Digital Discourse Database

Number of Posts: 3
Posts 1 - 3

«Jemandem zu sagen, er solle sich ficken, ist ziemlich schlimm»

(«Telling soeone to go fuck himself is pretty bad»)

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Newspaper | Tages-Anzeiger
Date | 5.4.2017
Language | German
Country | Switzerland
Topic Tags | anglicisms, language threat, research/study, texting, word/writing
Summary | Linguist Elisabeth Stark is research texting communication with a corpus of 18000 text messages and even more WhatsApp messages. She says that about 2-3% of the words are anglicisms and that their amount does not seem to be rising rapidly - the word "fuck" for instance is still too strong for most German speakers. In German, sex is too taboo for taboo language. Her data also shows that Swiss people choose the local dialect rather than the standard variety when texting. Most people's langugage competencies are not compromised by this informal communication, most can adhere to conventions when a formal register is appropriate.
Image Description | Portrait of the interviewee and a Keystone image of a protest with a sign reading "fuck".
Image Tags | female(s), text

Schriftliche Forschheiten: Vom Niedergang der Höflichkeit

(Written briskness: On the demise of politeness)

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Newspaper | Neue Zürcher Zeitung (NZZ)
Date | 1.9.2014
Language | German
Country | Switzerland
Topic Tags | email, language threat, politeness, school, texting, WhatsApp, word/writing
Summary | Communication researchers agree that politeness in professional writing has decreased with the rise of digital communication. Rules of formal writing are omitted: what was“Honored Professor So-and-so” is now a simple “Hello”. Both students and also professors are reported to have a relaxed level of formality in email exchanges. This is usually seen as an influence of texting, where traditional messages of respect are omitted, but it can also be argued that the new brief communication style is a form of respecting the addressee’s time by writing efficiently.
Image Description | Photograph of a female texting; the shot does not show the person's face but emphasizes the phone.
Image Tags | female(s), hand(s), smartphone, text

Viele, viele bunte Symbole

(Many, many colorful symbols)

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Newspaper | St. Galler Tagblatt
Date | 15.10.2014
Language | German
Country | Switzerland
Topic Tags | addiction, emojis, language threat, texting, What's up Switzerland
Summary | Emojis are frequently incorporated in text messages and are slightly addictive. Christa Dürscheid from ‘What’s Up, Switzerland?’ says that they are a must-have for ‘insiders' . Even older users are getting used to emojis since there is such a huge selection from which to choose. Emojis do however not replace written communication but serve to indicate emotions or add emphasis.
Image Description | Digital image of a chat bubble with words in German and emojis (beers and smiling face).
Image Tags | emojis, text

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