We always hear that texting is a scourge. The idea is that texting spells the decline and fall of any kind of serious literacy, or at least writing ability, among young people in the United States and now the whole world today. The fact of the matter is that it just isn't true, and it's easy to think that it is true, but in order to see it in another way, in order to see that actually texting is a miraculous thing, not just energetic, but a miraculous thing, a kind of emergent complexity that we're seeing happening right now, we have to pull the camera back for a bit and look at what language really is, in which case, one thing that we see is that texting is not writing at all. What do I mean by that?
我們總是聽說手機簡訊是個禍源 傳簡訊代表一種能力的退化 不管是任何正常的識字能力,還是寫作能力 美國以至於全世界的年輕人 都有退化的現象 事實上並非如此 但很容易讓人信以為真 為了要以另外一種角度來看這件事 為了要證明傳簡訊是件神奇的事 不僅充滿活力,而且非常神奇 這一種新興的複雜性 就在我們眼前發生 我們必須回顧一下 看看語言到底是怎麼一回事 在這種情況下,我們會知道 傳簡訊跟寫作完全不同 這是什麼意思呢
Basically, if we think about language, language has existed for perhaps 150,000 years, at least 80,000 years, and what it arose as is speech. People talked. That's what we're probably genetically specified for. That's how we use language most. Writing is something that came along much later, and as we saw in the last talk, there's a little bit of controversy as to exactly when that happened, but according to traditional estimates, if humanity had existed for 24 hours, then writing only came along at about 11:07 p.m. That's how much of a latterly thing writing is. So first there's speech, and then writing comes along as a kind of artifice.
基本上,我們想一想 語言已經出現了約15萬年 至少也有八萬年 而它的起源是說話—人類開始交談 那可能是我們與生俱來的能力 說話是我們最常使用語言的方式 寫作很晚才出現 而就像上次提到的 寫作到底何時出現仍有爭議 但傳統估計 如果人類存在了 24 小時 那大概晚上11:07寫作才出現 由此可知寫作是很晚才有的 因此,先有談話才有寫作 這樣的小把戲
Now don't get me wrong, writing has certain advantages. When you write, because it's a conscious process, because you can look backwards, you can do things with language that are much less likely if you're just talking. For example, imagine a passage from Edward Gibbon's "The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire:"
別誤會,寫作有它的優點 寫作是一種處理意識的過程 而且之後可以再回顧 比起談話,寫作對語言 有更大的自由度 例如,愛德華 · 吉本 《羅馬帝國的衰亡》當中有一段:
"The whole engagement lasted above twelve hours, till the graduate retreat of the Persians was changed into a disorderly flight, of which the shameful example was given by the principal leaders and the Surenas himself."
”兩軍相峙超過十二小時 直到波斯人的隊伍慢慢撤退, 以可恥的眾首領和Surenas為首 最終兵荒馬亂的逃跑。“
That's beautiful, but let's face it, nobody talks that way. Or at least, they shouldn't if they're interested in reproducing. That -- (Laughter) is not the way any human being speaks casually.
寫得真美!但說真的,沒人這樣講話 或者至少,我們不該這麼講話 如果我們對繁衍後代還有興趣的話 (笑聲) 沒有人平常會那樣講話
Casual speech is something quite different. Linguists have actually shown that when we're speaking casually in an unmonitored way, we tend to speak in word packets of maybe seven to 10 words. You'll notice this if you ever have occasion to record yourself or a group of people talking. That's what speech is like. Speech is much looser. It's much more telegraphic. It's much less reflective -- very different from writing. So we naturally tend to think, because we see language written so often, that that's what language is, but actually what language is, is speech. They are two things.
