Analysis of interpersonal metafunction in text messages a case study of group text messages among teachers of english at viet anh school

BINH DUONG PROVINCIAL PEOPLE’S COMMITTEE
THU DAU MOT UNIVERSITY

TRUONG THI THUY TRINH

ANALYSIS OF INTERPERSONAL METAFUNCTION IN
TEXT MESSAGES: A CASE STUDY OF GROUP TEXT
MESSAGES AMONG TEACHERS OF ENGLISH AT
VIET ANH SCHOOL

MAJOR: ENGLISH LANGUAGE
MAJOR CODE: 8 22 02 01

MASTER THESIS IN ENGLISH LANGUAGE

BINH DUONG PROVINCE - 2021


BINH DUONG PROVINCIAL PEOPLE’S COMMITTEE
THU DAU MOT UNIVERSITY

TRUONG THI THUY TRINH

ANALYSIS OF INTERPERSONAL METAFUNCTION IN
TEXT MESSAGES: A CASE STUDY OF GROUP TEXT
MESSAGES AMONG TEACHERS OF ENGLISH AT
VIET ANH SCHOOL

MAJOR: ENGLISH LANGUAGE
MAJOR CODE: 8 22 02 01

MASTER THESIS IN ENGLISH LANGUAGE
SUPERVISED BY NGUYEN VU PHUONG, PhD.

BINH DUONG PROVINCE - 2021


ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
I would like to express my sincere gratitude to my supervisor, Dr. Nguyen
Vu Phuong, who has given expertise support for the development and completion
of my thesis. His support has facilitated my professional growth as a researcher,
and he offered me his guidance and thorough critique with expertise. I also owe him
gratitude for his patience and encouragement throughout the process of the study.
I wish to express my deep gratitude to 15 teachers of English at Viet Anh
School who kindly agreed to participate in this study. The data collection would not
have been completed without their support. I give my sincere thanks to these
participants for their willingness and arranging time in their heavy schedules to
participate in this study
I also would like to thank the management of Viet Anh School for their
support on my completion of the thesis.
My gratitude is due to the postgraduate administrative office personnel at
Thu Dau Mot University for providing the necessary support during my study
period. I highly appreciate their care and service.
Special thanks are due to my grandma, parents, brother and sister for their
support, love, and encouragement that promoted my strength and passion to achieve
a master’s degree.

i


ABSTRACT

This study examines an interpersonal metafunction and textism analysis of
group text messaging among teachers of English at Viet Anh School. 1090 teachers
of English’ messages were analysed in terms of speech function, mood, modality,
personal pronoun and categories of textism (including linguistic textism, typing
error and contextual textism) in order to find out how the interpersonal metafunction
was being served in English teacher’ text messages and how the social relationship
among these teachers was expressed through their language in text messages.
Systemic Functional Grammar was used as the theoretical framework to guide the
study. The analysis reveals that through interpersonal metafunction the relationship
among teachers of English established and maintained. The analysis indicates that
the teachers of English often use text messages for providing more information and
demanding services by the dominant use of declaratives clauses in their interaction.
These teachers of English also perform their plans or desires about their future
intention through the frequent use of modality such as ‘will’, ‘can’ or ‘could’.
Through the analysis of personal pronouns, it can be clear that the teachers of
English tend to interact with each other by sharing their points of view rather than
mentioning about other things or persons. Their social relation is shortened through
the popular use of pronouns ‘I’, ‘we’ and ‘you’ Moreover, the application of textism
shows that the mutual comprehension among English teachers through the
pragmatic use of non-standard form in text messaging and the limited use of
categories of textism did not lead the receivers to confusions or misunderstanding.
The findings suggest that declarative clauses are suggested to transfer more
information to the teachers. In addition, the use of ‘will’, ‘can’ and ‘could’ for
indicating the inclination or probability of the teachers of English which is applied
in order to show attitude and intention in the performance their role in the society.
Moreover, the frequent use of personal pronouns ‘I’, ‘We’ and ‘You’ indicates
about the close relationship among the teachers of English when they interact to
ii

each other in order to show their position in the process of exchanging of
information. Textism benefits because teachers of English can give more
expressions on their information conveyed through the pragmatic use of nonstandard form in text messages.

