Texting: The Death of Grammar(?)

Texting has been a global phenomena that allows us to communicate short and simple (or even long and complicated) messages without the hassle of making phone calls. In short, it's a convenient form of e-mailing that can be done right on your phone. Yet although the benefits of the texting are many, the negative aspects of this action cannot be neglected.

Brushing aside the global debates on the dangers of texting and driving, let's turn our attention for a second to a less emphasized issue at hand; texting and grammar. The fact that you would spend more time to perfect the grammar used in a text message defeats the purpose of texting; it would naturally take more time. With this logical conclusion in mind, most of the text messages we receive (and send) are overflown with grammar mistakes, spelling errors, and, sometimes, phrases that make no sense at all.

It's difficult to argue that many of those texting do use poor grammar, though they cannot be blamed for merely wanting to utilize the convenient nature of texting. Yet surprinsingly, the number of these poorly-formatted texts have decreased drastically in recent years - why?

It is undoubtedly more difficult to type out words and phrases on a cellphone keypad when you must type out every single letter in the right order. However, most cellphones available these days provide a feature which allows the user to complete a small part of a word while the cellphone function completes the rest. And even more significantly, many cellphone users have acquired phones that come with a full-functioning QWERTY keyboard. Coupled with the function that completes words and phrases (sometimes correcting spelling as well, much like the abilities of computer applications), these technological advances and features have significant decreased the number of grammar mistakes in text messages.

So back to the main question, will the frequent usage of texts influence our society, namely the development of the youth, in a negative aspect? Not anymore.

It's true that many teens and young students text with poor grammar. Yet as technologies improve, texting could actually serve as daily grammar lessons for the minds of our youths. Imagine that every text you receive has been corrected by a program designed for proper grammar, and that every person who types a text, as well as every person who receives a text, will be reminded time after time the correct way to phrase and spell out certain words. The conclusion is simple; texting (with improved technological advanecs) will contribute to the positive growth of grammar abilities in those who choose to send and receive texts.