口語和書面語完全不同 語言學家實際上告訴我們 我們平常講話沒有注意的時候 我們傾向於使用大概 七到十個字的意群 如果你們有機會錄下 自己或一群人的談話 你們會注意到,這才是口語 口語要寬鬆得多,也更簡潔 它沒那麼多深思熟慮的痕跡—跟寫作截然不同 所以我們自然地會認為,因為常常看到書面語 那麼這就是語言本身 但實際上語言是口語。它們是兩種東西
Now of course, as history has gone by, it's been natural for there to be a certain amount of bleed between speech and writing. So, for example, in a distant era now, it was common when one gave a speech to basically talk like writing. So I mean the kind of speech that you see someone giving in an old movie where they clear their throat, and they go, "Ahem, ladies and gentlemen," and then they speak in a certain way which has nothing to do with casual speech. It's formal. It uses long sentences like this Gibbon one. It's basically talking like you write, and so, for example, we're thinking so much these days about Lincoln because of the movie. The Gettysburg Address was not the main meal of that event. For two hours before that, Edward Everett spoke on a topic that, frankly, cannot engage us today and barely did then. The point of it was to listen to him speaking like writing. Ordinary people stood and listened to that for two hours. It was perfectly natural. That's what people did then, speaking like writing.
現在當然,隨著時間流逝 口語和寫作之間 自然產生了一些「混血」 所以比方說,古時候 人們講話像書面語 是很常見的事 所以我的意思是,你們在舊電影裡面看過的演講 他們清清嗓子,然後說: 「嗯,女士們先生們」之後的演講 與口語已經八竿子打不著 它很正式,它用很多像吉本那樣的長句 它基本上是講話像寫作一樣,所以,例如 因為最近那部同名電影 我們時常想起林肯 葛底斯堡的演講其實沒什麼大不了 在那之前兩個小時,愛德華‧艾維雷特 發表了一篇演講,老實說,主題我們現在不會有興趣 當時的人也不感興趣 重點是,聽他發表 書面語般的演講 普通百姓站在那聽演講,長達兩個小時 在當時卻是再自然不過的事了 古代人就是這樣,說話跟書面語一樣
Well, if you can speak like writing, then logically it follows that you might want to also sometimes write like you speak. The problem was just that in the material, mechanical sense, that was harder back in the day for the simple reason that materials don't lend themselves to it. It's almost impossible to do that with your hand except in shorthand, and then communication is limited. On a manual typewriter it was very difficult, and even when we had electric typewriters, or then computer keyboards, the fact is that even if you can type easily enough to keep up with the pace of speech, more or less, you have to have somebody who can receive your message quickly.
好吧,如果你們可以說話像寫作一樣 那邏輯上,你們有時候 可能也想像口語一般來寫作 問題就在於,從材料、技術的角度來說 當時這很難辦到 原因很簡單,當時的材料並不適合 手工記錄幾乎是不可能的 除非速記,但溝通就變得有限 以手動打字機來記錄口語非常困難 即使我們有了電動打字機 甚至電腦鍵盤,事實上 即使打字已經容易到能夠 跟上口語的步伐,多多少少還是要 有一個人可以迅速收到訊息
Once you have things in your pocket that can receive that message, then you have the conditions that allow that we can write like we speak. And that's where texting comes in. And so, texting is very loose in its structure. No one thinks about capital letters or punctuation when one texts, but then again, do you think about those things when you talk? No, and so therefore why would you when you were texting?
一旦口袋裡有可以接收訊息的東西 才有條件 像口語一樣寫作 而那就是簡訊的由來 所以,簡訊的結構非常鬆散 傳簡訊的時候沒人關心大小寫跟標點符號 但話又說回來,誰說話的時候會注意這些 沒有人會,所以為什麼傳簡訊的時候要注意呢
What texting is, despite the fact that it involves the brute mechanics of something that we call writing, is fingered speech. That's what texting is. Now we can write the way we talk. And it's a very interesting thing, but nevertheless easy to think that still it represents some sort of decline. We see this general bagginess of the structure, the lack of concern with rules and the way that we're used to learning on the blackboard, and so we think that something has gone wrong. It's a very natural sense.
雖然簡訊涉及到 某項我們稱為寫作的野蠻技巧 簡訊事實上是手指的對話 現在我們可以用說話的方式來寫作 而這非常有趣,但是 我們仍然會認為,它還是代表著某種墮落 我們看到簡訊結構鬆散 忽視語法規則,那些我們曾經 在黑板上學到的語法規則,所以我們就覺得 一定哪裡出了差錯 這是很自然的反應
But the fact of the matter is that what is going on is a kind of emergent complexity. That's what we're seeing in this fingered speech. And in order to understand it, what we want to see is the way, in this new kind of language, there is new structure coming up.
