The United States is no longer a nation of readers. We are no longer a nation of writers. We aren’t even a nation of talkers anymore. We have become a nation of shorthand communicators. The well-constructed sentence no longer holds intrinsic value because of its usefulness in communicating complex ideas. Instead, we increasingly gravitate to abbreviated forms of communication that rely on not only a syntax that may be at odds with standard English, but that use an entirely new lexicon that is rapidly infusing the ways in which we write and talk to each other. In fact, this lexicon is developing and spreading so quickly that it is arguably the fastest growing language in the world. This new language of the 21st century is not Spanish or Japanese or even standard English. The new language is called Text, and it’s sweeping the globe like a pandemic flu.
Despite its shortcomings, texting is a cornerstone of contemp
