Noldo and netspeak
For some reason...the 'Silmaril' link didn't allow me to post! So, I'm posting here...maybe this will actually start a conversation?!
Because Noldo Hates Netspeak
I can’t say I like netspeak, but I think you over did it a bit. For one thing, no one uses 3s instead of ‘e’s! And that first verse is grossly exaggerated!
In any case, is language to remain static?! Spelling changes, grammar changes, and word usage changes. It's all part of growth. These 'Americanisms' that people seem to protest at these days, are actually closer to Elizabethan english than the english spoken in Britain today - like the usage of the word 'mad' for 'angry'.
Look at Chaucer's writing! He is considered the 'Father of modern writing', and just look at his spellings! The words are spelt differently today from the way Chaucer had spelt them in the 12th century, and this difference is an inevitable progress towards simplification. So why are we so intolerant about changing 'you' to 'u'?
Apart from all that, every medium has an appropriate style of writing. And just as the net has grown into a world of its own, so has the language used in it. The problem arises when people confuse one style for another. Disscussing school over MSN messenger is one thing, and writing a critical analysis of Sylvia Plath is another.
The net is the way it is largely thanks to its separate style. It has its own formalities (or lack of it) and formats depend on who is meant to read it. The problem is not with the netspeak, but with people who don't know where to use it.
What say you?
Because Noldo Hates Netspeak
I can’t say I like netspeak, but I think you over did it a bit. For one thing, no one uses 3s instead of ‘e’s! And that first verse is grossly exaggerated!
In any case, is language to remain static?! Spelling changes, grammar changes, and word usage changes. It's all part of growth. These 'Americanisms' that people seem to protest at these days, are actually closer to Elizabethan english than the english spoken in Britain today - like the usage of the word 'mad' for 'angry'.
Look at Chaucer's writing! He is considered the 'Father of modern writing', and just look at his spellings! The words are spelt differently today from the way Chaucer had spelt them in the 12th century, and this difference is an inevitable progress towards simplification. So why are we so intolerant about changing 'you' to 'u'?
Apart from all that, every medium has an appropriate style of writing. And just as the net has grown into a world of its own, so has the language used in it. The problem arises when people confuse one style for another. Disscussing school over MSN messenger is one thing, and writing a critical analysis of Sylvia Plath is another.
The net is the way it is largely thanks to its separate style. It has its own formalities (or lack of it) and formats depend on who is meant to read it. The problem is not with the netspeak, but with people who don't know where to use it.
What say you?
posted by 
@ 10:22 am
4 Comments:
At 12:11 am, January 16, 2005,
D. said…
The Silmaril link seems to have worked for everyone else. Try clearing your browser cache of the page (Ctrl+Refresh) and see if it helps.
As for 'no-one using 3s instead of es' - all I can say is that they do. Definitely. Along with '@' for 'a', '$' for 's', and a whole plethora of special ASCII characters for different letters. Perhaps people think it looks 'cool' to use strange characters instead of simple letters?
Chaucer, as a matter of fact, has almost nothing to do with the matter on hand - after all, he didn't rite lyke dis1111!! OMG LOL!!!!!
The usage changes between Chaucer's time and ours have more to do with the influence of other languages (and Shakespeare, who made up quite a lot of our current words and idioms) than it has to do with simplification. Comparing netspeak to Chaucer's English...all right, then, tell me which language this is supposed to be. Binary?
It's true, every medium has an appropriate style of writing. However, I fail to see how
'Eeee!!!!! Leggy iz so hawt!!111!!1!sixty-four!!!! Im gonna marry him!!!!eleventy-one!!!!!'
is appropriate in any situation. If you don't believe that anyone can write like that, I urge you to take a quick gander around Fanfiction dot Net. You'll quickly be disabused of the opinion that the human race as a whole actually has any sense.
It is true that netspeak is bad mainly because some idiots don't know where to stop. Still, the day that we all wind up writing in single-syllable words on our exam paper ('& Brutus said 'Portia I <3 U' and Portia said 'omg like cool man' and then...') is the day that I give up on the sanity of the human race.
As for Americanisms, I complain about them not because I think they're eating up the world, but more as a running joke (having been brought up on a steady diet of 'grey', 'favourite', 'colour', and 'cheque'). Certainly, the nutters across the Atlantic are welcome to continue being Americans in the privacy of their own homeland. I just want the freedom to spell my words the British way.