但事實上,這一切都是 一種新興的複雜體 這才是我們在手指對話中所觀察到的 為了瞭解它,我們需要了解的是 以簡訊,以這種新的語言 新的結構如何誕生
And so, for example, there is in texting a convention, which is LOL. Now LOL, we generally think of as meaning "laughing out loud." And of course, theoretically, it does, and if you look at older texts, then people used it to actually indicate laughing out loud. But if you text now, or if you are someone who is aware of the substrate of texting the way it's become, you'll notice that LOL does not mean laughing out loud anymore. It's evolved into something that is much subtler.
所以,例如,在簡訊界大家公認的— LOL 現在我們通常認為lol 意思是「放聲大笑」(laughing out loud) 當然,理論上,確實是這麼回事 如果你們看看舊的簡訊,那人們確實曾經用它 來表示「放聲大笑」 但如果你們現在有傳簡訊,或如果你是一個 意識到簡訊的基礎如何演進的人 你們會注意到 LOL 不再意味著「放聲大笑」 它演變成一種更微妙的意思
This is an actual text that was done by a non-male person of about 20 years old not too long ago.
不久之前有一則簡訊 是兩位20 歲左右的女性互傳的 內容如下:
"I love the font you're using, btw."
蘇珊:「順便說一句,我喜歡你用的字體。」
Julie: "lol thanks gmail is being slow right now"
朱莉:「lol 謝謝, gmail 現在好卡。」
Now if you think about it, that's not funny. No one's laughing. (Laughter) And yet, there it is, so you assume there's been some kind of hiccup.
現在你們想想,其實那並不是很有趣 沒有人笑(笑聲) 但是大家就這麼用LOL,所以假如 這裡有人打嗝
Then Susan says "lol, I know," again more guffawing than we're used to when you're talking about these inconveniences.
然後蘇珊說:「LOL,我知道」 這也比我們談到網路不順這種不方便的事時 顯得更好笑
So Julie says, "I just sent you an email."
所以朱莉說:「我剛寄給你一封電子郵件。」
Susan: "lol, I see it."
蘇珊:「lol,我看到了。」
Very funny people, if that's what LOL means.
如果這就是 LOL 的意思,那這些人真搞笑
This Julie says, "So what's up?"
這個朱莉又說:「那妳最近如何啊?」
Susan: "lol, I have to write a 10 page paper."
蘇珊:「lol,我要寫 10 頁作文。」
She's not amused. Let's think about it. LOL is being used in a very particular way. It's a marker of empathy. It's a marker of accommodation. We linguists call things like that pragmatic particles. Any spoken language that's used by real people has them. If you happen to speak Japanese, think about that little word "ne" that you use at the end of a lot of sentences. If you listen to the way black youth today speak, think about the use of the word "yo." Whole dissertations could be written about it, and probably are being written about it. A pragmatic particle, that's what LOL has gradually become. It's a way of using the language between actual people.
她並不覺得好笑。讓我們想想看 LOL的用法很奇特 它是移情作用的標記。也是調節的標記 我們語言學家稱這種東西叫做「實用顆粒」 任何真人使用的口語當中都有 比方說如果你們會講日語,想一下 那個「ね」字,很多句子的結尾都會使用 如果你們聽現在的黑人青年如何說話 想想「yo」這個字 關於它的用法可以寫一整篇論文 或可能已經有人寫過了。 LOL 已經逐漸成為這樣的「實用顆粒」 它是人與人之間使用語言的方式
Another example is "slash." Now, we can use slash in the way that we're used to, along the lines of, "We're going to have a party-slash-networking session." That's kind of like what we're at. Slash is used in a very different way in texting among young people today. It's used to change the scene.
