ABSTRACT
In the early days of texting, the use of abbreviations and non-conventional spellings attracted a great deal of media coverage, much of it highly critical and speculative. Carefully selected anecdotes characterised any attempt at an evidence-based argument. More recently, coverage has been somewhat less about text language itself, or its potential threats to literacy, or the entire English language. However, there are still critical voices, more likely questioning the process of texting itself: dangers that arise, for example, through sleep impoverishment or inattention crossing roads (Steinhauer & Holson, 2008). Here we will focus only on material that is related to literacy, and explore not just the media comments but scholarly analysis of those comments. We will consider both the negative and the more positive accounts, and then look at text language itself, from samples of actual texts contributed by children, teens and adults.
