Poor writing skills cost American companies $3b

[Tiassa]

E-mail a Detriment to Written Communication?
Writing skills declining in corporate America

"E-mail is a party to which English teachers have not been invited," Hogan said. "It has companies tearing their hair out."

A recent survey of 120 American corporations reached a similar conclusion. The study, by the National Commission on Writing, a panel established by the College Board, concluded that a third of employees in the nation's blue-chip companies wrote poorly and that businesses were spending as much as $3.1 billion annually on remedial training.

The problem shows up not only in e-mail but also in reports and other texts, the commission said.

"It's not that companies want to hire Tolstoy," said Susan Traiman, a director at the Business Roundtable, an association of leading chief executives whose corporations were surveyed in the study. "But they need people who can write clearly, and many employees and applicants fall short of that standard." ....

C-Net (New York Times)

In 1997, enjoying my first internet connection--I'd only used business networks prior to that--I found myself puzzled by the atrocious punctuation, lack of sentence structure, and generally-erratic excuses for communication that seemed to abound.

My brother, who had worked for software companies for several years at that point, explained, "Just wait. Once people figure it out, e-mail and the web will bring a new Golden Age of written communication."

And why should I not believe it? That people were speaking on the phone and not writing letters hadn't really troubled me, since I spent much of high school on the telephone, and my love letters to girlfriends in those years were more fanciful than communicative. But it seemed to me at the time that predicting a new Golden Age of writing wasn't particularly perverse.

And even though we didn't pause to think of video mail or voice-chat, retrospect suggests I cannot blame those factors for what many perceive as a continuing decline of American writing skills.

Sam Dillon's article for the New York Times (reprinted at C-Net) includes a few examples:

• i need help i am writing a essay on writing i work for this company and my boss want me to help improve the workers writing skills can yall help me with some information thank you (Inquiry to online school for business writing)

• I updated the Status report for the four discrepancies Lennie forward us via e-mail (they in Barry file).. to make sure my logic was correct It seems we provide Murray with incorrect information ... However after verifying controls on JBL - JBL has the indicator as B ???? - I wanted to make sure with the recent changes - I processed today - before Murray make the changes again on the mainframe to 'C'. (Systems Analyst to supervisor, Palo Alto tech firm)

• hI KATHY i am sending u the assignmnet again,i had sent you the assignment earlier but i didnt get a respond. If u get this assgnment could u please respond . thanking u for ur cooperation (Student to business-writing teacher, UC Extension, Santa Cruz)

• E-mails - that are received from Jim and I are not either getting open or not being responded to. I wanted to let everyone know that when Jim and I are sending out e-mails (example- who is to be picking up parcels) I am wanting for who ever the e-mail goes to to respond back to the e-mail. Its important that Jim and I knows that the person, intended, had read the e-mail. This gives an acknowledgment that the task is being completed. I am asking for a simple little 2 sec. Note that says "ok", "I got it", or Alright. (Purchasing manager at construction company to employees)

C-Net (New York Times)

One might also note the clear difference between paper and electronica in comparing the advice of UI-Chicago professor Linda Landis Andrews with that of Kaitlin Duck Sherwood of Webfoot.com. Andrews takes issue with abuse of exclamation points:

Exclamation points were an issue when Linda Landis Andrews, who teaches at the University of Illinois at Chicago, led a workshop in May for midcareer executives at an automotive corporation based in the Midwest. Their exasperated supervisor had insisted that the men improve their writing.

"I get a memo from them and cannot figure out what they're trying to say," the supervisor wrote Andrews.

When at her request the executives produced letters they had written to a supplier who had failed to deliver parts on time, she was horrified to see that tone-deaf writing had turned a minor business snarl into a corporate confrontation moving toward litigation.

"They had allowed a hostile tone to creep into the letters," she said. "They didn't seem to understand that those letters were just toxic."

"People think that throwing multiple exclamation points into a business letter will make their point forcefully," Andrews said. "I tell them they're allowed two exclamation points in their whole life."

C-Net (New York Times)

On the other hand, Sherwood suggests that exclamation points could help convey intonation, and avoid confusion in e-mail.

"If you want to indicate stronger emphasis, use all capital letters and toss in some extra exclamation points," Sherwood advises in her guide, available at Webfoot.com, where she offers a vivid example:

"Should I boost the power on the thrombo?

