I NEED YOU! To Participate in My Linguistics Project!

[timepiececlock]

Hello, hello folks! I have Linguistics field project that I need you guys to help me with. You see, I was collecting data IRL, but I lost some of the documents and I need new data from people. Can you help me in my time of emergency? I need to get at least 18 people to fill this out, the more the better. Men are especially welcome since there's so few on my friends list. Er... that I know about, anyway. ;P

If you guys could answer these 8 survey questions, that would be great.

If you could then create a link in your journal to this entry to spread the word about my survey, that would be even better. But that's not part of the survey, so you don't have to and you could just answer the questions.

Thank you so so much.

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SURVEY

Gender:
Nationality/ the country of residence which most affected your speech:
Age:

If you are 29 years or younger, do not fill out any more questions. You may leave now with my thanks.


If you are 30 years or older, please answer the following opinion questions to the best of your ability, and feel free to elaborate as much as you like:

1. Do you think language and vocabulary in common daily use has changed since 1990?

2. Do you think widespread computer technology has had a significant effect on the vocabulary you use and understand in the last 10-15 years?

3. How would you say the vocabulary of you, your children, or the people you know has changed since 1990 with the popularization of the internet?

4. What are some new words, phrases, idioms, or other bits of figurative language you might use now that you did not use 10-15 years ago? Do these relate to technology or to other things in life?

5. What are some positive aspects of changes in slang, terminology, idioms, etc. that have occurred since or resulting from the 90s and beyond?

6. What aspects of changes in slang, terminology, idioms, etc. frustrate you or do you dislike?

7. What’s your favorite word, phrase, term or idiom introduced in the last 10-15 years?

8. Do you have a job in the computer/tech industry, and if so how might that affect your answers on this survey?

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Thank you for participating. NOTE: The age question is very important so please be honest about it... my project involves the perspective of people over 30 because that's an age wherein I judged that people would have lived long enough to accurately measure some changes in the language over longer periods of time. Of course, if you want to fill it out for fun, you're welcome to do so. Just make sure you tell me so on the age question. :)

EDIT: I've got enough now, thank you!

Comments

[loriel-eris.livejournal.com]

Gender: Female
Nationality/ the country of residence which most affected your speech: UK
Age: 21

Hope it's of some help! Oh, and in case you were wondering, I found you via a post by voleuse on eretria's f-list.

Good luck with the survey. :)

[tartanboxers.livejournal.com]

SURVEY

Gender: Female
Nationality/ the country of residence which most affected your speech: US
Age: 40

If you are 29 years or younger, do not fill out any more questions. You may leave now with my thanks.


If you are 30 years or older, please answer the following opinion questions to the best of your ability, and feel free to elaborate as much as you like:

1. Do you think language and vocabulary in common daily use has changed since 1990?

Yes

2. Do you think widespread computer technology has had a significant effect on the vocabulary you use and understand in the last 10-15 years?

Yes

3. How would you say the vocabulary of you, your children, or the people you know has changed since 1990 with the popularization of the internet?

I think more people tend to abbreviate things and use short cuts. There's more technical-related vocabulary that's become part of mainstream speech. I can't say from personal experience, but I would assume that English usage has become more "Americanized" in English-speaking countries outside North America based on the simple fact that the North America has the largest English-speaking population.

4. What are some new words, phrases, idioms, or other bits of figurative language you might use now that you did not use 10-15 years ago? Do these relate to technology or to other things in life?

Lots of technical or internet related things: e-mail, web host, web site, mother board, spam (used to mean junk email) etc.

I'd say that maybe my vocabulary is "younger". I never used to say something sucks for example. Actually that expression existed when I was in high school, but it wasn't something I could have said in front of my parents, so I didn't use it and I didn't pick it up then. I use it more now because I see it all the time on the net.

5. What are some positive aspects of changes in slang, terminology, idioms, etc. that have occurred since or resulting from the 90s and beyond?

This is completely theoretical, but I would think in the long run it makes slang less slang. Classically slang was developed by a certain group to set itself off from another. It was meant to be difficult to understand. But when you're on the internet and chatting with people around the world, you have to stick to slang everyone understands for the most part. I think as a result certain slang expression catch on more than others, but then as a result of nearly universal understanding, would these terms really be slang.

Actually, I don't see this as either positive or negative. It's just something that's probably happening. IMO the language is going to evolve faster as a result. More words will come into universal usage more quickly.

