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Open access to "Error or Strength?: Competencies Developed in Adolescent Digitalk"

Do U Digitalk? Y?

By IGI Global on Jun 3, 2015
Do U Digitalk? Y?Contributed by Dr. Kristen Hawley Turner, PhD, Fordham University

Every day billions of messages are sent via digital devices, and adolescents compose many of these communications. On their phones, on their computers, and on their social networks, teens “talk” to one another - but they do so via writing. This combination of conversation and the written word has inspired a new language that can often only be understood by those who use it most. Digitalk blends elements of Standard Written English with shortcuts, phonetic spellings, and other manipulations of language.

But what, exactly, is this language? And why do teenagers write this way? I spent two years talking to adolescents in an attempt to answer these questions. What I found surprised me. First, I learned that teens adopted the conventions of their digital communities - and some of their practices were quite different than what the media portrayed. For instance, the majority of participants in my study did not use numbers in place of letters (e.g., let’s get 2gether). In addition, 97% of them used complete sentences in their digitalk. This finding suggests that texting is not, in fact, ruining the English language, a sentiment heard often in the media and in casual dinner conversations among adults.

More importantly, when I asked adolescents why they chose the conventions that they did, I learned that teens take into consideration their audience. For example, one young man said, “Only with my grandmother; that’s when I text proper.” Many of the participants in the study made similar statements about their choices being driven by “who’s on the other side of the phone.”

Similarly, the teens cared about personal voice. As one student said, “There are some things that you do because you, like, want it to be you”. Finding their own writing style and capturing how they “sound” were very important to the adolescents I interviewed and surveyed.

Overall, I learned that adolescents write a lot outside of school, they adopt the conventions of their digital communities, and they experiment with language in order to be a part of those communities and also to create an individual identity within them. In short, in this out-of-school context, they develop two key skills of writing - an understanding of audience and voice - that composition teachers stress in school.

When children are young, adults celebrate their creativity. Grandparents hang fingerpaintings reverently on their refrigerators. Teachers applaud stories filled with inventive spelling. Parents file all kinds of drawings, writing, and art forms neatly into memory boxes. At some point, however, we forget that experimentation and play are part of creativity. We expect teenagers to adhere to rules that limit them in their schoolwork - and often in their lives outside of school.

Fortunately, adolescents find their own outlets for creativity. Through text messaging, social networking, and instant messaging, today’s teens experiment with language. Though many adults fear that their digitalk may hurt literacy, in fact, teens develop important skills of writing in their digital communication. Rather than seeing errors in teens’ digitalk, parents and educators might look at the strengths inherent in this type of communication.


Dr. Kristen Hawley Turner is an associate professor of English education and contemporary literacies at Fordham University in New York City. Her research focuses on the intersections between technology and literacy, and she works with teachers across content areas to implement effective literacy instruction and to incorporate technology in meaningful ways. She is a Teacher Consultant for the National Writing Project and the director of the Fordham Digital Literacies Collaborative.

Dr. Turner's chapter "Error or Strength?: Competencies Developed in Adolescent Digitalk" from the title Exploring Technology for Writing and Writing Instruction is being featured for open access through the month of July. Access "Error or Strength?: Competencies Developed in Adolescent Digitalk" here.

Also view Dr. Turner's recent blog post "Think Your Kids Aren’t Writing This Summer? Think Again" on her blog Teachers, Profs, Parents: Writers Who Care.

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