blog uno

In his recent work, The New Literacy, Clive Thompson suggests that the overall outlook that kids today can’t write is an far from true claim. Researchers from Stanford university performed studies of students there and all of the “short form writing” that they perform every day, either in e-mails or text messages. They’re findings surprisingly contradicted common belief. The truth is if there wasn’t for this grammatically incorrect, short termed text messages and e-mails, many kids may not even write at all. Unfortunately 15 years ago the average high school graduate never wrote again unless signing a check. Not only are kids writing a lot more than usual outside of class, we may actually be in the biggest writing revolution since the Romans. Although Thompson does not say directly it is safe to say that he assumes the information displayed by Stanford professor Lunsford backs up a very likely theory. Personally I agree with the information conveyed because it is undeniable that kids are writing nowadays more than ever. You can hardly walk down the street without seeing a young person walking down the street staring at there cell phone mid-text. However, despite this massive jump in the amount of writing, the grammar usage and quality of the writing is decreasing rapidly. Due to limited word count and hurried texters, the amount of slang and acronyms has also been increasing at an exponential rate. However studies show that kids can in fact change the use of their language to better fit the application that they are writing for. Although some might feel that the drop in correct grammar usage Is not worth the increase in everyday writers, I still feel that it is better to write anything than to not write at all. I feel writing is an important part of life and is a skill that needs to be constantly practiced and used. This is a very important issue because it is quite controversial between the generations. It all comes down to which is more important the quantity of writers or the quality of the writing itself. When it comes down to it, everything changes, that’s just part of life and whether we want it to or not the English language changes on a daily bases, not for better or for worse but simply because that s how we progress as communicators. I don’t think there is anything we can do as a people to halt this change in the way we communicate at least not as long as technology keeps advancing which is showing no signs of slowing down whatsoever.