"NO!!!! If you turn it up to eleven, you'll overheat the motors, and IT MIGHT EXPLODE!!"

C-Net (New York Times)

At this point, I must object. Sherwood also advises that electronic communication is more conversational than traditional writing; I suspect this is a viable general justification for her advice regarding exclamation points. However, I believe she misses the point entirely. In fact, I will go so far as to call her advice about exclamation points idiotic.

For instance, from Webfoot.com:

Electronic communication, because of its speed and broadcasting ability, is fundamentally different from paper-based communication. Because the turnaround time can be so fast, email is more conversational than traditional paper-based media.

In a paper document, it is absolutely essential to make everything completely clear and unambiguous because your audience may not have a chance to ask for clarification. With email documents, your recipient can ask questions immediately. Email thus tends, like conversational speech, to be sloppier than communications on paper.

Webfoot.com

I understand what she's getting after, but it really bugs me because it is another example of how our culture is rolling over for the lazy. Don't get me wrong; I've never been economically viable and one of the ways I go crazy when I work is in trying to do my job correctly; it's generally impossible to to fulfill every point of your duty when, say, you're not given the equipment to do so, or your position was designed to serve one-third the number of people it does at present, or some of those points are unwritten and ne'er spoken with the result that you have no idea that this is expected of you. Really, I understand.

But it's a cultural problem. Americans are productive as a nation because they're innovative and absolutely consumed by their work. If anybody knows someone who works "flex-time", ask them what that term is supposed to describe. And then ask them how much they actually work. (We've stopped bugging my mother about it; she seems somehow happy putting 80 hours a week into a job description that covers something like 38. But she's unusual; most of her business associates--pharmaceutical representatives to doctors' offices--are permanently weary.)

In the end, there ought to be little or no difference whatsoever between spoken and written communication, much less written and other-written.

Email also does not convey emotions nearly as well as face-to-face or even telephone conversations. It lacks vocal inflection, gestures, and a shared environment. Your correspondent may have difficulty telling if you are serious or kidding, happy or sad, frustrated or euphoric. Sarcasm is particularly dangerous to use in email.

Webfoot.com

When I was in college, one of my favorite catch-phrases was my response to the question, "How are you?" I would usually shrug, smile, and say, "I'm alive." Now, my friends at the time knew exactly what that meant: "I'm alive, and that's enough for me." It's a way of saying, "Fine," without saying the word. And yes, it turned out to be problematic. People who didn't know me furrowed their brow. Someone eventually let me in on the secret that people were taking it as a complaint. Frankly, I still don't get it, but that was spoken language complete with gestures and facial expressions. My closest friends understand my turns of phrase via e-mail; they regard them as if I was speaking: What does his voice sound like when he says that? What does his face look like? Does he do that little faux-bashful thing that tells me he's euphemizing?

I can invent new turns of phrase and there are some people who know exactly how to interpret a string of words that looks out of place and unfamiliar. My brother, or the NASA engineer, or the PhD, the schoolteacher ... these aren't stupid people. (Two graduated from Stanford and the other two have advanced degrees.) Is it that they're "smart", or that they know me? I mean, straight away, people who can't see my face or hear my voice know what cues to assign my writing. That they're smart helps in other ways, but that they know me is the primary reason they know how to infer my tone.

And that's the key:

Hogan, who founded his online Business Writing Center a decade ago after years of teaching composition at Illinois State University here, says that the use of multiple exclamation points and other nonstandard punctuation like the :-) symbol, are fine for personal e-mail but that companies have erred by allowing experimental writing devices to flood into business writing ....

.... "E-mail has just erupted like a weed ... people now just let thoughts drool out onto the screen."

C-Net (New York Times)

I rarely use smilies; here at Sciforums they're okay because they turn into little pictures. But 'tis true; my lack of smilies contributed to people's perception of negativity, and over time I've become accustomed to using them in either a condescending (e.g. ) or irreverent and useless (e.g. , ) manner. But they don't really do much to communicate emotion. In my personal emails, I don't use them at all, and I tend to stay away from netspeak shorthand (e.g. "How RU?").

And the reason for this, perhaps, is that I don't communicate at a certain, intermediate level. I don't spend a lot of time with iChat or MSN, so the people I communicate with most often don't need smilies. And because this circle of people I know is better-educated than I am, they have less use than I do for shorthand.