iii


TABLE OF CONTENTS

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT ............................................................................................ i
ABSTRACT .................................................................................................................. ii
TABLE OF CONTENTS ........................................................................................... iv
LIST OF TABLES ...................................................................................................... vi
LIST OF APPENDICIES .......................................................................................... vii
CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION ............................................................................... 1
1.1. Background of the study ................................................................................... 1
1.2. Rationale of the study ....................................................................................... 2
1.3. Scope of the study .............................................................................................. 3
1.4. Objectives and research questions of the study .............................................. 4
1.5. Significance of the study ................................................................................... 4
1.6. Organization of the study ................................................................................. 6
CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW................................................................... 7
2.1 Text messaging and its role in communication and its challenge. ................. 7
2.1.1. Text messaging............................................................................................. 7
2.1.2. Role of text messaging in communication. ............................................... 10
2.1.3. Challenges of using text messages ............................................................ 11
2.2. Theoretical and Practical Studies on Text Messaging ................................. 12
2.3. Textism: Pragmatics of Word Form in Text Messages ............................... 14
2.3.1. Textism ....................................................................................................... 14
2.3.2. Pragmatics of word form in text messages. .............................................. 16

2.4. Theoretical background: Systemic Functional Grammar .......................... 17
2.4.1. An overview of Systemic Functional Grammar ....................................... 17
2.4.2. Context ....................................................................................................... 18
2.4.3. Metafunction .............................................................................................. 19
2.4.4. Interpersonal metafunction and the clause .............................................. 21
2.4.4.1. Speech functions................................................................................... 22
2.4.4.2.

Mood ................................................................................................. 27

2.4.4.3. Polarity and modality .......................................................................... 34
2.4.4.4. Personal pronoun ................................................................................ 37
2.4.5. Previous research findings ........................................................................ 38
2.5. Summary and research gap ............................................................................ 40

iv


2.5.1. Summary .................................................................................................... 40
2.5.2. Research gap .............................................................................................. 42
2.6. The framework of the study. .......................................................................... 43
CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY............................................................................ 46
3.1. Research Design ............................................................................................... 46
3.2. Sampling ........................................................................................................... 47
3.3. Data Collection ................................................................................................ 49
3.4. Data Analysis ................................................................................................... 50
3.5. The Trustworthiness of the Findings ............................................................. 52
CHAPTER 4: FINDINGS AND ANALYSIS .......................................................... 54
4.1. Mood ................................................................................................................. 54
4.1.1. Mood types and speech functions. ............................................................ 54

4.1.1.1. Declaratives ......................................................................................... 55
4.1.1.2. Interrogatives ....................................................................................... 57
4.1.1.3. Imperatives ........................................................................................... 58
4.1.1.4. Minor clause ........................................................................................ 59
4.1.1.5. Exclamatives ........................................................................................ 60
4.1.2. Speech function and responses. ................................................................ 61
4.2. Modality ........................................................................................................... 65
4.2.1. Inclination/ futurity ................................................................................... 68
4.2.2. Probability .................................................................................................. 69
4.2.3. Obligation ................................................................................................... 70
4.2.4. Usuality ...................................................................................................... 71
4.3. Personal pronouns ........................................................................................... 72
4.4. Textism ............................................................................................................. 75
CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSION .................................................................................. 80
5.1. Summary of findings ....................................................................................... 80
5.2. Implications ...................................................................................................... 81
5.3. Recommendations for future studies. ............................................................ 82
5.4. Concluding remarks ........................................................................................ 83
REFERENCES ........................................................................................................... 84
APPENDICIES....................................................................................................... ９２

v


LIST OF TABLES
Table 2.1. Categories of textism and examples ..................................................... 14
Table 2.2. Speech roles and commodities in interaction ....................................... 23
Table 2.3. Speech function and responses ............................................................. 23
Table 2.4: Example of Mood element structure .................................................... 27
Table 2.5: Finite Verbal Operator .......................................................................... 28

Table 2.6: Example of Structure of declarative mood ........................................... 30
Table 2.7: Example of Structure of Yes/No interrogative ..................................... 30
Table 2.8. Example of Interrogative Clause .......................................................... 31
Table 2.9: Example of Imperative Mood ............................................................... 32
Table 2.10: Example of Exclamative mood .......................................................... 33
Table 2.11: The Degree of modalisation realisations in English ........................... 35
Table 2.12: The Degree of modulation realisations in English ............................. 36
Table 2.13: Personal pronouns in English ............................................................. 37
Table 3.1. The participants of the study ................................................................ 48
Table 3.2: Data Analysis Sheet .............................................................................. 51
Table 4.1: Mood types and speech functions......................................................... 54
Table 4.2: Speech functions and their responses ................................................... 61
Table 4.3: Semantic realisation of modality .......................................................... 65
Table 4.4. Number and percentage of types of modality ....................................... 67
Table 4.5: Use of personal pronoun ....................................................................... 72
Table 4.6: Textisms in the text messages .............................................................. 76
LIST OF FIGURES
Figure 1: The framework of the study ................................................................... 44
Figure 2: The steps in analysing the data ............................................................... 52