另一個例子是「/」 現在,我們可以繼續使用斜線本來的意義 比方說「我們要開一個 派對 / 社交聚會。」 這就很接近我要表達的了 年輕人現在傳的簡訊中 斜線有了新的用法 它用於轉換場景
So for example, this Sally person says, "So I need to find people to chill with" and Jake says, "Haha" -- you could write a dissertation about "Haha" too, but we don't have time for that — "Haha so you're going by yourself? Why?"
例如,莎莉說: 「那我要找人一起玩」 然後傑克說:「哈哈」 你們也可以寫一篇關於「哈哈」的論文, 但是時間不夠了 「哈哈,那你要自己一個人去嗎?為什麼?」
Sally: "For this summer program at NYU."
莎莉:「因為今年紐約大學的暑期班。」
Jake: "Haha. Slash I'm watching this video with suns players trying to shoot with one eye."
傑克:「哈哈/現在在看一個太陽球員 單眼投籃的影片。」
The slash is interesting. I don't really even know what Jake is talking about after that, but you notice that he's changing the topic. Now that seems kind of mundane, but think about how in real life, if we're having a conversation and we want to change the topic, there are ways of doing it gracefully. You don't just zip right into it. You'll pat your thighs and look wistfully off into the distance, or you'll say something like, "Hmm, makes you think --" when it really didn't, but what you're really -- (Laughter) — what you're really trying to do is change the topic. You can't do that while you're texting, and so ways are developing of doing it within this medium. All spoken languages have what a linguist calls a new information marker -- or two, or three. Texting has developed one from this slash.
這個斜線很有意思 我不知道傑克之後還說了什麼 但你們可以注意到他的話題改變了 這聽起來似乎沒什麼大不了 但想想在現實生活中 如果我們在談話中想要轉移話題 其中不乏許多優雅婉轉的方式 不會只是硬生生插入新的話題 你們可能會拍拍大腿,意味深長地看著遠方 或者可能會說:「嗯,讓人想起 ...」 其實根本沒有想起什麼,只是想要 (笑聲) 只不過是想要轉移話題 傳簡訊就不能這樣 於是在這種媒介中,也發展出轉移話題的方式 所有口語的語言都有語言學家稱之為 「新資訊標記」的東西 它在簡訊中,由斜線衍生出來
So we have a whole battery of new constructions that are developing, and yet it's easy to think, well, something is still wrong. There's a lack of structure of some sort. It's not as sophisticated as the language of The Wall Street Journal. Well, the fact of the matter is, look at this person in 1956, and this is when texting doesn't exist, "I Love Lucy" is still on the air.
所以我們眼前有一整套新的結構 正在發展,而我們卻容易認為 嗯,這還是不對勁 還是缺乏某種結構 它跟華爾街日報的語言比起來 還是不夠華麗漂亮 嗯,事實上 看看此人,在1956年的時候 這時簡訊並不存在 電視上還在播「我愛露西」
"Many do not know the alphabet or multiplication table, cannot write grammatically -- "
「許多人不知道字母表或乘法表 無法以語法來寫作
We've heard that sort of thing before, not just in 1956. 1917, Connecticut schoolteacher. 1917. This is the time when we all assume that everything somehow in terms of writing was perfect because the people on "Downton Abbey" are articulate, or something like that.
我們之前也聽說過類似的事情 不只是在 1956 年。1917 年,康乃狄克州有一名教師 1917年,那是一個我們假設 大家的寫作技巧都很完美的時代 因為《唐頓莊園》的人都口齒伶俐 講話就是那樣
So, "From every college in the country goes up the cry, 'Our freshmen can't spell, can't punctuate.'"
他說:「國內每所大學都有這樣的呼聲 『新生不會拼寫,不會用標點符號。』
And so on. You can go even further back than this. It's the President of Harvard. It's 1871. There's no electricity. People have three names.
等等。我們甚至可以再倒帶 哈佛大學校長,1871年 那時沒有電,每個人還有三個名字
"Bad spelling, incorrectness as well as inelegance of expression in writing."
「拼字不佳 錯誤百出,而且寫作的表達不夠優雅。」
And he's talking about people who are otherwise well prepared for college studies.
