The New English of Convenience

By

Obododimma Oha

It was many years ago that George Orwell lamented the deplorable state of the English language in an essay that he called “Politics  and the English Language.” Orwell argued that meaning in the language had suffered and that users were becoming less and less creative. He blamed the lack of creativity on copying stereotyped expressions that had come into  existence, especially from meaninglessness authored by politicians to deceive. He gave examples of some patterns that users of the language should avoid. Orwell would weep if he sees what the language has now become, not because words like “mama-put” and “okada” are now English, or that norm users can be norm developers, as Braj Kachru explained it, but because the language is so dangerously creative for convenience in the discourse of some. This essay describes this “convenience” and its English.

You may not describe this as convenience at all, but a  symptom of laziness. Laziness always looks for a simpler and easier way out. If language shows that our minds are at work, then distorting it to the extent that any short form goes, is the mind not working to weave interesting patterns. The mind is merely looking for short cuts and making linguistic communication unimportant. It could be seen as a convenient way of making language uninteresting and disengaged from the activity.

Convenience, in this case, is a way of running away from what one is required to do make linguistic  communication interesting. If language is creative and a rule-governed behaviour, even keeping away from the rules of its structuring in the name of what seem "convenient" is linguistic lawlessness of anything-goes. It is not convenience; it is barbarism!

I sometimes encounter the following patterns in modern electronic writing (SMS precisely) and even in paper-and-ink writing!

1. It is 4 real.

2. This is d best way 2 go.

3. I am 4 Jesus.

4.  I luv apples and mangoes.

5. Laif is 4 d living.

Let us swallow our anger as language police for a while. Sorry for English, for the (“d” !) way it is going. 

Why is “for “ written as “4”? When did the numeral become equivalent to those letters that make up “for”? Are they synonymous? Is this not a sign of decay creeping into writing and into education? If “4” (“four”) is now “for,” has spelling not collapsed in language use? In that case, any word can be spelled anyhow! That means, standing things on their heads, the unacceptable becoming acceptable! Anything goes!

In the second instance, “2” like “4” witnesses a numeral wrongly substituting the preposition “to.” Two (“2”) cannot be “to.” Unless to an insane inmate of an asylum who wishes to vomit anything that in the mouth as language. Similarly, the definite article “the” cannot be the fourth letter of the English alphabet, “d.” Even asylum inmates know that. Their “that” is also not “dat,” even if their English is  deliberately designed  for linguistic comedy!

When I think of “d” becoming “the,” I think the irrelevance of the language teacher: there is then no need for any teacher. We can write or say anything and call it English!

 The third example tries to smear Jesus and born-again expression. “I am for Jesus” ( “I am the property of Jesus” or “I am a supporter of Jesus”) is not the same as “I am 4 Jesus”). Does “I am 4 Jesus” mean that the person belongs to four persons called “Jesus?” In that case, the user is moving from vagueness to ambiguity and non-creatively, too!  Sorry for being dragged into this linguistic mess, Jesus!

In the fourth instance, “love” is re-spelled as “luv” and we call that nonsense “convenience.” That is clearly a lazy person’s escape from conventional spelling. The person’s love for apples is a fake Valentine affection! The “love” is as disfigured as “luv.”

Imagine “life” in the fifth instance being spelled as “laif.” The excuse is that the writer is constrained by witing space and shortens (distorts!) the word. Indeed! How many letters make up the word “life” and how many make up “laif”? Four! If the last is mere linguistic comedy, say a malapropism, it is a great failure and cannot force me to laugh, except maybe at stupidity.

So, one is sorry for English that becomes a language of convenience and uses technological space constraints on SMS writing as an excuse. English of convenience can only be a symptom of decay and laziness that has gripped a bad user of language and technological equipment.