So I admit there's something I may be missing. But it seems to me that the need to clarify with "nonstandard punctuation" arises from a certain disconnection between writer and reader. If, for instance, I go into a retro-goth chatroom (are there any?) and use old turns of phrase from the 1980s art-school scene, those folks I don't know ought not need extra clarification for context. Should I be silly enough to go art-school in business correspondence, well, perhaps the need to clarify with nonstandard punctuation suggests that I ought not use that retro-goth style.

But to examine the Webfoot example--

"NO!!!! If you turn it up to eleven, you'll overheat the motors, and IT MIGHT EXPLODE!!"

--suggests that the tone of communication may become too conversational for the circumstances.

The example in the article comes from "A Beginner's Guide to Effective Email", which is the same document I've quoted from Webfoot:

If you want to indicate stronger emphasis, use all capital letters and toss in some extra exclamation marks. Instead of:

> Should I just boost the power on the thrombo?

No, if you turn it up to eleven, you'll overheat the motors and it might explode.

Say:

> Should I just boost the power on the thrombo?

NO!!!! If you turn it up to eleven, you'll overheat the motors and IT MIGHT EXPLODE!!

Note that you should use capital letters sparingly. Just as loss of sight can lead to improved hearing, the relative lack of cues to emotion in email makes people hyper-sensitive to any cues that might be there. Thus, capital letters will convey the message that you are shouting.

Webfoot.com

The calmly, simply written phrase, "Absolutely not," would suffice. The situation might warrant a single exclamation point; there's no law against the damn things.

As the example goes, it sounds like an exchange between Mr. Scott and Captain Kirk. (Imagine Kirk doing the "IT MIGHT EXPLODE!!" part.) Communicating by e-mail, or even instant chat, allows you the time to think about what you're going to say. After all, it's not like the examples given at Webfoot involve long, communicative e-mails.

In the same time it takes to write the capitalized, exclamation-rich response above, one can simply write, "Absolutely not. The unit will overheat and may explode."

And frankly, if your associate can't figure out the urgency of a left-handed thrombo exploding, s/he might not be the best person for the job.

Now here's the part that really bugs me:

I should warn you that there is a minority that doesn't like the shortcuts I showed you. They argue that if Mark Twain could convey emotion without resorting to such artifice, then we should too. Well, I'm not as skilled a writer as Mark Twain, and usually don't have as many words to make my tone as clear as he did. I believe that there is a greater danger of angering or offending someone by not using these shortcuts than there is of annoying someone by using them.

Webfoot.com

You know, it's not that one must be Mark Twain, or Aldous Huxley. One need not have the emotional control of a Ray Bradbury or Joyce Carol Oates. There is a vast difference between being Mark Twain and simply being able to communicate. The underlying presumption of Sherwood's advice involves the idea that the person reading your e-mail is a moron. And that leads back to the idea that this is a cultural problem.

After everything else people do, it seems the last thing they want to put effort into is communication. Of course, recognizing the need to communicate, people create informal rules that cause them to waste more words and keystrokes than it's worth. The result is a further fracturing of human communication: not only is there a growing gap between spoken and properly-written communication, there is now a gap between forms of written communication. In order to not put the effort into being "as skilled a writer as Mark Twain", or even something less viciously-phrased, people now face the possible necessity of learning three forms of communication, all in the same language. If we throw in the difference between how many of us speak to different audiences--e.g. grandmother or best friend--there's four at a minimum.

And all of this is apparently for the sake of style and pretentious aesthetics. I promise you, on my life, that properly-written English, in either the European or American form, is far more aesthetic, communicative, and enjoyable than any fleet of emoticons and bad punctuation. And I promise you as well that it's easier.

And just look at the Webfoot examples, which clearly include business e-mails. I dare anyone looking for a job to send out twenty resumés with the cover letters written in netspeak, complete with emoticons, abusive capital letters, and rich with exclamation points. Seriously, let me know how it goes. Without sarcasm: I would be very interested in the result.

We're accommodating idiocy, and any number of political groups complains about "lowering the bar" in society. The "New Golden Age" of writing is turning into the remnants of Babel, and all because we haven't the confidence in ourselves to communicate with people we presume to be idiots. Or something like that.

Ten years ago, when the Webfoot guide was created, perhaps Ms. Sherwood had a point. But then again, one of the best writers I know of once advised me against italics; comparatively, my use of italic type is abusive. This, too, could be said to be a concession much like those I disdain, but in all honesty it came from reading too much Stephen King over the course of a year when I was about fourteen. I really shouldn't carry it over like I do; on that note, I've actually gone back and killed some of the italic tags in this post.