vi


LIST OF APPENDICIES
Appendix A: Samples of data analysis .............................................................. ９２
Appendix B: Emailed request for participation. ................................................ ９５
Appendix C: Consent form for participants at Viet Anh School. ...................... ９６
Appendix D: Peer-investigator confidentiality agreement form. ...................... ９７

vii

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION

1.1. Background of the study
The rapid development of the technology (e.g., modern devices such as mobile
phones) appears to meet the needs for the communication and entertainment. The
development of modern telecommunication has brought people closer in order to open
all aspects of life. Among effective tools for conveying information, text messaging is
becoming more popular when it responds to various purposes by its written language.
It is the most effective, convenient and common technological tool for communication
because it is time-saving and economical (Mampa & Kwema, 2005). According to
DeVito (2001), communication is one of the key mediators in today’s world.
Communication occurred firstly in oral forms which were then transferred into written
ones. Thus, oral and written communications have become part of human life and have
been hard to separate (Soffer, 2010).
Text messaging has brought benefits for communication to users as regards speed,
security, and connection which are evaluated highly in the world. Besides that, the
evolution of language was mainly influenced by the speed of texting messages, because
it is important for the users of texting messaging to have a timely reply rather than a
grammatically correct one. Soffer (2010) stated that interpersonal communication
through texting messages is not as effective as traditional face-to-face interaction since
the expressions in text messages are lack emotions on face, gestures, voice and sight.
However, he regarded these are as the key components for creating personal and
professional relationships.
Halliday and Matthiessen (2004) expressed that language functions build and
maintain social relationship between writers and readers. The way the texters apply
their language in texting indicates their behaviors and attitudes in receiving the
information from messages. Also, people interact with one another and share all kinds
of information such as expressing their status, social and individual attitudes by sending

1


text messages. Matthiessen (1995) pointed out that interpersonal meaning refers to the
form of action for making meaning in order to show how people establish their language
through forms of action such as asking information, offering services and expressing
their thought (Lock, 1996). Halliday and Hasan (1989) stated in an interpersonal
metafunction analysis that sentences in the text are viewed as an interaction among the
interlocutors. The interpersonal metafunction also expresses the way the sender and the
receiver interact with each other. Their language is used to establish and maintain
relationships, express our own view point on things in the world. In addition, text
messaging can be examined from a variety of perspectives.
1.2. Rationale of the study
Halliday’s theory on systemic functional grammar is expanded to the analysis of
various types of text such as speeches, movies, and stories (Nurhidayah, 2013; Martanto,
2014; Fauzi, 2013; Ilham, 2019; and Prasetyo, 2013). The current study tends to focus
on analysing the language in text messaging which can match the studies of El-Falaky
(2016), El Kholy (2019), and Nepomuceno (2005) on the analysis on text messages
within the Hallidayan framework. Two of them conducted by El Kholy (2019) and ElFalaky (2016) on analysing interpersonal metafunction via advertisements in text
messages and Nepomuceno (2005) investigated the students’ conversation in texting
messaging to explore the influence of their culture and language on interpersonal
metafunction. According to Halliday and Matthiensen (2014), meaning is created from
language, so text is a process of making meaning in context. They state that:
“Thus recipes, weather forecasts, stock market reports, rental agreements, e-mail
messages, inaugural speeches, service encounters in the local deli, news bulletins, media
interviews, tutorial sessions, walking tours in a guide book, gossip during a tea-break,
advertisements, bedtime stories, and all the other innumerable text types we meet in life
are all ways of using language in different contexts.” (Halliday & Matthiensen, 2014, p.
27)

Through the interpersonal metafunction, the speakers/writers and listeners/readers can

