Enjoy the beginning of the week with our new #MondayReading suggestion: The Multilingual Internet: Language, Culture and Communication Online. This book is written by Brenda Danet and Susan C. Herring and it was published by Oxford University Press, Inc. in 2007.
Although English is seen as the Lingua franca of the Internet, this book takes a closer look of other languages that are used for online communication, in non-native English, or both. However, the English-based scholarly literature on computer-mediated communication (CMC) does not reflect this diversity. The book analyses text-based CMC in different languages that are not native English. The 18 Chapters of the book, most of them case studies, focus on a particular language or a plurilingual situation.
According to the publishers abstract those chapters are related to topics such as writing systems and the Internet; linguistic and discourse features of local language use online; gender, language, and culture online; language choice and code switching; and linguistic diversity on the Internet, currently and projected into the future. Secondary themes presented include playfulness and creativity in CMC; romanization of languages ordinarily written in other scripts; and comparison of CMC-specific features in various languages. The languages described include French, Arabic, Chinese, Greek, Spanish, Catalan, Japanese, Thai, Portuguese, and non-native Englishes. A wide range of CMC modes is covered, from personal email, discussion lists, and text messaging on mobile phones (asynchronous) to instant messaging, ICQ, and graphical chat (synchronous) — as used by teenagers, university students and other young people, housewives, and professionals.
We hope you find this recommendation interesting! Enjoy this #MondayReading and have a lovely week!
Written by Efi Lousta – Terminology Study Visitor at the Terminology Coordination Unit of the European Parliament. She is doing a Master in Learning and Communication in Multilingual and Multicultural Contexts at the University of Luxembourg.
Source:
- University Oxford Press Scholarship Online (2007). ”The Multilingual Internet: Language, Culture, and Communication Online”. Available at: http://bit.ly/2sd3LVu (Accessed: 29 May 2017)