In the end, though, there is a difference between "reading" and "reading comprehension". Comprehending requires more than the mere process of looking at or reciting words in sequence. Creating an additional form of communication is the counterintuitive solution to questions of comprehension.

Let's pretend for a moment that everyone you communicate with electronically is so moronic as to require constant clarification with unconventional punctuation and cutesy emoticons. One question that begs an answer: "How did this happen?"

Now, obviously, this isn't the case. So to scale back into reality, how is it that people get university and sometimes advanced degrees without being able to read or write a simple e-mail? What the hell happened?

We can't point to the past and say it's a carryover from more primitive times. I tried using shorthand when e-mailing my partner's cellphone (150 character max., I think), but I can't stand it. So what is it? Is it really a product of how our culture treats education? Have basic things like communicating with one another become so secondary to specialization? Consider in the 1990s, when healthcare was so luxurious that people had the temerity to complain about doctors' bedside manner. That people are now begging for even a rude doctor is beside the point. The doctors never set out to be rude, they just came across that way because, frankly, they carry heavy loads. They were so specialized they "forgot" how to communicate with people in certain ways.

Some letters to the editor of the New York Times:

• As a university professor, I am troubled by the inability of students (and their working counterparts) to differentiate between their off-the-cuff, private e-mail style and public, formal writing. The speed and informality of Internet and mobile messaging, free of proper spelling, grammar, punctuation and syntax, are partly responsible.

But secondary schools and universities are also culpable: workers have managed to graduate without knowing how to write. In secondary schools as well as colleges and universities, writing-based learning is being cut in favor of recall and test-based curriculums.

Schools need to re-emphasize solid analytical reading and writing, usually taught by much-embattled humanities departments .... (UI-Chicago Asst. Prof. of Art History)

• "What Corporate America Cannot Build: A Sentence" neglects a major source of the lamentable prose of many company employees: the decline of the liberal arts education.

Driven by economic anxieties, both parents and undergraduates often assume that the principal purpose of higher education is preparation for a particular job, which they believe is best accomplished through courses specifically tailored to that field. But my literature classes, like my colleagues' courses in history, philosophy and so on, are not mere frills. Rather - in addition to all its other vital functions - a liberal arts education teaches skills in reading, writing and thinking that, as your article demonstrates, are crucial to any number of jobs. (Univ. of Wisconsin professor of English)

• "What Corporate America Cannot Build: A Sentence" makes several correct comments about the dismal quality of communication skills and commerce.

It should also be noted that reading and writing are inseparable. From this, we can extrapolate a lesson for corporate America and the country in general - read so that you can write. The positive effect of clear, concise written communication is obvious; the opposite may catalyze inadvertent negative consequences. (Adult-education reading and writing teacher)

Your photo of the writing instructor in front of a PowerPoint presentation captures nicely the reason that good writing is increasingly rare today. Bullet points have replaced the use of complete sentences and carefully constructed paragraphs. Sadly, this is true not only of the corporate world, but the academy as well. (DePaul Univ. associate professor of philosophy)

• Every five or 10 years, you publish an article about corporate writing concerns. But nothing changes because corporations don't really care .... (Some guy in Connecticut)

New York Times

I note the letters because they lend to the idea that this is a cultural problem. The reading and writing problems costing American corporations up to $3b helping employees improve their writing and communication skills. As a recruitment director for a Silicon Valley firm put it, "Considering how highly educated our people are, many can't write clearly in their day-to-day work."

How widespread is this? What will it take to alleviate the situation? When a British writer went off about apostrophes, the Americans scoffed at how many technical mistakes her editors allowed into the printing. But hey, now the complaint is coming from the one place Americans pay attention to: the bottom line.

Three billion dollars a year because college-educated people can't write coherent e-mails? It's an epidemic at least. I have problems with the way they teach corporate people to communicate, as well (specifically, an odd insistence on eliminating the occurrence of past-tense verbs in writing, which, while it saves a bundle on "was" and "have been", makes language awkward, and furthermore accomplishes nothing positive about gerunds).

But those problems seem rather small, now.