2


show their social status in their interpersonal relationships which is presented with
clauses as exchange (Halliday, 1985). Thus, the study of interpersonal metafunction
offers people an understanding of the mechanism by which interpersonal meanings are
created as regards their social positions, attitudes and judgement (Nurhidayah, 2013).
With chatting features in text messaging, the speech function, mood, modality and
personal pronouns in interpersonal meaning are exploited in order to discover the
functions expected from their language use as well as to identify their behavior in social
interaction. In addition, there are a number of non-standard forms in English occurred
in text messages when they create a situation for analysing textism related to
abbreviations, single letters or symbols. Textism produces a variety of pragmatic
meanings in order to indicate the texters’ intention and implication which cannot be
present in standard forms. Because of the necessity of the comprehension of
information conveyed for obtaining an effective communication, the users of textism
needs exploring and comprehending clearly so as to avoiding causing any confusion to
the receivers.
In short, language needs exploiting through different contexts. The current study
focuses on the exploration of social relationship in interpersonal metafunction among
the colleagues through text messaging which connects to the tradition of the analysis of
metafunction in the context of workplace. This particular context should be investigated
to comprehended how the interaction among colleagues impacts to their social relation.
Therefore, the rationale of this study is to connect the feature of interpersonal
metafunction and textism to the language of text messaging in that it matches with the
tradition of text messaging for meeting the communication need and maintain social
relations. Understanding the function of interpersonal metafunction may help to

discover language “as a means of communicating information” (Halliday, 1975, p. 21)
1.3. Scope of the study
This study focused on interpersonal metafunction of the text messages which were

3


mainly analysed in terms of the speech functions, mood, modality and personal
pronouns and features of textism. The study used Systemic Functional Grammar as the
theoretical framework to examine the components of interpersonal metafunction in the
text messages of teachers of English at Viet Anh school. In addition, textism is regarded
as the main feature of text messaging which will be analysed in term of three main
categories including linguistic textism, typing error and contextual textism. Thus, the
analysis of interpersonal metafunction and textism between the sender and receiver
aimed to discover how the social relationship maintained and developed through the
use of text messaging.
1.4. Objectives and research questions of the study
As mentioned above, the study was conducted to analyse interpersonal
metafunction including mood types, speech functions, modality, personal pronouns and
features of textism in order to interpret the interpersonal meaning of text messages in
communication. Therefore, the objectives of this study are:
1. To find out the way the interpersonal metafunction is being served in text messages
of teachers of English.
2. To discover how social relationship among teachers of English is expressed through
their language in text messages.
Research questions
1. How is interpersonal metafunction being served in text messages of teachers of
English?
2. How are social relationships facilitated among teachers of English through their
language use in text messages?

1.5. Significance of the study

4


This study has both theoretical and practical significance. Theoretically, this study
provides an extra resource in the analysis of interpersonal metafunction in text
messages manifested by teachers of English. The structures performed in text messages
emerged not only the lexicogrammar, but also the semantic and by the frequent
application of interpersonal metafunction to convey information, a variety of functions
for interacting among participants contribute to the development of functional language.
It is suggested that interpersonal metafunction expresses the function of lexicogrammar
and semantic which are not only in oral communication but in written language.
Through the analysis of interpersonal metafunction of text messages, language is
discovered in a variety of aspects of the clauses including complex clauses. From the
understanding of the exchange of information of clauses in the text messages, clause
complexes are analysed in terms of interpersonal metafunction which includes the
aspects of speech function, mood, modality and personal pronouns. Therefore, the
study’s theoretical contribution is that through such analysis, the mechanism of how
speech function, mood, modality and personal pronouns are structured to establish
social relationship. A part of interpersonal metafunction, the pragmatic meaning is
conveyed through the analysis of textism in text messages which supports the
comprehension about more shortened words or abbreviations.
From practical aspect, teachers of English (foreign teachers and Vietnamese
managers) can understand and evaluate the language verbalized in text messages so that
they can interact with each other appropriately. Each person produces different mood
types with various speech functions, so the findings of the study provide teachers of
English with insights into their written language so that they are aware of and able to
create appropriate messages with relevant communication purposes for their context.

To English Department, the analysis of interpersonal metafunction and textism
gives a valuable insight into the attitudes of foreign teachers in performing their
language so that managers can have an opportunity to understand firmly language use
in written language of teachers of English. In addition, this study helps to evaluate the
way foreigners use language in communication as well as in teaching students. Since

5


texting is used frequently among foreign teachers, the way they use English in texting
messages influence partly to their teaching including spoken and written language.
1.6. Organization of the study
The structure of this study includes five chapters. Chapter one introduces the topic
and its main features to provide an overview of the other chapters. Chapter two reviews
the literature including the theories related to the topic and previous studies which have
been done by scholars and researchers worldwide. Chapter three covers the
methodology which were used to conduct the study. Chapter four presents the analysis
of the data and the discussion of the findings. Finally, chapter five presents the summary
of the findings, implications, recommendations for further research and concluding
remarks.

