The Effects of Technology on Social Life
As time goes on, the world is constantly going through changes. One main aspect of these changes is technology, and how it affects the social aspect of our lives. The passages “How Texting is Wrecking our Language'' by John Humphrys and “The Telephone” by Anwar F Accawi both specifically talk about new technology and what changes it has on our social lives and our language. Both of these stories are first person accounts on how new technology was introduced to their lives and what changes it had on the environment that they lived in. As technology has gotten more and more advanced, it continues to play a bigger role in impacting the social aspect of our lives.
The story “The Telephone” by Anwar F Accawi
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Life in the village was very simple where the community was very tight-knit and everybody had a job to do. Accawi explained how the villagers were skeptical and fearful of the new technology at first, believing it to be some kind of foreign magic. However, they soon became captivated by the phone and the possibilities it offered for communication and connecting with the outside world. Accawi goes on to describe the ways in which the telephone changed the lives of the villagers. They were able to keep in touch with family members who had moved away from the village, conduct business more efficiently, and even find love through phone conversations. He also talked about the more negative aspects of the phone, such as the potential for eavesdropping and the loss of in person communication, mainly how it changed the village as a whole. In the story Accawi states, “And they were always looking up from their games and drinks and talk to glance at the phone in the corner, as if expecting it to ring any minute and bring news that would change their lives and deliver them from their aimless existence” (Paragraph 22). This shows what the arrival of the telephone really did to the village over time. Accawi writes about how the telephone …show more content…
Humphrys is very passionate about this subject and uses very strong language to get his points across. The main argument in this reading is that texting is causing a decline in literacy and communication skills. He talks about how the abbreviated and often misspelled language used in text messages is leading to a culture of laziness and carelessness in language, which ultimately undermines the complexity and value of the English language. In the text he states, “It is the relentless onward march of the texters, the SMS (Short Message Service) vandals who are doing to our language what Genghis Khan did to his neighbours eight hundred years ago. They are destroying it: pillaging our punctuation; savaging our sentences; raping our vocabulary. And they must be stopped” (Paragraph 15-16). This shows the true distaste that Humphrys has for texting and what it has done to the English language, particularly losing punctuation and abbreviating words. Humphrys states that text messages are filled with abbreviations and acronyms that have no place in formal writing or speech. And he argues that these forms of language are becoming increasingly prevalent in everyday communication, leading to a decline in the quality of our writing and speaking skills. He goes to the extreme explaining his distaste for texting and what its done to language,
Naomi Baron, a linguistics professor at American University, believes that texting is harming students writing. She states, “So much of American society has become sloppy and laissez faire about the mechanics of writing” (131). The author used this quote to drawl in the teachers who believe texting is harming students writing. Cullington goal is to make them continue reading and learn how she believes texting is actually beneficial. By putting the opposing view point of texting affecting writing in the beginning, is confusing to the target audience.
Although the Internet has many benefits, it has negatively impacted our society in the way we spell, the way we read, our physical fitness, and our critical thinking skills. People no longer have to think about how to spell a word. The auto-correct features in the technology we use automatically fix any errors made. In Carr’s article, he states
Today, texting has become the most widely used communication technique for teenagers and young adults. It is written in completely informal language and it has no literature value in it. Although the critics believe texting is destroying literature value, McWhorter has another opinion in mind. McWhorter thinks that texting is another form of language that is developed by teenagers. It is the creation of a brand new language evolving from the old literature.
2). Cullington uses another source by author Jacquie Ream, saying “Keep It Short and Simple” (as cited in Cullington, 2010, p. 2) to write more efficiently. Another source dissents that point stating that the younger generations lack communication skills due to the shorthand acronyms in texting affecting not just the writing but also spelling. The same source also states that texting has changed emotion in the student's papers due to the use of emojis in
In her essay "Does Texting Affect Writing?", Michaela Cullington presents her argument that texting does not impact formal writing written by students. She discusses the concerns presented by many people about how texting language can transfer into writing, but through the use of personal experiences and credible sources she discusses how this is not true. Her use of multiple different studies and situations help boost her argument and allow the reader to truly see how students actually do formal writing. She presents a strong argument as to why those who believe students don't have the control and knowledge to write formally, instead of with text speak, are wrong.
