Texting and Technology

In this blog post I will be summarizing and comparing two theories about how texting and technology can have a negative effect on the English Language. The author of the first theory: Txtng is killing language JK! is John McWhorter, and the second theory: Texting is by David Crystal.

Txtng is killing language JK! : Summary
John McWhorter, the man of this theory believes that texting and technology will not affect the English Language a single bit neither in a positive or negative way. He also states that the way people text is 'writing how you talk'. He does believe that texting is its own language, but strongly believes that it will not have an affect on any of the teens in their homework's or essays. He believes that children are 'intelligent' and want to get good grades. He also mentions that many hundreds of years ago it wasn't simple and people were not able to 'write how you talk'; but these days with the technology available and texting, that has now become possible. He also uses the famous term 'lol' used in texting as an example.

Texting: Summary
David Crystal describes texting as 'language in evolution'. Just like the previous theory of John McWhorter; David Crystal also believes that texting and technology will not affect the English language itself, but he does indeed believe that texting does affect children and teens when it comes to completing school work and essays. Many teens in the world text friends and family for long periods of time during their time, and David Crystal believes that it will only be worse when it comes to school work as they are used to writing 'r' instead of 'are' for example. As we all know, LOL stands for 'laugh out loud' or 'lots of love'. David Crystal mentions how the term LOL is at times used on the context on what LOL truly means.

Similarities and Differences of both theories
Clearly, both authors of both theory have the same General idea about how texting and technology will definitely not impact the English Language at all. John McWhorter thinks that children's grades and essays in school will not be affected by texting and technology as they are 'intelligent' enough to know the difference. On the other hand, David Crystal can disagree with that statement, as he believes that children's essays and schoolwork will be affected since they spend lots of their time texting and will get used to it. John McWhorter's theory focuses more on the historical view of language, while David Crystal focuses on the different terms used by people in texting in the modern day. We can conclude that there are bits and pieces where the two author's have different opinions, but they generally have the same opinion on the topic of texting and technology.