Is the internet creating a generation of illiterates?

[AndrewR]

Illiterates being definied under the "2." definition in Webster's.

I consistently see how the internet demands, according to some, brief and rapid communication in the form of instant messaging or email or, in a more relevant context, message board systems like this one. In many, many cases which can be seen here and elsewhere, grammar, spelling, punctuation, capitilization, and vocabulary take a distinct backseat to the rapidity of communication. So, instead of posting a cogent article with proper English, the errant communicator fires off a garbled mess of "netspeak", replete with acronyms, mysterious abbreviations and lacking form and organization.

The justification seems to be, "Well, you understood it, didn't you?" The principles of a formal language, however, exist to FACILITATE understanding, and the lack of use of those principles makes understanding that much more difficult.

Therefore, when is the use of proper English warranted? Only in offline communications? I sometimes wonder about the future of those who grow up communicating over this medium. I suppose when the resumes start arriving in netspeak, I'll know if my predictions come true.

Thoughts?

 

[Deicide]

I would say that I've become more literate from using the internet. Practically everything you do on the internet involves some sort of reading, which is more beneficial than just watching TV, which is what I used to do before I started using my PC more. I think that peoples literacy (or lack of) is more contingent on their education, surroundings, etc. These message boards aren't really all that formal, either, so I can see why people don't take much time in proof reading their posts. I usually try to, but if its nothing major and doesn't dillute the point of the message, then I don't see the big deal.

 

[vi edit]

Well, it's certainly not helping, but I think that our society in general is the one responsible.

When I have to present a cost analysis or proposal to my boss, she only wants the bottom line or the number at the end of the page. She doesn't want the filler in between because she's too busy doing other things.

I'm pretty sure that the same can be said in many other businesses as well. We are trying to relay the most amount of information in the shortest amount of time.

 

[Viper GTS]

The internet is not responsible for the illiteracy you're seeing, it's simply where it shows up the most. We have a whole generation of children who don't know how to speak a sentence without punctuating it with profanity, and even WITH the profanity couldn't write it properly to save their lives. Currently, the internet is dependent on written forms of communication - Thus their biggest weakness becomes glaringly obvious.

You can thank our wonderful school system & the decay of parental responsibility for this generation of idiots.

Viper GTS

 

[Total Refected Power]

It has made my handwriting barely legible!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[Deicide]

I think Viper made my point better, a persons poor writing on the internet is just a reflection of their poor skills in the real world, and not a result of the effect of the internet on their abilities.

 

[kranky]

Guess I have to respond, my sig demands it.

All I can say is I don't care how people want to communicate with each other on ICQ or in a chat room. u no whut im sayin? But when I'm looking to hire people, they better have a resume of complete sentences and free of misspelled words. And in the interview, they should be able to articulate a thought clearly.

If you work by yourself, no problem, you can do whatever you want. But where I work I see people who are all excited to communicate via email, then write incoherently. Eventually, since email tends to get forwarded around, people higher up decide that these people are functionally illiterate, and they are just not going to be promoted. And no one ever tells them why!

A good friend works for a university, and they were having a Christmas party. One of the people in the PR department sent out an email to everyone as an invitation, and here's a piece of it:

"All employees are invited to come too the Christmas party to be held in the Student Union third floor ball room on Thursday at 1PM. Having a after lunch visit Santa Clause will be their for everyone to enjoy."

Two months later, fired. The president of the university decided that person was unqualified for the job based solely on reading that atrocious email.

Netspeak has a place because it is the "street slang" of the net, and in certain venues I think it's OK. But I also fear that people aren't recognizing the difference between netspeak/slang and proper English. It is indeed a form of illiteracy.

People need to understand that a spell checker doesn't keep you from looking stupid when you end up using a wrong, correctly-spelled word.

 

[Shudder]

Because using a computer used to require basic intelligence.

AOL was the downfall. "So easy to use, with so many complete morons in the world, no wonder it's #1!"