6. What aspects of changes in slang, terminology, idioms, etc. frustrate you or do you dislike?

I don't like "net speak". I realize it's faster to type, but when you're communicating by means of message boards, LJ, something more permanent than chat, I feel it's a sign of laziness. It honestly doesn't take all that much longer to type "you" than it does "u".

Common abbreviations like LOL or BTW are fine IMO. ;-)

7. What’s your favorite word, phrase, term or idiom introduced in the last 10-15 years?

Can't say I have one.

8. Do you have a job in the computer/tech industry, and if so how might that affect your answers on this survey?

No I don't, although I used to run a website, and I still have a small personal one.

[daev.livejournal.com]

Gender: M
Nationality: American
Age: 37

1. Do you think language and vocabulary in common daily use has changed since 1990?

Of course; linguistic change in action. It mostly seems to be on the same narrow heavily-contested ground as always: words for "good" "cool" "bad" "boy" "girl" come and go.

2. Do you think widespread computer technology has had a significant effect on the vocabulary you use and understand in the last 10-15 years?

Well, yes, because I am a programmer - I use words that wouldn't exist otherwise! Outside of the obviously technical field, I made a big effort to pick up old-style "hacker slang" when I read The Hacker's Dictionary in 1983, so that's probably the biggest computer-related influence on my speech.

3. How would you say the vocabulary of you, your children, or the people you know has changed since 1990 with the popularization of the internet?

Since I was active on the Internet before the big popularization in about '92, I've seen some of my own usages shift to match emerging popular consensus. For example, we used to say "send me some mail"; mail (meaning e-mail) was a mass noun. Now it's "send me an e-mail". "Surfing" the web is another one that's come from outside rather than from within my tech community experience. Other people my age have been more unconsciously resistant, but I try to stay linguistically hip.

4. What are some new words, phrases, idioms, or other bits of figurative language you might use now that you did not use 10-15 years ago? Do these relate to technology or to other things in life?

A lot of Anglicisms from spending a year in Britain. ("Brilliant" "chat up" "boozer" and other such words that fit a niche well.) "Lame" for pathetic, "rules" and "rocks" (though these existed in the '80s), "timesuck", "earworm", "what.ever" (i.e. that particular Generation X way of saying the word), "web-surfing" (as mentioned above), and the productive use of the "-age" suffix (sheepage, flamage, suckage, etc.). A certain amount of "gangsta" slang, used very ironically; I'm on the wrong side of whatever divide happened where white kids identified with hip-hop culture. The "have a X thing going" construction.

5. What are some positive aspects of changes in slang, terminology, idioms, etc. that have occurred since or resulting from the 90s and beyond?

The spread of Net popularity has meant that there are now commonly understood phrases to convey to non-geeks what I had to struggle with explaining in the '80s. Some annoying slang has passed on into oblivion (Valley Girl, Preppie, and Heavy Metal talk), but this is part of the constant churn. See also some of the phrases in question 4 and question 7.

6. What aspects of changes in slang, terminology, idioms, etc. frustrate you or do you dislike?

Probably the biggest one - though it's written only - is the mainstreaming of teen chat-room habits. You can now see people posting quite unselfconsciously in serious public forums (such as "comp.compilers" on Usenet) in that all-lowercase, apostropheless, "u" and "ur"-laden unreadable crap; it's moved outside the realm of in-group slang that its writers wouldn't feel comfortable using in adult company. I can easily see where a lot of the casual writing for public consumption by younger Net users might end up quite hard for me to decode in the future.

I also don't like "owns" (intransitive) and the ubiquitous -ors verbal suffix: Cory Doctorow recently wrote a short story called "0wnz0red" which I almost didn't read because of its title. :-)

7. What’s your favorite word, phrase, term or idiom introduced in the last 10-15 years?

The construction "Best. X. Ever."

8. Do you have a job in the computer/tech industry, and if so how might that affect your answers on this survey?

Yup. I'm a programmer, and have been a "hacker" (old word for "geek") since 1980 when I was writing machine-language programs for my TRS-80. Thus I saw the '90s Internet onslaught from the inside perspective of someone who had already consciously adopted '60s and '70s computer slang.

