The communication process is an important aspect of life. It is, as sociologists, anthropologists, and language experts have stressed earnestly over and over again, an essential process that facilitates our growth for the betterment of ourselves and the society in general. Growth sometimes translates to certain changes in the system. And language is always changing, a fact that most people do not see coming. Language change is brought up by a lot of factors; migration, wars, etc.
But the most common and yet underrated factor is the advances of technologies that aided man throughout his existence. The invention of printing press, to my opinion, is the best example as to how technology influences language to extreme degrees. Back then, books were still scribbled and bounded by scribes.
These scribes were made to translate texts to the language of royalty, which was Latin, from old manuscripts and ancient scriptures from conquered countries and from their own archives. Admittedly, translating something so archaic was a Herculean, if not daunting, task. Now here's the tricky part; ancient scribes were left to their own devices so translating was pretty much based on the scribes' subjective bias.
That means they were Mr. Webster in their own right, word meanings were given as scribes felt like it. To make the story short, every scribe, theoretically, has wrongfully translated quite number of old words to Latin on purpose. Tomes bearing different translations of the same texts? You can grasp the picture now if you get my drift.
Who invented the first printing press, I am not quite sure, as there are many debates about it. But one thing is for sure, the printing press not only make copies of books and other reading materials by the volume, but it unified language, promoted a single and conventional structure for both oral and written standards. The English language benefited heavily on the printing press' success.
English had its varieties prior to the invention of the printing press. When the said device came along, the English structure was roughly modified and some rules were now present, though there were still some kinks on the sheet. To our modern times, cellular phones are now the common mode of communication, thanks to the advances in mobile communications technology.
And this might have sneaked under our noses, but we are experiencing language change. Unconsciously, most of us are embracing it, integrating it to our subconscious. Text language may not conform to the standards of written language, but we do not condone it. We accidentally found it ourselves and started using it because for a lot of reasons, rational or otherwise. We are using it because of the people have this cell phones and these sets of mobile phone accessories to match.
We use text language not because Nokia is the number one brand when it comes to cellular phones and Nokia accessories. We are not using text language not because Sprint is the biggest carrier in the United States and Sprint accessories are the best. We are using text language because of the technology that ushered it in. We used it for the relative comfort and ease it brings when we, mobile phone users, communicate through texting.
And if there are any language scholars and purists who demand that you use the standards of written language, then screw them. This is cultural change we are talking about. Too late to undo it now.
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