Use your 700 minutes all in the first month for free! And what will you do with those 4 minutes a day that your 700 minutes won't cover? Might as well reboot.

 

[prodigy]

fjkeidsf el32;jijf? kfjek ekj9i902 laskdmv lkoiwe!! jfkew, djsiw, eoiz.

 

[AndrewR]

Ok, that makes sense that the internet has just revealed to the world the existing illiteracy. However, I am still not convinced that the premise of the internet FURTHERING such illiteracy is false. Since this medium is becoming the default communication method, especially those who have grown up with it, the lack of proper communication on it continues the poor skills of those who have problems with "there", "they're", and "their", among other things.

Sure, some of these kids might be able to declare that they are ub3r l337 haX0rs, but they tell you in a coherent sentence what that means.

kranky: Good for the President. You'd think that someone working for a university, especially one working for a public relations (ie., COMMUNICATION) department, would demonstrate some basic writing skills.

And then there's people like prodigy.

 

[Demon-Xanth]

I've never been good at writing. Although I have been good at math, science, and reading; I have never been able to write well. If anything the internet has HELPED because of the fact that I have to see what I am thinking and saying.

 

[Wagner]

The Internet is not creating illiteracy, rather it is exposing it. Before the Internet, you would rarely (if ever) need to expose yourself to the writing skills (or lack thereof) of illiterate retards.

However, since the main communication medium of the Internet is text, you are invariably subjected to lots and lots of text. Until quite recently, this wasn't a problem, because retards were incapable of figuring out how to get onto the Internet. However, with the recent popularization of the Internet, and the availability of user-friendly tools and services, the situation has changed. These retards have been flooding communication networks by the bucketload. You are therefore being subjected to aforementioned text by aforementioned retards more and more each day. Hence the mistaken, yet reasonable assumption, that such illiteracy is somehow connected to the Internet.

It is indeed connected, but not through a causal relationship. As I said before, the Internet is not creating illiteracy, rather it is exposing it. In a healthy society, this situation would shame people into literacy. After all, in a healthy society where members have a sense of responsibility, people would want to present themselves to the world in the best possible manner. However, in America, the land of zero personal responsibility, nothing of the sort will ever happen. The only solution is to frequent literate websites and messageboards, and to avoid most other venues.

 

[Tauren]

Well said Viper GTS!

 

[Ornery]

Yep, many good points all around. My son is NOT allowed to write in slang and what not. I told him when he masters English he can write anyway he wants. I always yell at my sister for letting her daughters write like that. They can certainly use the practice to learn to write correctly. I don't mind when my son punctuates his messages with <sigh> (I get that a lot ) and other emoticons, but I want to see good spelling and grammar.

I notice my own bad habits crop up when I write formal letters. Who needs to have these habits in the first place. Feel free to jump on my spelling and grammar. God knows I need the tutoring, and I remember better if I get shamed in the process!

 

[LadyNiniane]

Viper GTS has the right of it; it started about the time I first got out of college and began teaching.

Does anyone here remember when a &quot;technique&quot; called phonetic writing was advocated and used to encourage creative expression skills in children? The basic idea was that a child needed to learn to be expressive without the &quot;limitations&quot; of traditional spelling, grammar and punctuation interfering with the &quot;creative process&quot;.

The next short step was to forbid any &quot;editing&quot; of the output, because it would &quot;stifle&quot; that process as well; this led to a ban on editing in the traditional sense because &quot;Maybe the child thinks in this manner and forcing them to conform to traditional language usage might cause them psychic harm...&quot; (Dreck!)

I'm almost tempted to start a poll - how many of you have been taught sentence diagramming? I know that during my tenure as a public school teacher, that particular technique was not in vogue; it was considered to be &quot;too confining&quot; for writing. When my first child reached 5th grade at his parochial school, I specifically asked his teachers if sentence diagramming was taught as part of the English curriculum. They not only said yes, they pointed out that their choice of textbooks was based at least in part on the fact that the books defined and described that technique.

