Texting is Killing Language by John McWhorter Ted Talk Speech Analysis Essay

Linguist John McWhorter in his Ted Talk ‘Texting is Killing Language’ introduces the popular opinion that texting is a “scourge”. McWhorter’s purpose is to contradict this statement and present texting as an “emergent complexity” of its own kind. By first defining the ideas of language, speech, and writing McWhorter claims that texting is not a form of writing, but rather a new language closely related to speech. In fact, McWhorter goes on to compare the substrate of texting to the benefits of being bidialectal. With this, he adopts an analytical tone to assure those who question the development of texting that it is purely human for language to evolve, using historical and worldly examples to remain logical. 

At the outset, McWhorter encourages his audience to think critically about the connections between language, speech, and writing. He then defines speech as language, explaining that speech developed before writing. By differentiating the evolution of writing and speech in this manner, the speaker alludes to his claim that texting is a new branch of language, as it too developed with time. McWhorter follows this by defining writing as a reflective process, conceding that it may have “certain advantages”. Further, he defines casual speech to be looser in nature. These are the building blocks of McWhorter’s claim, as it creates a baseline of definitions for the audience to refer back to throughout the speech when he later states that texting is not a form of writing. 

After clarifying the definitions of speech and writing McWhorter begins to discuss the overlap between the two, using the Gettysburg address as an example of speaking the way one writes. This allows him to introduce the more natural form of language where a person writes like they speak, contrasting the two ideas in a way that reminds the audience that people typically communicate without thinking about formality. McWhorter adds that technology is responsible for this evolution, as it allows for a natural pace of speech and “somebody who can receive your message quickly”. This introduces the concept that texting is merely “fingered speech” as it is presented to be capable of just that. By labeling texting as ‘fingered speech” McWhorter is providing a new definition in place of the misconceptions he conceded to earlier. 

With this, McWhorter provides examples of texting threads using “LOL” and “slash”. He describes “LOL” to be a “marker of empathy” despite its literal meaning “laughing out loud”. By negating the literal meaning of this and replacing it, McWhorter is reaffirming that only those who participate the substrate of texting could have full understanding. This circles back to his claim that texting is a new form of language in its’ own right. McWhorter similarly follows this train of logic with “slash” as a “new information marker”, describing that its use is not practical in real life conversation. Being that it can thus only be used while texting, this is presented as a new nuance of meaning, again having an analytical tone to present texting as its own language. Without such examples, the audience could not have a full understanding of the texting culture that McWhorter explains is a new miraculous language. 

McWhorter concedes that abruptly changing topics with “slash” and using “LOL” as a marker of empathy may seem mundane, but provides historical evidence to reaffirm that it is deemed miraculous. He uses examples such as “ … look at this person in 1956, and this is when texting doesn’t exist … ‘Many do not know the alphabet or multiplication table, cannot write grammatically’ …” to reassure that society has always carried the weight of grammatical correctness prior to the development of technology. Therefore, technology only allows for quicker communication of this new language without it being to blame for its loose structure. McWhorter wraps up his historical timeline by refuting “there are always people worrying about these things and the planet somehow seems to keep spinning”. 

In conclusion, McWhorter in his Ted Talk ‘Texting is Killing Language’ argues this statement, making his own claim that texting provides similar benefits to that of being bidialectal, as it is an “expansion of their linguistic repertoire,” referencing young people who are known to be the most common texters. He presents this first by defining language and negating the ideas of speech and writing. McWhorter then introduces texting as a new language by calling it “fingered speech”, adding finally that comprehension of popular texting conventions proves texting to be “a whole new language [that] has developed among our young people…”. Ultimately, McWhorter would like to see the progression of such language through time, describing it as a “linguistic miracle”.