[bhartman36]

Originally Posted by RickyMaveety

OK .... here's one for you and it's a corker, because it doesn't really stand for anything. It's not an initialism, it's not a word, it's not anything more than a translation from code. A code originally created by Samuel Morse, although this particular code sequence was created by the Germans in 1905.

I'm talking about SOS. A better "spelling" of which would be ---...--- Just for your information, the "initialisms" involved in that code translation came well after it was created. And, it was created as such because pretty much any moron could remember it in code.

All of which, while vaguely interesting, has nothing to do with what I was saying (unless you're going to make the bizarre claim that S.O.S. is a "word" now).

Originally Posted by RickyMaveety

Texting spelling represents small keyboards and for some people a limited number of characters one can send without incurring additional fees. It has become part of the language out of habit. Most of the new words one finds start out as a habitual usage.

Texting spelling started out as a way to type on small keyboards of cell phones. It's now expanded beyond that, simply by virtue of the fact that people who do a lot of texting can have access to QWERTY keyboards on their phones. It continues on phones now partially because people are lazy, and partially because there are certain elements of the culture that have encouraged the belief that it is a language unto itself (which has the unfortunate side effect of letting lazy and/or illiterate people believe they are intelligent). And it has leaked on to undergraduate level papers because people that age are becoming less and less literate.

By "literate", as I said before, I don't mean lacking the actual ability to read. At an undergrad level, that kind of illiteracy would be extremely rare. Rather, I'm talking about the inability to write coherently. Writing coherently involves both being able to communicate your ideas and the ability to understand your audience and adjust your writing accordingly. The inability to do that is why texting spelling ends up on undergraduate papers.

And while we're on the subject, my girlfriend teaches graduate-level courses, so illiteracy (i.e., not being able to string words together coherently) at that level is more than a little alarming. And no, it's not just a matter of dangling participles (although those annoy her in formal writing, as well).

I apologize if actually being able to read and write properly offends you, of course.

Originally Posted by RickyMaveety

Thru didn't used to be an "alternative spelling" it became so because people were either illiterate or lazy and didn't want to remember how to type the actual word. Really tough that you find that unfortunate.

1) I think you meant "Thru wasn't always" rather than "didn't used to be".
2) While the use of "thru" as a spelling goes back to at least the Chicago Tribune, spelling reform has nothing to do with why it's still in the language. It's in the language for more informal reasons (laziness and illiteracy). If it was simply a matter of spelling reform, "thru" would be acceptable in formal writing. It is not. That's why the Chicago Tribune no longer uses the "reformed" spellings.

Originally Posted by RickyMaveety

So, give us some more examples of what you clearly don't understand. I'm interested in hearing them, if only because I need a good chuckle. My mother was an English professr at the university level (before she gave it up to teach elsewhere), but she didn't have a huge stick up her ass. She had the good sense to teach me that English is a living language.

I obviously understand a lot more about the English language, and language in general, than you do. Apparently you weren't able to absorb your mother's knowledge by osmosis.

Originally Posted by RickyMaveety

If you can't evolve along with the language, it is you and your girlfriend who will become illiterate and unable to communicate. Let me guess, you two don't even allow your participles to dangle in everyday conversation.

Texting isn't a case of a language evolving. It's the language devolving -- making one's ideas less clear, rather than more clear. The only saving grace is that it's almost certain that texting spellings will die out, even in electronic communication, as technology evolves to the point where it's no longer much harder to spell actual words rather than texting spellings.