit, to MAKE things with their hands instead of mindless texting and computer nonsense.
I have a shop and my wife gets them sewing things for their parents on special occasions, it has worked out well and has been fun.
IDK but we’ve had FUBAR far longer than txtg.
AJNTSA!
GMTA.
I mean this in no confrontational way, but I found this comment ironic and funny.
“I ask people to write in complete sentences, it appears to be a lost form.”
For sure!
;)
Some of us used some of the misnamed “text message” abbreviations 20-30 years ago on email, usenet, and BBS.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.