1. CORPUS LINGUISTICS STUDY OF SMS TEXT MESSAGING Presentation on Thesis Dissertation November 23, 2011 Writer: Caroline Tagg Presenter: Mahbubur Rahman Advisor: Prof. Nilanjan Banerjee

2. Mobile Pervasive and Sensor Systems Laboratory Table of Contents  Introduction  Background  Motivation  Language Variation & Role of CORPORA  CORPUS Compilation  Respelling in Text Messaging  Spoken grammar, Text Grammar  Conclusion 1

3. Mobile Pervasive and Sensor Systems Laboratory Introduction  SMS  Short Message Service  Generally known as Text in USA 2

4. Mobile Pervasive and Sensor Systems Laboratory Objectives 3  Three main objectives  Methodological  address the challenges and decisions raised by the compilation, storage & exploitation of text messages  Explore effective procedures for identify and retrieving features for analysis  Empirical  Provide empirical data  Substantiate and refine previously-made assertion  Theoretical  Finding way of resembling texting and spoken language  The linguistic features which deifnes texting as a language variety

5. Mobile Pervasive and Sensor Systems Laboratory Motivation 4  Texting  Significance is continuously growing as a academic interest  Little Attempt in in-depth linguistics description  No of Texting is increasing at a rapid rate Source: www.text.it/mediacentre/

6. Mobile Pervasive and Sensor Systems Laboratory Motivation 5  Research into Texting  Increasing number of mobile user all over the world  Need Corpus of Txt  CorpTxt is the language of Texting  Sociocultural Role of Texting  Multidisciplinary field emerged based on based on mobile and computer mediated media  Theoretical perspective and methodologies of social science & humanities are employed on new media  There is no based on text messaging data  Linguistics of texting  Data based investigation focused on spelling variation  Linguistics exploration of text messages is limited in previous studies  Unconventional spelling creates a gap

7. Mobile Pervasive and Sensor Systems Laboratory Motivation 6  Research into Texting  Communicative functions  Most studies showed that the function of texting is interpersonal  The number of analysis lack of corpus data of texting  Need a Corpus of texting to analysis the variation and diversity of texting  Forensic Research  Multidisciplinary field emerged based on based on mobile and computer mediated media  Theoretical perspective and methodologies of social science & humanities are employed on new media  There is no based on text messaging data  Linguistics of texting  Data based investigation focused on spelling variation  Linguistics exploration of text messages is limited in previous studies  Unconventional spelling creates a gap

8. Mobile Pervasive and Sensor Systems Laboratory Language Variation & Role of CORPORA 7  Spoken & Writing Varieties  Language Variation  The language domain is always large & diverse  same people produced different language in different situation  Language is shaped by three categories-topic, purpose and interrelation  Texting study can be on two points-speech-writing dichotomy, spectrum &Multidimensional analysis of writing-speech  Speech-Writing Dichotomy

9. Mobile Pervasive and Sensor Systems Laboratory Language Variation & Role of CORPORA 8  Spoken & Writing Varieties  Spectral & Multidimensional Model of Speech & Writing  Varies on situation, inter-relation and purpose  Particular text types can’t be always presented in particular modality  But it can be clustered based on different linguistics feature  Frequency plays important role in clustering text language

10. Mobile Pervasive and Sensor Systems Laboratory Corpus compilation: Challenges & Consideration 9  Corpus Specification(CorTxt)  Data  Bibliography composition  Relatively small  Representative

11. Mobile Pervasive and Sensor Systems Laboratory Respelling in Text Message 10  Spelling  Used instead of Orthography for Texting purpose  Pattern of Spelling Variation  Reflecting Spoken Language through Spelling  Spelling system  Orthographies using alphabet is usually phonetic  Language sound is not always accurate but reflecting across language  is virtually always pronounced /v/; is usually /a ɪ /.  Colloquial Contraction  Reduced or contracted written form  Example- going to -> gonna; go to -> gotta  Reflecting Speech mean  Respelling are chosen to reflect pronunciation  Sound is not ultimate purpose  It’s a kind of ‘eye dialect’