6


CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW

As introduced in Chapter 1, this chapter describes text messaging, its role in
communication, and theoretical and practical studies related to an analysis of text
messages. The discussion of relevant theories of using Systemic Functional Linguistics
can provide insights into the application of interpersonal metafunction to review

interpersonal meaning in communication. In addition, some forms of textism are
discussed because they appear in text messages and carry pragmatic and personal
meanings for those involved. The review then discusses the application of Systemic
Functional Grammar as a framework for analysing text messages focusing on
Interpersonal metafunction in terms of mood, speech function, modality and personal
pronouns.
2.1 Text messaging and its role in communication and its challenge.
2.1.1. Text messaging
Since the late 1990s, when there was a translation from analogue to digital mobile
phones, the use of text messaging has reached phenomenal growth. It is a term that has
been focused in numerous studies, so there were a variety of definitions of text
messaging. The term ‘text messaging’ (texting) is a kind of messages which the users
apply for sending information via their phones such as mobile phones, cell phones,
smartphones or web browsers (Thurlow & Brown, 2003). Tayebinik and Puteh (2012)
claimed that text messaging relates to the employment of shortened forms and other
kinds of typing to compose SMS or instant messages. There have been two types of
texting: synchronous and asynchronous. In synchronous texting, the users are online at
the same time, while in asynchronous texting the participants are not simultaneously
online. Thurlow and Brown (2003) claimed that text messaging referred to the
asynchronous text which relied on technological mediated discourse and often
expressed through simple sentences for communication and may create unpredictable,

7


unrestricted new ways for communication (Chiad, 2008; Ong'onda, Matu, & Oloo,
2011).
Text messaging has been used widely, especially towards the teenagers, by the
popularity of modern technology such as mobile phones accessing the Internet. In the
recent survey, around 8 trillion texts are sent every year to reach a dramatic rate at 99

percent, and they are often responded within three minutes (Cardacci, 2018). 33 percent
of Americans like texting messages rather than other tools for communication; therefore,
it becomes the most used means of communication for Americans aged under 50 (Smith,
2011). According to Wood, Kemp and Waldron (2012), the adults were found to make
significantly less capitalisation and punctuation errors, and to use unconventional
punctuation more frequently than the children, when the length of their messages was
taken into account. In addition, some experimental studies of exposure to misspelled
words has suggested that young adults’ spelling performance is more likely to be
disrupted by exposure to misspelled forms than that of children (Dixon & Kaminska,
2007). The study shows the popularity of text messages for timely communication in
the world. Therefore, texting is regarded as one of the most common tools of
communication at present if the users use it via mobile phones or other means such as
Whatapp or Viber. This shows the importance of text messaging which has become an
accessible medium that has changed the way of interpersonal interactions.
Language has always been a common tool that is obviously used for framing ideas
and sending messages in social interaction. It is also applied in multifunctional speech
events. Since English is an international language, English is associated with the
educational systems of English speaking all over the world and become the language
used in writing (Geertsema, Hyman, & Deventer, 2011). English used in text messaging
does not obey standard rules. It is a form of abbreviated written or actually typed
language. The small size and its limited character space (160 characters) and the small
key pad appear to be the challenge that has stimulated the use of more abbreviated
language than emerged in chat groups in virtual world (Crystal, 2008). The newer
phones are able to link up 12 text messages that the length can reach 1800 characters.

8


Plester, Wood, and Joshi (2009) found out that texting was a form of phonic
abbreviation, and a certain degree of phonological and/or orthographical consciousness

