Blackberries?
I read the term blackberries twice today, once in the article Billy referred to in his blog ("Yahoo! News - `Netspeak’ doing more good than harm to English language") and another time in Billy's blog too. And I have to admit: I didn't know what blackberries are!! So I decided to find out and typed in 'blackberry' in google and clicked on search (talk about omnigooglisation!!). The results confirmed my doubt that blackberries have something to do with wireless communication, except maybe for one hit which was mainly about blackberry jelly :) Interestingly, I went on from there to read a piece on "How BlackBerry conquered the world" on http://www.cnn.com/2005/BUSINESS/03/23/blackberry.rim/ and learned that the blackberry technology was actually born in Canada!! But I was not too impressed by it, though, as the article defined the three major signs of a blackberry user as "pursed lips, a distracted look, thumbs working furiously" and thought that writing a PhD in linguistics is enough :)
Oh.. and about Netspeak, I agree that it is actually proving the fascinating creativity of language and language users, but I also have to say that it did add more problems for those who teach English. I myself find it very irritating when I find a student ending his essay for example with ".. and that's how u c that life is 2 precious 2 waste 4 anyone coz its very short, so learn 2 live ur life happily :)". David Crystal says it's important to teach students the importance of standard English, but as more students are getting used to Netspeak at a younger age, it becomes a matter of habit for them. In fact, I think that getting used to typing assingments and essays does affect the way students develop their handwriting and their spelling, especially with the autocorrect and spelling check tools available.
Quick question: you are standing in a queue in a supermarket and a lady behind you tries to start a small talk with you by saying "oh.. you have such clean nails". What would you do? (example mentioned by Vlad Zegarac at the pragmatics reading group 23/3/05) Sounds pretty weird, eh?!!
Mai
Oh.. and about Netspeak, I agree that it is actually proving the fascinating creativity of language and language users, but I also have to say that it did add more problems for those who teach English. I myself find it very irritating when I find a student ending his essay for example with ".. and that's how u c that life is 2 precious 2 waste 4 anyone coz its very short, so learn 2 live ur life happily :)". David Crystal says it's important to teach students the importance of standard English, but as more students are getting used to Netspeak at a younger age, it becomes a matter of habit for them. In fact, I think that getting used to typing assingments and essays does affect the way students develop their handwriting and their spelling, especially with the autocorrect and spelling check tools available.
Quick question: you are standing in a queue in a supermarket and a lady behind you tries to start a small talk with you by saying "oh.. you have such clean nails". What would you do? (example mentioned by Vlad Zegarac at the pragmatics reading group 23/3/05) Sounds pretty weird, eh?!!
Mai
posted by Mai at 2:30 AM
2 Comments:
Vlad's example is interesting, and he's always got loads. Since I heard Laver's ideas about what you can and can't do phatically, I've noticed loads of counterexamples. One thing I like about students at Middlesex is that they treat staff as fellow humans rather than as objects of deference so they'll comment on my new haircut, how tired I look etc. My favourite example, though, was the first time I took the train to Hadley Wood and cycled through the common to Trent Park. I came out of the woods and asked a stranger if he knew how to get to Trent Park. His reply was 'you're sweating!'
B-)
Clean nails!! ..
it's amazing what people say sometimes .. but being in a corporate world where every word u say as a rule in the book on how to say it, i do miss those innocent, childish, natural comments in my life ...
i'd luv someone in a queue to tell me "u've got clean nails" ... :)
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