Chapter 2

REVIEW OF THE RELATED LITERATURE AND STUDIES

This present the related literature and studies that are related to the current study. This

gives the readers insights and ideas about the paper. It includes various definitions, concepts,

principles, and some studies which serve as significant information.

Related Literature

Text- speak

Texting, text-speak or short message format is popular to cell phone users,

which consists mostly of teenagers, aging from thirteen to nineteen. Due to texting,

cellphones Users tend to adopt the texting lingo, which is more of abbreviations

and slang’s. Sometimes, smiley faces, asterisk emoting and emoticons,

which are commonly used by Texters, are always present in their

message (Rosen, Chang, Erwin, Carrier and Cheever, 2008).

Crystal (2008) explains that text speak (text language) is characterized

by its distinctive graphology, its chief features is rebus abbreviation, words

are formed in which Letters represents syllabus. The clear ideology

behind the usage of such abbreviations is directly related to less consumption

of time, energy, as well as space. As one of the features of SMS language,

abbreviation is a shortening, specifically, a letters, taken from a word or

words, and employed to represent them for the sake of brevet

(Proysen, 2009).
Acronyms

In 1950, in the addition to the New Words and Words in the News Funk &

Wagnalls defined the term `acronym` as words formed using the initial letters of

words as in Unesco < United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural

Organization. According to their definition, it is also possible by using initial

syllable of a word as in radar < radio detecting and ranging or agglutinating initial

and final syllables as in motel < motorist’s hotel (Baum, 1995: 103). As is seen

the first attempt of defining acronyms was not very successful, as it unites the

features of other types of shortening, such as blending and does not provide the

full picture.

Abbreviation

An abbreviation is used by taking the first letter of a longer sentence

(McCarthy, 2009). Abbreviation is a group of several letters picked up from a

word or phrase that is shortened. An abbreviation is a result from abbreviating one

word. It is used to summarize idea in communication. The using of abbreviations

will add new vocabulary (Irawan, 2013).Crystal (2008) reveals an abbreviation is

a shortened or contracted form, usually represented by a single token, of a term

(comprising a single word or multiple words). Usage of abbreviations is common

in almost all types of text genres. Specifically, technical documents often contain

a considerable number of abbreviations (as cited in Glass et al., 2017).

 Shortenings

The shortened word is short compared to the source word and has only

one meaning which makes this type of word formation easy and useful.

Shortening is a unit or written or spoken language which is created by using some

parts of the word or words, in some forms of shortenings separate letter(s), sounds

can be taken (Levkovskaia, K. 1956: 178, 194-195). Linguists offer various

approaches and interpretations towards the issue of etymology of shortening. For

instance, Zipf believes that shortening is ‘principle of the least effort’ or ‘the law

of economy of speaking means’ (Zipf G.K., 1949:117). K. Levkovskaia thinks

that creation of abbreviation was connected to the demand of quick writing,

economy of space during writing, development of scientific fields as chemistry,

mathematics, astronomy (Levkovskaia, K. 1956: 178, 194-195). D.I. Alekseev

opposes with the latter and offers that economy was not the main factor, though, it

might be one of the reasons. (Alekseev D.I. 1998: 8). There are several

development periods regarding specific terminology of shortened words and

units: a)

Text (SMS) language

Short message service (SMS), though dominant used by people of

the younger generation ( Freudenberg, 2009), has also become present

among the senior ones. A research conducted by tekelec, a mobile

messaging company, found that SMS is reaching across all demographics

and is now prevalent among senior generations; not just an adults

and teenagers ( Harnick, 2010) Proysen, Aziz, Shamim, and Avais(2013) in

their study that profuse use abbreviation and contraction forms of text

language among

Students is an identified factors to the occurrence of SMS features in

their academic writing, which also claimed to cause endangerment to the

standard form of language. Apart from that, Balakrishan and Yew (2008),

in their study of mobile phone texting satisfaction, revealed that texting

users also tend to apply code-mixing in their text messages.

Textism

Textism, and text speak are all different ways in which current

literature refers to the phenomenon of writing in shorthand within the

confines of a text message or SMS (Crystal, 2008; Plaster, Wood and Bell,

2008; Wood, Kemp and Plester, 2013.) Originally This development as a way

to save space in order to fit more information within an SMS to save on

the cost of sending multiple message (Mose, 2013). With the popularity of

contract phones increasing (ofcom, 2003) the cost of sending individual text has

decreased, yet textism use is still popular due to the social affordance it

offers such as so such as social belonging(Thurlow, 2013), the ability to

express oneself (Plester, Wood and Joshi, 2009) and fun from `playing` with

language (Crystal 2008). The popularity of texthas been declining in the Uk

since the beginning of 2012(Ofcom, 2013) however, textism usage is

apparently in other media such as instant messaging, e-mails and social

Networking (Ling and Baron, 2007), Due to the increase in smartphone

ownership usage of these midea is also increasing (Ofcom, 2013) thus,

despite the receding popularity of texting, it seems that textism usage is here to

say.

