Since the world’s first text message was sent in December of 1992, text messaging has become one of the most popular methods of communication in the 21st century. Despite being recently overtaken in some respects by Twitter, Facebook and other messaging services such as Whatsapp, texting still remains a very “in” means of correspondence. The language of texting has remained a disputed topic, with many teachers and old ’uns arguing its downright unsuitability as “proper” English, and many of the younger generation pushing its ease of use and informality as a positive. Abbreviations in text speak (txtspk) first came about due to mobile phones requiring users to limit their messages to 160 characters. Thus, the giovani of today created a new language with new words and spellings practically illegible to the untrained eye. This new wave of language has become recognised worldwide, with words such as LOL (laugh out loud) becoming internationally understood abbreviations (LOL specifically has also made its way into the Oxford English Dictionary). It is therefore no surprise that the English speaking communities were not the only ones to loosen their lingo, with Italy sporting its fair share of abbreviations and slang used in texting as well.
One commonly found example in Italian 'txtspk' language is the simple x being used to mean per, and perché becoming xk. This follows the idea that in Italian, the mathematical “x” which means “multiplied by” is read out as per. Despite appearances then, Italian texting language is not a completely random mix of letters in the attempt to confuse an older, non-texting generation, but does actually follow a certain logic.
Another interesting factor that is comparable with English ’txtspk’ is that of the eradication of vowels. In spoken Italian, the lengthening of all sounds is imperative to the romantic eloquence of the language, something that ‘txtspk’ eliminates. This is the case with words such as grazie, which is shortened to grz, and prego, which becomes prg.
By
Abigail
Marrow
TXT SPK
Photography: Vonder Auvisuals -Flickr.com
LINGUA
Text speak is becoming an ever-more fundamental part of language
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