Like I said earlier, word-usage changes mainly because of the influence of other languages on English. With that in mind, I shall now propose a new way of writing:
class NoldoHatesNetspeak
{
public static void main(String args[])
{
NoldoBehaviour Noldo=new NoldoBehaviour();
if(NetspeakIsPresent)
{
Noldo.ThrowsHissyFit();
}
else if(GrammarIsAbsent)
{
Noldo.ThrowsHissyFit();
Noldo.CorrectsGrammar();
}
else if(MathProblemIsDifficult)
{
Noldo.GritsTeeth();
Noldo.TriesToSolve();
if(IsNotSolved)
{
Noldo.AsksGrandfather();
}
}
else if(FoodOnTable)
{
Noldo.Eats();
}
You get the idea.
At 3:21 am, January 16, 2005,
Meghna said…
I think I will just continue here now. Thank you though.
From that entire post, Deepthi, it seems to me that your intellectualist problem is with bimbos. Not netspeak. Which just proves my point more, that a value judgement is passed not only with a style, but also with substance.
If I said: "Oh my God! Legolas is so hot! I am going to marry him!" would it sound (or look) any better to you? All the punctuations being right, no short forms being used, how is that sentence any less annoying?
I wasn't connecting Chaucer with 'the matter on hand'. I was merely giving an example of how changing spelling to suit an audience is not necessarily a bad thing. Like I said, it is all part of growth. And if you say that English changing because of influence from Shakespeare is not a bad thing, then why are you so against American English exactly? American English, after all is just influenced, or evolved British English! And by the way no on every asked you not to spell 'colour' without a 'u'.
Will you deicide whose side you are on? That new language only proves my point more. Would you use that style of writing to give a cause-and-effect in your social studies class? And if you would, or know people who would, the problem is with the person. Not the language. Use things appropriately.
To sum up, I can't say I don't agree with you on how annoying giggling Legolas fans can be! But you are directing the sarcasm in the wrong direction. Rip apart those who don't have the sense to use language appropriately. Don't dismiss the value of netspeak as the style of chat language.
At 4:58 am, January 16, 2005,
D. said…
Meghna, I think this entire conversation revolves around neither of us getting the other's point at all.
I will grit my teeth and tolerate netspeak in its location. I never, never, never want to see the rubbish outside chat - if it's for chat, let it stay in its environment and not rear its ugly head in English exams, or stories, or even (*shudder*) published novels (There is a recently-published book that is entirely in netspeak).
I have no problem with American English, likewise, if it stays where it ought to be. It's when people 'correct' my Brit spellings and remopve my 'u's that I have a problem.
For your information, by the way, that so-called 'new language' wasn't one at all. It was in fact a perfectly ordinary passage of text written into a JAVA program. Not a 'language', not a form of English.
(If you want me to go technical, I could say that 'Noldo' is an object of class 'NoldoBehaviour', which calls the functions available in that class using all those 'if' statements (which call on different boolean objects - i.e. stimuli in the real world) but considering that this statement would bore you to the land of Morpheus, let's pretend I didn't type it.)
If we spelt like Chaucer now, and you'd been brought up on it, you'd probably consider this sort of spelling 'strange and heathen-like' anyway. The thought of convenience probably never crossed the mind back then - language was about clarity and expression, not convenience - and for me, at least, that is its function. I'm perfectly willing to type a few letters extra to get my point across.
English changing because of Shakespeare introduced new words and more clarity of expression. That, it seems to me, is worlds apart from English changing due to Instant Messaging - which revolves around making existent words shorter so that they're easier to type. And confuse the hell out of me, because I find it hard to connect the disjointed vowels spattered across my screen with the words they're supposed to represent.
Style versus substance? While both are equally important, something that has no substance whatsoever but is stylistically perfect, I'd consider mediocre, but not exactly awful. However, something that is stylistically bad has the unfortunate tendency of making my eyeballs pop out and roll about on the floor, thus necessitating some considerable difficulty, as I have to stop and collect them.
Quite frankly, I have absolutely no problem with taking about ten seconds more to respond to my instant messages because I take the time to type out actual words. However, if in your opinion,
typin lyke diz iz ok b/c itz only chat
then I won't comment. Each to their own, and one thing is for sure - netspeak isn't mine.
At 5:26 am, January 17, 2005,
Meghna said…
Deepthi...you can't control people. Get over it. Anyways, I suppose I proved my point. There is nothing wrong with netspeak...until people use it wrong. So your lashing out at netspeak was unjustified...while I would completely support you if you lashed out at bimbos! =D
I think you have established the fact that you don't particularly admire consiseness. The way I see it, if you can get your point across in 3 lines less, why don't you? It's like that nike add that has this whole essay on the word 'impossible'. Why wouldn't you try to be concise?!
And, shocked though I am, I choose not to reply to the style versus substance bit in your comment...You would know huh?
I guess we mutually agree to dissagree! But still...I think we have more or less decided that the anger should have been directed at bimbo's who go nuts over "Leggy"...not at netspeak.
Post a Comment
<< Home