Spoken Language Study

1602 Words7 Pages
aspects and devices. Creativity in the English language is evident through use of text speech, occurring due to the lack of paralinguistic features in addition to the mere selection of the 136 available characters, and shown by the nuances and idioms of spoken language. In text speech, via the use of a meagre emoticon, we can instantly add facial expression to the otherwise featurelessness, of text speech. The paralinguistic device of expression is extremely important in all forms of communication, adding emotion and depth to a statement. However, an emoticon can also be used to show sarcasm, a feature of language usually only available by use of nuances, as the only method of detecting sarcasm is via tone, pitch and body language. Emoticons are exceptionally creative as they make up for the lack of paralinguistic features to show facial expression only by using a few simple symbols. They add something to text than is the equivalent of colour to a painting; emotion, vividness and diversity. An example of an emoticon in use is [from the text conversation between Mark and Alex] “nm im at skl :’( “. The use of the emoticon “:’(“ shows the reader that the speaker, or ‘texter’ in this case, is unhappy about what they are doing. In this case it would be due to the fact that they are, or were, at school. Furthermore, this statement brings use to our next point; abbreviations. Abbreviations, contractions and acronyms are devices used to crop down words; they take the first letter of each word in a phrase, or a letter that sounds like a word, to create a new word, normally only a single letter or a few letters long. These phrases, such as “nm“ (meaning ‘Not Much’), as shown by the previous example, or “u” (meaning you) are used in every day text speech, and are broadly recognised. These phrases are created due to the fact that in texting, speed and
Open Document