was required to create and read such abbreviations. These characteristics included the
omission of words such as abbreviations, letters/ number homophones, and emoticons.
Areni, Wahyuni, Indrabayu, and Anugrahyani (2017) indicated that the users could
send and receive information in the form of short messages and they tried to find a way
to communicate effectively so that the receivers could understand the text messages
they interact. Therefore, texting changes standard rule of writing and speaking. There
exists inconsistency and non-standard forms of grammar and syntax (Chiad, 2008).
There were investigations on the non-standard rules of text messaging (Ong’onda,
Matu, & Oloo, 2011; Ahmed & Al- Kadi, 2016; Lee, 2002; Tayebinik & Puteh, 2012).
Ahmed and Al-kadi (2016) indicated that “laudable features that distinguish SMS
texting from standard varieties of English, such as using shortened forms of language
which are orthographically, morphologically, syntactically and phonologically deviant
of the formal discourse” (p.131). In orthography, the texters applied single letters,
numeral and typographic symbols to describe words, parts of words or even noises (e.g.,
b means ‘be’; 2 means ‘to’). Morphologically, that was the common use of shortened
words among the participants (Ahmed & Al-kadi, 2016). Ahmed and Al-kadi (2016)
found out that the speaker used “JK” to state that the participant was “just kidding”
about his previous statement (p. 138). Phonologically, Ahmed and Al-kadi (2016)
showed that “interlocutors tend not only to use more shortened forms but less attention
to pronunciation marks” (p. 139). For example, they tended to use ‘plz’ instead of
‘please’ because ‘please’ was pronounced with a ‘z’ sound (p. 139). Special
characteristics were widely used in text messaging. For instance, “the short forms of
words, lack of capitalization, omission of vowels, incorrect spellings, replacement of
numbers for words, simplified contractions, initials, subject drop, typing letters for
homophone words and miscellaneous” (Tayebinik & Puteh, 2012, p. 98). This led the
formation of new abbreviations with non-standard orthographic forms and phonic

9

substitution (Jose & Raj, 2014; Tayebinik & Puteh, 2012; Ong’onda, Matu, & Oketch,
2010a; Chiad, 2008).
Syntactic structures in texting have changed as large sentences are reduced into
smaller units without changing the meaning (Ehrlich, 1987). The texters often use
abbreviations, non-standard spellings, shortening of sentences and incorrect
punctuation in text messages written in English. Tayebinik and Puteh (2012) agreed
that the formal writing, speaking, grammatical skills and spelling aptitudes had been
affected by the textism. Thus, texting has an adverse effect on the structure of formal
language.
2.1.2. Role of text messaging in communication.
Text messaging has become an important tool for communication all over the
world (Geertsema et al., 2011). It is increasing at a noticeable rate with an estimated
eight trillion text messages to be set each year. Most of users apply text messaging for
coordinating activities, maintaining social relationship, filling dead time and sharing
information with others in their social network (Ling, 2005). In addition, Jose and Raj
(2014) pointed out that text messaging was “a very popular voiceless communication
technique that offers the possibility of exchanging written messages between mobile
phones” (p.57). It is “a simple and global form of communication, facilitated by the
ubiquitous nature of mobile phones” (Chen & Kan, 2013, p. 299). Thus, text messages
provide a variety of benefits in communication which assist users communicate with
the others in the most convenient way.
Texting is as a way to produce new form of texting lingo which connects to
vocabulary, language and spellings altogether and affects all levels of linguistics that
is from phonology to pragmatics (Kahari, Mutonga, & Ndlovu, 2013). Crystal (2008)
added to this statement that texting had supplemented a new dimension to language
use and also influenced language and linguistic variations. Similarly, Nai, Jia, Chih,
Shan, and Yu (2017) concluded that input methods used through text messaging gave
condition to reduce hand writing messaging longer and time-consuming. They stated

10

that “text messages and notes such as emails and instant messages replaced
handwriting letters and notes in communication due to the popularity and availability
of mobile devices and personal computers” (p.1). That is the way to use “abbreviations
and other techniques to compose SMS and instant messages” (Tayebinik & Puteh,
2012, p. 97). For the convenience of text messages on mobile phones, the users tend
to apply more shortened words for some reasons. Tayebinik and Puteh (2012) found
out that there were four reasons for applying textism: fast communication and time
saving, simplicity, credit saving and low cost, and youngsters’ trend. Similarly,
Ong'onda et al. (2011) added that SMS communication allowed for an appropriate use
of syntactic and lexical abbreviated forms, which saved character space, or touches of
the handset keys, as compared with using the full forms of words.
Communication involves the exchange of information and build several types of
discourse that reflects our cultural world, power relations and ideological background
(El-Falaky, 2016). The characteristic of a good communication includes anything that
makes sure that people can communicate each other either face-to-face or phone calls.
Therefore, there are two types of communication including oral and written forms. In
oral communication, spoken words are used in face-to-face conversation or through
media such as telephonic conversation, video, radio, television, voice over internet
(Dona-Ezenne & Levi, 2016). Whereas, written communication maybe hand-written
or printed and can be transmitted via email, letter, report, or hand to hand delivery
methods. The messages in the written language can be affected by the vocabulary and
grammar used, writing style, precision and clarity of the language used.
2.1.3. Challenges of using text messages
Although there are a variety of positive aspects in using text messaging, there are
some negative impacts. It has been some usability issues, especially in the message
input. First of all, text messages are awkward to type, and even the ideas of texting on
the best phrase to put in the messages must be clear with the aim to align with the
acceptable numbers of words so as not to overreach the maximum characters (Barasa,

