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Journals by EmailI read an article in STC’s recent Intercom magazine that really stirred an internal struggle. Entitled “What If Readers Can’t Read” by Tony Self, it talks about shifting how we need to adapt our writing to changing reading (or other information ingestion) patterns.
He doesn’t outright suggest that a shift from conventional text to “text speak” in technical communication will happen imminently, but since he spends half the article talking about text speak, the implication is there.
Part of me knows that as a technical communicator, I need to deliver information to users that they can understand. If what they understand is text speak, shouldn’t I write in that format?
Pardon my shuddering.
This concept bothers me on many levels.
You Call It Literacy?
Self says his teenage daughter tried to communicate with her grandfather by text message during a trip. “However, not only did her grandfather not know how to receive text messages on his phone, but he also did not know how to read them. My daughter was shocked to realize that her grandfather was functionally illiterate.” So because this teenager decided to essentially put a wall between herself and her grandpa by writing in another language, he’s the one who’s illiterate?
I have a fundamental problem with that. College students who can read only text messages and chat room lingo are not setting themselves up for success in the real world. People teach classes on how to properly write emails and memos in corporate settings, and I imagine they don’t encourage you to end write things like “w8ing 4 yur nxt prpsl. tia!”
Doing Less with Less
We often remind each other that today’s audience searches and scans reference information; they don’t read from beginning to end. Though the universe is expanding, people’s attention spans are collapsing. But I don’t see how blowing away half the English language would help us communicate any better.
I took a couple of classes from a linguistics professor in college who said that if we communicated verbally in the way that is the absolute easiest, all the words in all languages would become “uh.” The only thing you have to do to make that sound is just that: make a sound as the breath comes out of your lungs and past your vocal cords. No tongue or lip movement necessary.
But the problem is that we would lose all kinds of meaning. Making the language easy to speak (or in this case, write) doesn’t make it better. The point of language is to communicate, to transmit meaning.
What’s the Common Denominator?
If older users can’t read text messages and young users can’t read anything but, we have a more serious problem on our hands than having to learn text speak ourselves if we don’t know it. It means you have to be able to communicate with both groups and everyone in between. Where is the common denominator then?
I realize that many kids today learn how to use a computer at age three or four. They should also be learning to read at that point. They ought to have that foundation so they can get along in the real world. Someone who understands English in its fullness has a greater power to communicate than someone who doesn’t. Then at least with simplified, plain English we also have a common denominator.
Lost in Translation
While English becomes more and more common, there are still a lot of languages out there, and there are people who are just as happy with their own non-English languages. That’s why we localize content. But if you write in text speak, I imagine that the translation agency won’t be inclined to take you seriously.
The Rug Yanked Out
Of text speak, Self reports:
New Zealand high school students [taking national exams] … must clearly demonstrate the required level of understanding, but they can use a language that some older folks might find difficult to recognize as English! For the uninitiated, text speak is an abbreviated form of spelling that aims to use the fewest number of characters needed to convey a comprehensible message. Hence, punctuation, grammar, and capitalization [and spelling, I might add] are largely discarded.
I find the last two sentences contradictory. The whole point of grammar and the rest of it is to expedite comprehension. You yank those things, then understanding, then communication, go out the window right along with them.
Take the letter combination comp. If I use that in documentation written in text speak, what does it mean? Computer? Component? Compression? Compound? Compensation? Who decides?
I’m being a bit extreme here. But I realize that things change—faster and faster. The way people access information changes all the time.
Self suggests we “no longer [include] task information for software in user assistance.” This strikes me as odd given that people seem to prefer task-oriented, not feature-oriented, information. If we don’t give either one, what are we offering?
The TV Generation Has Given Way to the YouTube Generation
The funny thing about low user patience is that I can’t be bothered to watch a video and wait for it to get to what I want. I’d rather click and scan to find what I want. But this may be related to the fact that I don’t watch much TV—20 hours in a year is probably about what my TV-watching time amounts to. Yes, I’m absolutely serious about that, and it’s not normal. That’s my point. I’d rather read than watch TV. (But I do enjoy watching a good movie with my wife.) Someone has suggested that our culture of seeing problems resolved in a tidy 30 to 60 minutes has engendered an impatient society with unrealistic expectations.
But since many people do like watching videos, and that format is the best for some people’s learning style, I don’t have a problem with the concept of video. It’s more of an expense thing. I have only so much time, and videos are time consuming. The more they need to be localized, the longer (and the more money) they take.
The bottom line, which I think Self got right, is that we need to be aware of our audiences’ information ingestion patterns. Many times, it ends up sounding like psychological mumbo-jumbo, but psychology has to do with what’s in people’s heads. What’s in people’s heads is their reality, even if it’s not objective reality.
That’s why frequent usability testing or even just observation of real users is so important; we can see firsthand how they seek out and ingest information. Then it’s more real to us than a bunch of statistics and can have a more concrete bearing on our deliverables.
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3 Comments to 'A Cloudy Forecast for Technical—and Any—Communication?'
March 27, 2009
I think there is still a place for well written English, my take on the ideas put forward by Tony was more around the access points and structure.
That said, the point he makes about text speak does fit my own internal model of “yeah grammar is part of what I do but it’s not the biggest piece of the pie by any stretch”
March 27, 2009
If our profession ever gets to the point where grammar, punctuation, and spelling are an afterthought, it will be time for me to find a new career. Seems like we might have another ‘ebonics’ debate beginning. Just because that’s the “language” everyone speaks now, doesn’t mean we need to abandon acceptable practices.
If we were writing a book about Klingons from Star Trek, would it be acceptable to write completely in Klingon?
March 27, 2009
My sister who has two young children thinks our profession complicates things needlessly. A stove heats up food. It is not “a mechanical device that…” She says she has no time to read. The attention span of her household has shifted to that possessed by her kids.
She wanted Item X one weekend. She sent her husband out to buy one. Every such item he brought home that came with a manual, she had him return. “I don’t have time to read,” she said. She finally found one so simple it had no manual. That’s the one she kept. Frightening.