Texting is ubiquitous in modern Western society. It's a convenient way to communicate basic ideas quickly without having to commit to a phone conversation or the long wait for a letter. All of this is done through cellular phones on the go and many teenagers have subscribed to this method of communication as their primary one. When texting, it is customary to abbreviate certain words in order to save time. These abbreviations can be considered a language that evolves out of texting, and that language can be referred to as textspeak.
In the essay by Turkle, she identifies people’s personal experience with phones calls and how they feel about the topic. Towards the beginning of her essay, she indicates why it matters when she claims that when we answer phone calls, we think of it as time consuming and requiring a considerable sense of commitment. Turkle claims, “Technologies live in complex ecologies. The meaning of any one depends on what other are available… Although we still use the phone to keep up with those closes to use, we use it less outside this circle.
Michaela Cullington was a former student at University in Pennsylvania when she wrote the essay of “Does Texting Affect Writing?” Have you ever thought if texting truly effects our writing style when it comes to college levels? Cullington did research of her own from different people group asking this question. Her thesis sentence was “IT TAKES OVER OUR LIVES” (…). The way that she capitalized all the letters is something that can engage the reader and the curiosity of knowing what is taking our lives?
Everyone makes mistakes in their writing. As time progresses people are getting more lazy when it comes to constructing a piece of writing. Sloppy habits, writing with slang terms, and utilizing tools such as spell-check or grammar-check have contributed to the devolution of the English language. In the essay “I H8 TXT MSGS”, John Humphrys employs the appeals logos, pathos, and ethos, directed toward texters; to address the destruction of the English language by mainstream grammatical errors used in text messaging. Humphrys utilizes logos, persuading with the use of reasoning; through analogies and hard evidence to recognize the loss of English language by text messaging.
In Nicholas Carr’s article “Is Google Making Us Stupid?”, the author claims that the Internet is changing for the worse the way we communicate and retain our messages. Carr states that in 1882, a man with failing vision bought a typewriter, and in using this device his style of communication changed dramatically. Carr is correct that technology is changing the way we as humans process information and communicate our messages, but the Internet is just the natural next stage in this development. All communication starts a message, but a message requires some form of a language, be it through voice, hand signals, pictures, electronic transmission, or writing. Throughout history communication has changed with the advent of new technologies as mankind continues to develop new ways to send more complex messages farther, faster, and more efficiently, while a message can now be anything from a simple greeting to the complete Wikipedia database or beyond.
In her essay “Does Texting Affect Writing?” Michaela Cullington addresses the issue of text messaging possibly causing poor communication skills and the use of textspeak, abbreviations used during text messaging such as “LOL” and “g2g,” in students’ formal writing. Cullington argues that “texting actually has a minimal effect on student writing” (pg. 367). She addresses the opposition directly, even citing credible sources. However, she also cites credible sources with better information to support her point, and even conducts an experiment of her own.
The underlying theme is that the telephone is meant to bring people together
Text messaging allows people to send messages to anyone in the world quick and simple, but it 's only temporary. In other words, sending a text can be effortlessly erased. Postman believes that new technology such as text messaging is a blessing and a burden, meaning that there are many advantages as well as disadvantages. Furthermore, he also believes that every new technology will replace the old. In other words, new technology such as messaging on cellular devices has replaced writing letters to people as a way to communicate.
Nowadays, technology devices become plays an important role in our daily lives, especially in adolescents’ categories. While there is a very clear argument for how the technology is effected on us and causing social isolation as we know, but in another way is also the argument that these technologies are helping us to become more social in our society. This is very probably because we have a good and perfect ability to communicate with each other. Despite long distances. We all know that the goal of technology is to make our lives easier and more efficient.
Along with this, Orwell openly portrays his anger revolving around the destruction of the English Language. In prior writings, Orwell displays his disgust at the evolution of language and his unhappiness in the migration of shorter, unexaggerated sentences to the lengthy wording of simple phrases. In Orwell's writing titled “Politics and the English Language,” he states “no modern writer of the kind I am discussing- no one capable of using phrases like “objective consideration of contemporary phenomena”- would ever tabulate his thoughts in that precise and detailed way,” a passage which thoroughly depicts Orwells contempt of modern writers. By incorporating Old English language into his writings, Orwell subtly displays his unrest with the modernization of our language.