Digital Discourse Database

Number of Posts: 4
Posts 1 - 4

Abusar de los "Emojis": ¿el nuevo enemigo del lenguaje?

(Abusing emojis: the new enemy of language?)

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Newspaper | infobae
Date | 13.1.2016
Language | Spanish
Country | Argentina
Topic Tags | emojis, language threat, youth
Summary | An Instagram study revealed that emojis are becoming more popular and are replacing words in messages. Linguist Silvia Ramirez Gelbes claims that using emojis allows users to say something very precise in one click -whereas using words would take longer. Are emojis detrimental to written language? According to the linguist, emojis are not harmful and they are not a "youth phenomenon".
Image Description | Photograph of a man (head cut off) holding a selfie stick and taking a selfie; he is also wearing five emoji medals around his neck.
Image Tags | emojis, male(s), selfie stick, smartphone

El impacto de la redes sociales en el lenguaje

(The impact of social media on language)

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Newspaper | infobae
Date | 3.7.2016
Language | Spanish
Country | Argentina
Topic Tags | emojis, language threat, social media, spelling
Summary | Social media have an impact on the Spanish language with the adoption of new words such as "tuitear" (to tweet) or googlear (to google). Linguist Silvia Ramirez Gelbes claims that language is alive; it is growing, changing, and adopting new words. The introduction of new words in a language is not anything new; for example, when planes were first created, the aeronautical world had to create new words. Gelbes also states that people (and not authorities) are the ones who decide which words are to be used. Moreover, she says that although we live in a "visual culture", emojis are not a threat to our language; they should be viewed as a complement. Finally, people write more, so we witness a multiplication of spelling mistakes, but new technologies don't have a negative impact on spelling.
Image Description | Photograph of a man holding a speech bubble with different symbols related to new technologies, and five Twitter links to other related infobae articles.
Image Tags | emojis, male(s), Twitter

Ante la violencia de género: 'Educad al niño para no castigar al hombre'

(Gender violence: 'Educate the child so as not to punish the man')

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Newspaper | El Mundo
Date | 26.11.2016
Language | Spanish
Country | Spain
Topic Tags | addiction, gender, threat, youth
Summary | A photo competition called "Don't touch my WhatsApp" (No me toques el WhatsApp) took place in Spain in order to fight against gender violence. A work called "Connected" won the second prize in the '14-17 year-old' category. According to the director, the photograph represents a different side of today's reality; whereas young people rely a lot on new technologies -which can harm relationships-, the work portrays the substitution of a digital relationship to a face-to-face one. The face-to-face relationship is sincere, direct, responsible, and caring.
Image Description | Photograph of two young people sitting on a bench and texting; YouTube video (second prize in the 'video' category); photograph of two young people talking face-to-face in the backgroung (foreground: two smartphones).
Image Tags | female(s), male(s), smartphone, text

¿Le mandarías una foto desnudo a tu mejor amigo?

(Would you send a naked picture of yourself to your best friend?)

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Newspaper | El País
Date | 15.4.2016
Language | Spanish
Country | Spain
Topic Tags | sexting, texting
Summary | Human beings have three vital functions: communication, reproduction, and drinking/eating. Nowadays, people can satisfy these three functions online. Some might say that sharing naked pictures online is egocentric, but others try to normalize online nudity (e.g. with #FreeTheNipple and #Nutscapes). Another example is frexting (friends + texting); people send (half) naked pictures of themselves to friends instead of sending them to everyone on social media. Unlike popular beliefs, the author of the article found out that users who practice frexting can be males, females, and from different sexual orientations. Unlike sexting and the idealization of bodies, frexting is a way to go beyond the pressure of body representation. Frexting equals normalization and ridicule.
Image Description | Two photographs of frexting on social media: Paco Leon on Twitter, and Chelsea Handler on Instagram, and GIF of a naked woman (breasts and genitalia blurred).
Image Tags | female(s), gifs, male(s), social media

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