Author: kawenn

participled:

for real though, internet english is STAGGERINGLY multi-modal. the problem with communicating via writing is that you lose certain dimensions of spoken conversation, like intonation, facial expression, body language, pauses and fillers etc, but there’s been so many linguistic innovations to maintain richness in communication, like

• emojis/emoticons
• use of capslock and purposefully creating/not fixing typos to convey excitement, or likewise not capitalizing anything
• use of punctuation (or lack thereof) to indicate /emphasis/ or ~irony~ or apathy
• reaction images and memes
• use of familiar songs in tumblr text posts or vines etc
• variational spellings like you/u or true/tru
• bolding, italics, strikethrough, font size, line breaks, etc
• (using parentheses to whisper)
• tags as commentary, also the body of commonly used/commonly mocked hashtags

like i could go ON and ON about the things that internet language users have created to get around the difficulties of non-verbal communication, like ??? what other dialects can do all that and change that much in 30 years????