Stylization is the category that most represents casual spoken language.

Initialism And acronyms however, follow conventional English language

rules which have been popular throughout history (Baron, 2003; Crystal, 2008).

Knowledge. These phonetics textisms rely heavily on English language ability;

in order to decode these words, or create them; you must first have good

knowledge of letter-to-sound mappings. Dr. Crispin Thurlow (2003) and Dr. Beverly

Pester (2008) were pioneering scholars when it came looking at how and why

people use textisms. Since then, there have been several Researchers that have

come to the forefront in research examining the impact of texting upon language,

these include Dr. Nenagh Kepm, Dr. Richard Ling, Prof. Clare Wood, Dr.Larry

Rosen and Dr. Michele Drouin.

Spelling

Spelling is the writing of one or more words with letters and diacritics. In

addition, the term often, but not always, means an accepted standard spelling or the

process of naming the letters. In the sense of a standard, spelling is one of the elements of

orthography and a prescriptive element of alphabetic languages. Spellings attempt to

transcribe the sounds of the language into alphabetic letters, but phonetic spellings are

exceptions in many languages for various reasons. Pronunciation changes over time in all
languages, and spelling reforms are irregular in most languages and rare in some. In

addition, words from other languages may be adopted without being adapted to the

spelling system, non-standard spellings are often adopted after extensive common usage,

and different meanings of a word or homophones may be deliberately spelled in different

ways to differentiate them visually” (https://www.definitions.net/definition/spelling).

Stages of Spelling Development

The following are identified stages of spelling development given by HOMER

(2021) cited from https://www.learnwithhomer.com/homer-blog/3934/stages-of-spelling-

development.

Precommunicative Stage

At the precommunicative stage of spelling development, children lack an

understanding of letter-sound correspondence. This means that the relationship

between written language (the letters of the alphabet and how they combine to

make words) and spoken language (vocabulary your child may already know or

will eventually learn) isn’t yet clear to your child.

Semiphonetic Stage

The semiphonetic stage is true to its name — your child will get their first

concrete exposure to phonetic learning during this time. Initially, they’ll begin

with learning how to match written letters to letter sounds. When shown letters of

the alphabet, they may be able to pronounce the correct phonetic sound for each
 letter. For example, if they see the letter “b,” they may say “buh” for the /b/

sound.

Phonetic Stage

The phonetic stage of spelling development is when your child’s letter-

sound correspondence learning comes into full bloom, so to speak. Consonant-

vowel-consonant (CVC) words may become easier for them to learn and read as

their foundation in phonetic spelling grows even more concrete.

Transitional Stage

With their phonetic instincts strong at this point in their spelling

development, your child may have increasing success with memorizing those

words that just can’t be sounded out.Rather than relying on phonology, they may

begin to notice visual cues and patterns to assist them with pronunciation and

word-learning. Memorization will become a handy tool to add to their arsenal.

Correct Stage

The final stage of spelling development is the correct stage. At this point,

your child fully comprehends the basic rules and patterns of English spelling.They

can handle books at their reading level on their own and have a comfortable

vocabulary of words that they consistently spell correctly.

Principles on Spelling Development

The following are the six spelling principles given by Topfer (n.d.):
 Spelling is learnt as we use it: Teachers have an essential role in increasing

students' interest in words and in influencing their attitudes toward spelling. Students

need to feel they are able to succeed in learning to spell.

Learning to spell is part of the developmental process of learning to write:

When teachers understand spelling development, they can match teaching strategies to

developmental needs. Records can be kept showing the developmental indicators,

strategies and skills that children are using by monitoring students' writing. In this way,

teachers can decide when and how it is appropriate to intervene. Teachers are able to

determine what students already know about spelling and they can then build on that

knowledge.

Errors can be viewed as diagnostic and developmental signposts: Error

analysis provides information about how far students have developed their

understandings of spelling. Analysis of errors from students’ writing guides

understanding of the strategies the students are relying upon as they attempt to spell.

Exploring words and vocabulary are part of learning to spell: Teaching

spelling is an on-going activity. Whenever students come across new words, they should

be encouraged to analyse them and to look at their structure and relate this to word

meanings. Word study is an important part of the literacy program.

