Beowulf

Beowulf's Grendel's Approach to Heorot (702b-745a)

This piece of writing shows just how much the English language has changed and evolved over the years.  Looking at this text it is hard to even decipher 10% of the words let alone figure out what the passage means.  There are letters/symbols that are no longer used which is half of the reason that it is so incredibly hard for most people to read this.  The other reason is that the majority of the words would no longer be used in everyday English.

You can read Beowulf's work at: http://faculty.virginia.edu/OldEnglish/Beowulf.Readings/Beowulf.Readings.html

Seeing how far English has come since the days of Beowulf is incredible.  It makes us wonder how far it will go and how much it will have changed in the future.

With the way things are being miss spelt in the present moment of time I wouldn't be surprised if they are permanently spelt like that in the next 50 years or so.  Confusing simple things like loose with lose and brought with bought, makes me wonder if words like loose and lose and brought and bought are just melded into the one word meaning the same thing.

Al the txt talk that hapns thes days teches peple horibl habits - If you couldn't read that I don't blame you.  Sure it is spelt phonetically and its how it sounds but it doesn't look right and the lack of vowels makes it hard to figure out the words. To reiterate it said 'All the text talk that happens these days teaches people horrible habits.'  Sure it makes talking via SMS, E-mails and programs like MSN quicker surely it is harder to read than normal.

With everyone talking like this online it is sure to carry over out of these online worlds into reality.  It is sad that even companies like Telstra are adopting 'text talk' by using words like 'thanx', they are professional and you would think that they would at least use proper English in their 'professional' messages.

Sadly with this all said I truly believe that text talk will become the new English making it hard for those of us who are adjusted to Middle English to communicate with the 'text talk generation'.  Text talk will also make it even harder than it already is for people trying to learn English as a second language.

Grendel's Approach to Heorot (702b-745a) n.d., Virginia Education, accessed 07 May 2012, <http://faculty.virginia.edu/OldEnglish/Beowulf.Readings/Grendel.html>.