When my daughter comes to me for help with English assignments now (studying parts of speech), I ask her to show me the subject and predicate of the sentence in question. Most of the time, she finds her answer once she has delineated those two components - amazing...

Lady Niniane

 

[Viper GTS]

I've had sentence diagramming. I hated it. :|

Just out of curiosity, though, what books did your school use? $5 says it was A-Beka...

Viper GTS

 

[Windogg]

I think JeffK will eventually be proven to be the root cause of illiteracy caused by the internet.

 

[LadyNiniane]

Viper GTS unwisely said, &quot;Just out of curiosity, though, what books did your school use? $5 says it was A-Beka...&quot;

Nope - pay me at the door.

This is a Lutheran school - standard McMillan and Harcourt textbooks all the way around. May not be the newest around, but they are about as traditional as they come.

A-Beka texts are well known in this area, though; they are widely used in home schooling and small independent church-based schooling programs, and our county has the highest percentage of home-schooled and parochial students in the state (which should tell you something about the state of the public school systems around here).

Lady Niniane

 

[fobbman]

I think that it all started with the moron that came up with the three R's...talk about someone who needed a spell-checker!

Also, I'm this || close to grabbing a rattle-can of spray paint and tagging every business that puts a backwards &quot;N&quot; on their reader boards WITH THE CORRECTLY DRAWN &quot;N&quot;!!! It's starts at the bottom left, goes to the top left, goes down to the bottom right, and the to the top right. It is alarming how often I see this on signs in front of businesses.

It's laziness. That's all.

 

[Zoltar]

What's illiterates mean?

 

[fobbman]

Zoltar you buffoon! It's people who throw trash out of a moving vehicle!

 

[Viper GTS]

What's illiterates mean?

Those who are illiterate.

Viper GTS

 

[MajesticMoose]

Maybe I'm special but I can speak and write english coherently, if not legibly. I don't bother proof-reading all of the crap that I put into emails, chatrooms, and forums because it just isn't worth it. Since I'm usually &quot;talking&quot; with friends, which would normally be informal, I'm not going to usually invest the effort to proof-read.

Who cares if we are taught sentence diagraming. I did a tiny bit of it, and hated every moment. It did help my writing at all. Rather than teaching how to diagram, why not teach syntax. Sentence Diagraming just seems to be a waste of time, which could be better spent doing someting else.

m00se

 

[gunf1ghter]

AndrewR,

I think that I am forced to agree with you. When I started to use the net back in the late 80's it was pretty much limited to Usenet and old style chat programs like talk... I guess email was pretty big then as well.

I have observed the increasing lack of punctuation, grammer, cognitive sentances, etc. I think that it's a combination of things. Poor education coupled with lack of typing capabilities possibly.

I think my freshman high-school english teacher summed up written communication best.

&quot;Say it succinctly and with great precision&quot;.

Obviously the succinct part happens a fair amount, but where did the precision go?

:disgust:

 

[LadyNiniane]

MajesticMoose wrote, &quot;Who cares if we are taught sentence diagraming. I did a tiny bit of it, and hated every moment. It did help my writing at all. Rather than teaching how to diagram, why not teach syntax. Sentence Diagraming just seems to be a waste of time, which could be better spent doing someting else. &quot;

Umm, I could point out your tiny little error &quot;It did help my writing...&quot; as a good reason to proofread posted messages...



However, I will say that sentence diagramming, if it is taught correctly, is a way of teaching syntax, just as flowcharting helps a programmer learning to parse &quot;If...Then...Else&quot;.

I will also say that I see nothing wrong with shorthand comments and acronyms in any particular conversation (written or spoken) as long as the participants understand each other. Some of the worst offenders in that regard are computer geeks like us, who naively assume that everyone understands what PPP, RAM, <insert your own favorite computer acronym here> mean.

Lady Niniane