Independence and self-evaluation are essential in spelling development:

Encourage students to evaluate their own progress, identifying goals achieved and areas

that need further work, teach students how to learn words and how to check spelling of

words they have attempted and make students aware of processes for trying to write new

words.
 Effective spellers use a number of different strategies interactively in order

to spell correctly: Students need to be explicitly taught a range of strategies in order to

internalize them and use them interactively to produce correct spelling. There are three

major spelling strategies - visual, sound/symbol and morphemic.

Writing

The importance of essay writing for students is underpinned by Shaffle et al

(2010) who mentioned that students will need English writing skills that range from

simple paragraph and summary skills to the ability to write essay and professional

articles. Adas and Bakir (2013) state that writing is an intricate and complex task, it is

most difficult of all languages to acquire. They also highlight that many students

understand the English Language but most of the students face the problem of

communicating their ideas effectively. The problem is lack of adequate stock of

vocabulary, creativity in writing and several other factors (Adas and Bakir: 2013).

Dawson and Yon (2008) suggest that both students and teachers should be

knowledgeable of such aspects to improve in writing essays.

Good English essays have correct spelling, punctuation and properly arranged

sentences with recommended word division (Dawson: 2006). Dawson and Yong

Stated that students have many basic mistakes in written works on spelling,

grammar, punctuation and organisation. Kiuhara et al (2009) also suggest that some

words become spelling problems because of the gap between spelling and

pronunciation. In order to improve essay writing techniques, teacher should put great
emphasis in the use of figurative language and various errors that crop up in students

work (Al Fadda:2012)

Related Studies

Catherine Bushiness, Nenagh Kemp, and Frances Heritage Martin “Text-Speak

Message Practices and Links to General spelling skills: A Study of Australian

Children from University of Tasmian in 2011.’’ In this study, 10-12 years old

Australian children were investigated in the matters of text-messaging practices with

their relationship to traditional spelling ability. It has been found that 82 percent of 227

tested students reported sending text-messages in an average of 5 messages perday. It

was noticed that the use of predictive and multipress entry methods was approximately

equal. The researcher found out that children produced a wide-range of text-message

abbreviations when asked to rewrite a list of 30 conventionally-spelt words as they

would in a text message to find a friend.

The “Linguistic Study of SMS Text Message” a thesis submitted to the

University of Birmingham for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy, March 2009

by Caroline Tagg is a study deals with using a corpus of text message in English o

discover linguistic features, which define texting As language variety. The study

focuses on how the language of texting, is shaped by the texter actively fulfilling

interpersonal goal. The thesis start with an over view of the literature on texting. This

necessitate the need for full linguistic investigation of text based on large data set. In

the presents texting with the tradition of research into the speech writing
range,which highlights limitations of focusing on mode at the expenses of Other user-

variable. The thesis also discusses the need for inductive investigation Together with

the quantitative corpus based frameworks that dominate the domain.

“A field Study of Use of Synchronous Chat on Online Courses” by David H. Spencer

and Starr Roxanne Hiltz. New Jersey Institute of Technology in 2003.The study

proposes Media Mode as the independent variable characterized by for nominal values

derived from the mixture of asynchronous discussion forum. The researchers collect

data from 29 course sections. Students’ perceptions of the use of chats are investigated.

They use university records to determine grade distributions. The study comes to the

result that when students use chat they find it "rewarding" and not "complex.”

However, its use not significantly related to predicted improvements in outcomes for

courses. Students seem more satisfied with face-to-face courses that use

Asynchronous Learning Network (ALN) as alternative communication media than

courses that are entirely ALN based.

A study in university in Ireland intitled “An Analysis of Language in University

Students’ Text Messages” by Fiona Lyddy Francesca, Farina James Hanney, Lynn

Farrell, Niamh Kelly O’Neill. This study set out to examine the textual characteristics

of a large sample of text messages, with a view to informing experimental research using

generated text messages. Text messages were collected from a convenience sample of

139 undergraduate students (99 women and 40 men) attending university in Ireland. All

participants were Irish and English was their first language. Each participant was asked to

provide up to ten text messages sent in the previous week. Participants were informed

that the research study was concerned with ‘‘the language used in text messages.’’
Participants transcribed their texts verbatim onto paper; they were instructed (verbally

and in writing) to carefully reproduce the original message, paying attention to spacing

between words, punctuation marks and capital letters. They also provided other details,

such as their age and gender, the age and gender of the message recipient, and their

relationship to the participant. Each participant also selected the purpose of the text from

a number of categories. , this analysis found that 25% of the word content used some

spelling variant, supporting the view that the majority of text messaging language is

standard form.