12. Mobile Pervasive and Sensor Systems Laboratory Respelling in Text Message 11  Pattern of Spelling Variation  Visual representations of meaning  Shape of words  Writing is not just written down speech  Reformists & public often in their spelling try to represents sounds  Respelling cannot be just simply attempts to reflect sound.  Should be arise from the unconventional shape of words  Phonetic Spelling  Eye dialect  Irregular standard spelling corresponding to particular sound  Example-enuf,frum, cum, tu, yu,ur  Technology constraint & abbreviation  Early Europe saved printing cost using concise word  Telegram like language need concise language  Linguistic economy-RAM, ROM, HDD

13. Mobile Pervasive and Sensor Systems Laboratory Respelling in Text Message 12  Respelling in Texting  Previous studies on Texting  Existing research and media used abbreviated texting  Example-  THX (thanks); MSG (message); XLNT (excellent); B4 (before); C U l8r (see you later); c %l (cool)  Different researcher researched on this and have made abbreviated dictionary  Overview of CorTxt  Absence of unconventional spelling in sorter Texting

14. Mobile Pervasive and Sensor Systems Laboratory Respelling in Text Message 13  Respelling in Texting  Overview of CorTxt  Presence of unconventional spelling in long message  Colloquial contraction in respelling  Methods  Challenges in identifying and categorizing respellings  Standard form is generally most frequent  For example, are (with 1,054 occurrences) was considered the headword of a gro up comprising r (422 occurrences) and ar (2)  For some worlds it is different  For Example-

15. Mobile Pervasive and Sensor Systems Laboratory Respelling in Text Message 14  Respelling in Texting  Methods  Ambiguous or ‘Shared’ respelling  One word is respelled for more than two referent  For example-2 can refer to : to, too, two, 2; and ur can refere your, you’re  Sometimes it comes shared spelling

16. Mobile Pervasive and Sensor Systems Laboratory Respelling in Text Message 15  Respelling in Texting  Methods  Ambiguous or ‘Shared’ respelling  Some are difficult to understand  For example-Wk could be work or week  Hapaxes and misspelling  Some abbreviation are written only once but included in Cortxt  Hapaxes are useful for language

17. Mobile Pervasive and Sensor Systems Laboratory Respelling in Text Message 16  Respelling in Texting  Results & Discussion  Spelling Groups  Texters always respell common words such as you(u, ya, ya, yer)  Analyzing 250 headwords the respelling is found as below

18. Mobile Pervasive and Sensor Systems Laboratory Respelling in Text Message 17  Respelling in Texting  Results & Discussion  Form of Spelling variation  Text can be grouped into four categories  Letter substitution, letter omission, letter appellation and letter transposition  thanx can be described as the ‗substitution‘ of with  jst as the ‗omission‘ of ;  soooo as the ‗appellation‘ of  In plz, for example, the is replaced by  The function behind spelling variation  Colloquial contractions as n, av, yer, wiv etc  Colloquial respellings include goodo, pleasey, nope  Regiolectal respelling include summat, summort, sumfing  Phonetic spelling include 2, 4, u,b,c, gud, woz, coz  Abbreviations include tomo, cause and bout

19. Mobile Pervasive and Sensor Systems Laboratory Spoken Grammar, Texted Grammar 18  Use of Spoken Grammar  Texted grammar cannot be fully explained using the Spoken Grammar  Extended spoken grammar can be used to analyze the texting  Models incorporating Spoken Grammar  Systematic functional Approach to Casual Conversion  Concern with interpersonal, alongside other language functions  Used for clause analysis  Used to relate grammatical structure to function and social context  A Grammar of Speech  Speakers functions is defined by grammar  Driven specifically by considering speech and how participants involved in speaking  Corpus Approach  Overcome the limitation of Systematic and grammatical approach  Account for naturally occurring features of speech  Works within or around traditional structure rather than building a theoretical grammar  Non-existing categories are described as functional and purposeful in speech