11


2010). It is difficult to compose the text of a short message on a small device
(Schneider-Hufschmidt, 2005).
Another common downside of text message is that only literate people can access
to it. This is a reality in many villages that the children cannot communicate with their
parents via text messages because the parents are illiterate (Barasa, 2010). Therefore,
the best way to contact with each other is using expensive voice calls.
Texting has negative impacts on language structures in English through the
contracted use of grammar and incorrect forms, resulting in non-standard words in
English. Not all users use complete sentences when using text messaging. Omission
may be applied to many parts of words or sentences. This can produce confusion to
texting receivers. In addition, Tayebinik and Puteh (2012) pointed out different negative
aspects affecting language structures: limited social presence, anonymity, reduced/
delayed message feedback, depersonalized communication, extensive application of
texting. For example, instant messages distort youth literacy because they promote
undesirable patterns in reading and writing, and such informal language use endangers
the students’ mastery of formal and standard literacy skill (Craig, 2003). As a result, a
deterioration in formal writing, speaking skill are “also affected, causing damages to
the grammatical skills, confusion in vocabulary spelling” (Tayebinik & Puteh, 2012, p.
102). Thus, the negative aspects create a series of new words and symbols, resulting in
the need for developing dictionaries for SMS.
2.2. Theoretical and Practical Studies on Text Messaging
Since text messaging is used for various purposes, a number of researchers (such
as Tayebinik & Puteh, 2012; Chaka, 2015; Albasheer & Alfaki, 2016; Ling, 2005)
conducted studies in analysing linguistic aspects in text messaging. Based on the use of
lexicogrammatical structures in text messaging, the texters can show their function in
constructing social relations and maintaining the relationship with the receivers. The

interpersonal relations among the interlocutors found out in El-Falaky (2016) and

12


Nepomuceno (2005) studies indicated that they were manifested through the analysis
of interpersonal metafunction in terms of mood, tenses and pronouns. Through the use
of interpersonal metafunction the link of social relationship is maintained and improved
and it increases the effectiveness of communication as well. The application of text
messaging in communication is for maintaining social relationship, sharing information
and it helps to save space or times to type messages instead of writing complete words,
phrases or sentences (Kemp, Wood & Waldrone, 2014; Ling, 2005; Jose & Raj, 2014;
Ong’onda, Matu, & Oloo, 2011).
Besides the advantages, texting messaging produces some negative effects on
language proficiency. Previous studies such as Tayebinik and Puteh (2012), Yousaf and
Ahmed (2013), and Ahmed and Al-kadi (2016) showed that, unlike adults that had
ability to use language properly in different context to reduce the listeners/readers’
confusion as much as possible, teenagers were negatively influenced by using text
messaging. For instance, textism has an impact on formal writing assignment when
students apply too many non-standard forms in English writing (Tayebinik & Puteh,
2012). With the frequent use of textism, the grammatical skill is affected through the
use of omission and incomplete sentence structures. It could be seen from Tayebinik
and Puteh (2012), Yousaf and Ahmed (2013) and Ahmed and Al-kadi (2016) that the
participants omitted a number of parts and even made spelling mistakes due to their text
messaging using habit; therefore, it can affect to grammatical structure in formal
standard in English. Moreover, according to Ong'onda et al. (2011), the way of using
text messaging influenced directly to the syntax of English and can create the new
linguistic variation of language beyond the syntax of English. Alias (2016) added to
this statement that the senior generations had problems understanding messages from
those from the younger generation when they were not able to respond to most of the

abbreviations in the list, which contained short forms and abbreviations frequently used
by those teenagers. Thus, the use of text messaging has been popular and has appeared
to be a new challenge in communication (Albasheer & Alfaki, 2016).