他所說的正是任何 有大學學歷水準的人
You can go even further back. 1841, some long-lost superintendent of schools is upset because of what he has for a long time "noted with regret the almost entire neglect of the original" blah blah blah blah blah.
我們甚至可以再倒帶 1841 年,學校某位不知名的院長感到很不安 因為他長久以來「遺憾地發現 幾乎整個忽視原來的⋯」等等之類的
Or you can go all the way back to 63 A.D. -- (Laughter) -- and there's this poor man who doesn't like the way people are speaking Latin. As it happens, he was writing about what had become French. And so, there are always — (Laughter) (Applause) — there are always people worrying about these things and the planet somehow seems to keep spinning.
我們還可以一路追溯到西元 63 年 (笑聲) 有個可憐人並不太喜歡 大家講拉丁文的方式 那時,他寫的東西後來演變成法文 所以,總有 (笑聲)(掌聲) 總有人擔心這些事情 然而地球似乎不受影響繼續轉動
And so, the way I'm thinking of texting these days is that what we're seeing is a whole new way of writing that young people are developing, which they're using alongside their ordinary writing skills, and that means that they're able to do two things. Increasing evidence is that being bilingual is cognitively beneficial. That's also true of being bidialectal. That's certainly true of being bidialectal in terms of your writing. And so texting actually is evidence of a balancing act that young people are using today, not consciously, of course, but it's an expansion of their linguistic repertoire. It's very simple. If somebody from 1973 looked at what was on a dormitory message board in 1993, the slang would have changed a little bit since the era of "Love Story," but they would understand what was on that message board. Take that person from 1993 -- not that long ago, this is "Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure" -- those people. Take those people and they read a very typical text written by a 20-year-old today. Often they would have no idea what half of it meant because a whole new language has developed among our young people doing something as mundane as what it looks like to us when they're batting around on their little devices.
所以,我認為現在的簡訊 是年輕人正在發展的 一種全新的寫作方式 他們在日常寫作技巧之外也能使用 這意味著他們能夠同時擁有兩種寫作方式 越來越多證據顯示 雙語有利於認知上的能力 能駕馭兩種說話方式亦是如此 能駕馭兩種寫作方式尤為正確 所以說,傳簡訊其實是一種現今年輕人 使用平衡藝術的證據,當然,是不知不覺地 簡訊擴展他們的語言能力 這很簡單 如果生活在1973 年的人 去看 1993 年學生宿舍的留言板 跟《愛情故事》的時代 (1970) 相比 俚語會有些改變 但他們會明白留言版上的內容 假如讓1993 年的人— 不算很久以前 那是《阿比阿弟大冒險》的年代 讓這些人去讀 現在二十歲青少年傳的簡訊 很有可能一半都看不懂 因為一種全新的語言已經誕生在年輕人的世界 他們正在做著一些不足掛齒的事 我們看他們好像只是在亂敲 手機鍵盤的時候
So in closing, if I could go into the future, if I could go into 2033, the first thing I would ask is whether David Simon had done a sequel to "The Wire." I would want to know. And — I really would ask that — and then I'd want to know actually what was going on on "Downton Abbey." That'd be the second thing. And then the third thing would be, please show me a sheaf of texts written by 16-year-old girls, because I would want to know where this language had developed since our times, and ideally I would then send them back to you and me now so we could examine this linguistic miracle happening right under our noses. Thank you very much.
所以總結來說,如果我可以先到未來 如果我可以去到 2033 年 我會問的第一件事就是大衛 · 西蒙 他的《火線》有沒有出續集,我想知道 我真的會問這個問題 然後,我會想知道《唐頓莊園》後來劇情如何發展 這是第二件事 然後第三件事是 請給我看一段 16 歲女孩所寫的文本 因為我想知道,我們這個時代發展的語言 走向了何方 如果可以,我會把它寄來給現在的我們 讓我們可以檢視 這個發生在我們眼皮之下的語言奇蹟 謝謝大家
(Applause) Thank you. (Applause)
(掌聲) 謝謝(掌聲)