20. Mobile Pervasive and Sensor Systems Laboratory Spoken Grammar, Texted Grammar 19  Text Grammar  Features of conversational speech can be found in texting  Ellipsis is not found in speech but found in texting  Texters may be motivated by other purpose or affordances of medium  Clause Combination  Overview  Based on CorTxt  Focuses on relationships between clauses  One-clause unit  One clause text  19% text are of this kind  Most of them are exclamation or questions

21. Mobile Pervasive and Sensor Systems Laboratory Spoken Grammar, Texted Grammar 20  Clause Combination  Speech-like clause combination  Based on CorTxt  Focuses on relationships between clauses  Clause in speech strung together using connectives such as ( and, but, because)  Limited to 2 to 8 clause sentences  Mid position tag-question & wh-fronting also found in texting Clauses are divided by |, and units with ||.

22. Mobile Pervasive and Sensor Systems Laboratory Spoken Grammar, Texted Grammar 21  Clause Combination  Text-Specific clause combination  Differ from speech like clause prototype  38% of texting of CorTxt are of this kind  Comprises of several units  Some may have only one clause Clauses are divided by |, and units with ||.

23. Mobile Pervasive and Sensor Systems Laboratory Spoken Grammar, Texted Grammar 22  Situational Ellipsis  Speech-like ellipsis  Initial elements of phrases and declarative clauses omitted  Omitted elements are shown using * Clauses are divided by |, and units with ||.

24. Mobile Pervasive and Sensor Systems Laboratory Spoken Grammar, Texted Grammar 23  Situational Ellipsis  Subject ellipsis  Usually pronoun elision is limited in spoken language context.  In the texting, pronouns is mission for multiple times Clauses are divided by |, and units with ||.

25. Mobile Pervasive and Sensor Systems Laboratory Spoken Grammar, Texted Grammar 24  Situational Ellipsis  Medial Ellipsis  Non-speech-like way across CorTxt.  ‘be’ is omitted while subject is present Clauses are divided by |, and units with ||.

26. Mobile Pervasive and Sensor Systems Laboratory Spoken Grammar, Texted Grammar 25  Deixis  Inclusion of words based on speakers place, time and listener  Important feature in functional grammar  Deictic reference is advarbs (here, now, then), pronouns(I, we, me) etc  Deixis is also observe in texting  Reference to Time  75% of this in CorTxt refer explicit period or points of time

27. Mobile Pervasive and Sensor Systems Laboratory Spoken Grammar, Texted Grammar 26  Deixis  Reference to Place  Less percentage of time ‘this’ is used for referring place  Reference to medium and the interaction  A little percentage of time this is used to refer the medium itself

28. Mobile Pervasive and Sensor Systems Laboratory Spoken Grammar, Texted Grammar 27  Header & Tails  The term introduced by Carter & McCarthy  Determine non-clausal items placement together with clause  Mainly noun phrase and repeated within clause with a pronoun  Reference to medium and the interaction  A little percentage of time this is used to refer the medium itself

29. Mobile Pervasive and Sensor Systems Laboratory Spoken Grammar, Texted Grammar 28  Vogue Language  Vogue Expression in speech  Vogue terms are purposeful and prevalent in language  Used to softens the declarative or authoritative statement  Sort of, kind of, well etc are some example of vogue expression  Vogue expression in texting  Spoken vogue expression also present in texting

30. Mobile Pervasive and Sensor Systems Laboratory Spoken Grammar, Texted Grammar 29  Fixed Tag  Questions tag  Does not change in form  Used to confirm that something is agreed  Right and yeah are mainly used in Texting

31. Mobile Pervasive and Sensor Systems Laboratory Spoken Grammar, Texted Grammar 30  Response Token  Usually precede further comment or statement  Usually form part of longer term

32. Mobile Pervasive and Sensor Systems Laboratory Spoken Grammar, Texted Grammar 31  Discourse Markers  Organizing discourse  Marking topic boundaries  Functional –anyway, cos, btw, fine, good, great etc  Clausal item-you know, I mean etc

33. Mobile Pervasive and Sensor Systems Laboratory 32