13


2.3. Textism: Pragmatics of Word Form in Text Messages
2.3.1. Textism
Textism is defined as “a change in a word’s orthographic form as compared to
traditional writing” (Bernicot, Volckaert-Legrier, Goumi, & Bert-Erboul, 2012, p. 2).
Also, textism is the new language of texting which often concerns the usage of
shortened words or phrases (Thurlow & Brown, 2003). In other words, textism is some
forms of phonetic abbreviation at the word level (spelling) rather than at the sentence.
Plester et al. (2009) argued that producing and reading such abbreviations required, in
the text, a level of phonological awareness and orthographic awareness. These
abbreviations are categorized into “shortenings, contractions, G clippings, other
clippings, acronyms, initialism, letter/number homophones, misspellings, nonconventional spellings and accent stylizations” (Thurlow & Brown, 2003, p. 6). These
categories are grouped into three main types of textism: linguistic textisms, typing
errors and contextual textism (Table 2.1).
Table 2.1. Categories of textism and examples (Chaka, 2015, p. 75)
Textisms

Examples

Linguistic textisms
Shortenings

S'fiso (Sifiso); shez (she is)

Alphabetisms/consonant
writing/vowel omissions

bcz (because); hw (how); gvs
(gives)

Apostrophe omissions

hes (he is); its (it is); thats
(that is); shes (she is)

Clippings/aphaeresis

cause (because); coz
(because)

Initialisms/acronyms
Letter/number
homophones
Phonological/phonetic
approximations

KET
4sm1 (for someone); 4 (for);
4rend (friend); 2 (to)
u (you); gudnyt/gud nyte (good night);
n (and); u (you); hu (who); sy (say);

14

skul (school); ur (your); nyc (nice); r
(are)
iz (is); dat (that); evn (even);
smtimz (sometimes); duz
(does)
Iwant (I want); infront (in
front); nshez (and she is);
datgvz (that gives); andenvn
(and even); alot ( a lot)

Accent
stylisation/respellings

Word combinations
Typing errors

looser (loser); HI (he);
ADVIS (advice); idore
(adore); suts (suits); voce
(voice); special (special);
peaple (people); ignore
(ignore); attension (attention)

Misspellings/
typographical errors

Contextual textisms
Graphic emoticons

:). :(

Emoticon words
Typographical
emoticons

Hahaha, hihihi
!!
A ROLE MODEL IS A
PERSON …; MY ROLE
MODEL IS …; a role model
is a

All upper/all lower
cases and other
keyboard characters

Under linguistic textisms, there are nine categories namely, shortenings,
alphabetisms/consonant
clippings/aphaeresis,

writing/vowel

omissions,

initialisms/acronyms,

apostrophe

letter/number

omissions,
homophones,

phonological/phonetic approximations, accent stylisation/respellings and word
combinations (Chaka, 2015). This category is used widely by texters when they would
like to have a quick type or saving time by reducing the letters in words or replace them
by numbers. The typing errors are also classified into misspelling words such as
“hungary” for “hungry” and typographical errors such as “knwo” for “know”
(Albasheer & Alfaki, 2016, p. 24).

15


The contextual textism is also divided into a variety of categories which
indicate pragmatic meaning.
“Within the pragmatic device category, we classified use of words to express emotion,
such as representing laughter (e.g., hahaha) or repeating vowels to mirror pragmatic
lengthening (e.g., whaaat to represent a drawn-out expression of surprise) as emotion
words. We classifified use of acronyms to express emotion (e.g., lol) as emotion
acronyms. We classified use of upper case to represent emotion (e.g., WHAT to
represent surprise) as upper case and extraneous use of punctuation for emphasis
[e.g., !!!!!) or as emoticons (e.g., 8-)] as emotion punctuation.” (Varnhagen et al., 2010,
p. 725)

2.3.2. Pragmatics of word form in text messages.
Pragmatics is the study to look at the hidden meaning or how we can realise its
meaning when it is not said or written (Yule, 1996). In other words, pragmatics is the
study of language based on its contexts. In order to understand the pragmatics in these
contexts, the speakers or writers need to depend on a lot of shared assumptions or

expectation whey they try to communicate. In this case, people can manipulate
language to achieve certain purposes, so the way they apply pragmatics in their text
messages allows them to achieve their intention on showing ideas.
In texting messages, “texters are forced to express and understand emotion without
the voice prosody one is afforded in a voice phone call, or the prosody and body
language of face-to-face communication” (Tully, 2013, p. 3). Therefore, they create
rules for comprehending emotion as well as for conveying ideas in text messaging.
Therefore, texters have developed rules for understanding emotion and expressing their
ideas in text messaging through the use of pragmatics of word forms. According to
Abraham (2016) pragmatics had been defined as the general study of signs and symbols.
There are a number of text messages filled with pragmatics. They are non-standard
spellings which often convey pragmatics meaning and cannot be found in standard

16