[par-avion.livejournal.com]

SURVEY
Gender: female
Nationality/ the country of residence which most affected your speech: USA
Age: 32

1. Do you think language and vocabulary in common daily use has changed since 1990?
Yes

2. Do you think widespread computer technology has had a significant effect on the vocabulary you use and understand in the last 10-15 years?
Yes

3. How would you say the vocabulary of you, your children, or the people you know has changed since 1990 with the popularization of the internet?
Yes

4. What are some new words, phrases, idioms, or other bits of figurative language you might use now that you did not use 10-15 years ago? Do these relate to technology or to other things in life?
email, imac, ipod, mp3, internet, cell phone, mocha (Starbucks), tivo
Tech related plus Starbucks

5. What are some positive aspects of changes in slang, terminology, idioms, etc. that have occurred since or resulting from the 90s and beyond?

6. What aspects of changes in slang, terminology, idioms, etc. frustrate you or do you dislike?
The increasing prevalence of abbreviations and wacky misspellings which are derived from AIM / text-messaging. (e.g. sk8ter boi)

7. What’s your favorite word, phrase, term or idiom introduced in the last 10-15 years?
email

8. Do you have a job in the computer/tech industry, and if so how might that affect your answers on this survey?
No. I'm a paralegal.

[aibhinn.livejournal.com]

Female
United States of America
30

1. Do you think language and vocabulary in common daily use has changed since 1990?

Absolutely.

2. Do you think widespread computer technology has had a significant effect on the vocabulary you use and understand in the last 10-15 years?

Yes. The explosion of Internet use, which began in 1995 or so, changed the language dramatically. I noticed it at the time, and I still notice it.

3. How would you say the vocabulary of you, your children, or the people you know has changed since 1990 with the popularization of the internet?

It's changed in everything from slang (The use of the term 'to 404' to mean to forget, as in when your destination website is not available and you pull up a "404 error") to spelling (I HATE!!! IM slang/shorthand) to simple frames of reference--very few people knew what e-mail was in 1990.

4. What are some new words, phrases, idioms, or other bits of figurative language you might use now that you did not use 10-15 years ago? Do these relate to technology or to other things in life?

5. What are some positive aspects of changes in slang, terminology, idioms, etc. that have occurred since or resulting from the 90s and beyond?

I'm fond of the aforementioned "I've 404ed on that," but overall, I don't there's anything particularly positive about it. Nor particularly negative; it's just a fact of life in the 21st century.

6. What aspects of changes in slang, terminology, idioms, etc. frustrate you or do you dislike?

The use of IM slang in writing (e.g. students writing "b4" instead of taking the time to write out "before") and the lack of spelling/punctuation/grammar in some emails is quite frustrating.

7. What’s your favorite word, phrase, term or idiom introduced in the last 10-15 years?

Heh... probably the 404 one.

8. Do you have a job in the computer/tech industry, and if so how might that affect your answers on this survey

No, I don't. I work in education.

Hope that helps! :)

Answers from my husband - I did the typing ;)

[vivien]

SURVEY

Gender: male
Nationality/ the country of residence which most affected your speech: US
Age: 40

If you are 29 years or younger, do not fill out any more questions. You may leave now with my thanks.


If you are 30 years or older, please answer the following opinion questions to the best of your ability, and feel free to elaborate as much as you like:

1. Do you think language and vocabulary in common daily use has changed since 1990?
Yes.

2. Do you think widespread computer technology has had a significant effect on the vocabulary you use and understand in the last 10-15 years?
Not a drastic effect.

3. How would you say the vocabulary of you, your children, or the people you know has changed since 1990 with the popularization of the internet?
It's changed quite a bit.

4. What are some new words, phrases, idioms, or other bits of figurative language you might use now that you did not use 10-15 years ago? Do these relate to technology or to other things in life?
More of mine comes from academic areas, but I do use tech terms occaisionally like gig, email, web site, etc. I'm not much of a computer person though.

5. What are some positive aspects of changes in slang, terminology, idioms, etc. that have occurred since or resulting from the 90s and beyond?
"Hip hop" speech has made American English more colorful. It's given pedantic terms different meanings, and therefore colored the language.

6. What aspects of changes in slang, terminology, idioms, etc. frustrate you or do you dislike?
I hate the way the military uses abbreviated euphanisms lately (WMDs, etc).

7. What’s your favorite word, phrase, term or idiom introduced in the last 10-15 years?
Dope.

8. Do you have a job in the computer/tech industry, and if so how might that affect your answers on this survey?
No

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