You don't have to be Mark Twain. Besides, Mark Twain is just a bit overrated. But the point is that you don't have to win Nobel or Pulitzer Prizes or Iowa Awards. You just have to be able to communicate. And if conventional communication is so troublesome or offensive, what's the point of inventing a new form? When it's something more tangible, what do we say? "Do the work. There is no free lunch."

Once upon a time, the communicative problem was presuming that people were too smart. I know that sounds weird, but there was even a time at Sciforums where one could be called "elitist" if you didn't dumb it down a certain degree. Think of a child's game. (I watched children on Zoom try to do this sometime this year.) Very simply: go into a kitchen with a friend, presuming it is sufficiently stocked, and give your friend step-by-step instructions on making a peanut butter sandwich. Your friend is to do only what you say in the most literal context possible. It took the kids on Zoom a couple tries before they could even get the bread out of the bag because they presumed the sandwich-makers would figure out for themselves to open the freaking bag and take the lid off the peanut butter. Certes, it is an exaggeration, but one of the darkest days in computer technical support is the day that e-mail gained popularity among the elderly and computer illiterate. Those silly questions that go around workplaces? They're real. "Is the computer plugged in? Is it turned on?" I mean, how much has to be presumed before you get to the story about the coffee cup in the CD-ROM?

These days, though, the point seems to be to presume people are stupid. "What if he doesn't understand me? I should put a little emoticon there to show him I'm happy."

Or what of that damnable Webfoot example: "Gosh, I don't know if he understands how bad it will be if the thrombo explodes. I'd better use some capital letters and extra exclamation points to make it clear, just in case."

I mean, really, who's on the other end there? Homer Simpson? I mean, as much as I enjoyed the Captain Kirk moment, Mr. Scott is far too intelligent to think he could boost the thrombo to eleven.

Just how stupid is the guy if he needs the extra capital letters and exclamation points? Or is it just important to work in that personalized aspect? I mean, I don't want to oppress anyone, here. Sure, I suppose I can see how the product exploding during a sales demo is secondary to making sure you get to be you. But that in itself would suggest an entirely new problem that I won't even begin to attempt describing.

We can do better as a society. The least we can ask of ourselves is that the productive workers and good citizens we attempt to create with our educational system be capable of basic communication.

A note to my international neighbors - Yes, this is in large part why so many people excuse "Bushisms". We know what he meant; like that time he said the U.S. government was hard at work finding new ways to hurt Americans. There are many, many educated people in this country who have desperate difficulty communicating. It might be perceived as cruel to suggest that this president, who sounds an awful lot like many of these challenged folks, isn't up to par. It might hurt their self-esteem. So despite the problems it causes, people would rather invent new ways to excuse, perpetuate, and even encourage poor communication skills. Who knows? Maybe three billion dollars isn't enough to get people's attention anymore. That's only about twelve Alex Rodriguez baseball contracts.
____________________

Notes:

Dillon, Sam. "What corporate America can't build: A sentence". C-Net.com (New York Times), December 7, 2004. See http://news.com.com/What+corporate+A...ml?tag=st.prev

Sherwood, Kaitlin. "A Beginner's Guide to Effective Email". Webfoot.com, December, 1994. See http://webfoot.com/advice/email.top.html#intro

New York Times. "Letters to the Editor: E-Mail and the Decline of Writing". December 11, 2004. See http://nytimes.com/2004/12/11/opinion/l13email.html

[Ophiolite]

It occured to me that the little button at the lower left of my text entry box , marked Post Quick Reply, was singularily inappropriate in this situation. You have taken a considerable time to assemble your thoughts on what is clearly an important issue for you. It seems almost disrespectful to dash of a hasty response, especially as I have read only 2/3 of the post! [Was that an exclamation point, indicating mild irony? Surely not.]

The problems you describe are real, they are important, but they are not limited to the US. I have worked globally with first-language English speakers from the UK, the US, Canada, Australia, Eire, New Zealand, Malaysia, Singapore, and India, and the problems are the same for all: lack of sentence structure; poor compositional skills; careless spelling; questionable vocabulary; and a repetitive failure, in consequence, to communicate clearly.

I do disagree with you on two points: one may be a misunderstanding on my part, the other is clear cut.

At one stage in your post, and regretably I can no longer find it, you wrote words to the effect that 'there should be no difference between spoken and written English.' Please tell me I misinterpreted you.

Secondly, you argue against supporting the written word with visual devices. I believe a good case can be made for these within e-mails and posts such as this. Here are some elements that would form part of such a case:

1. There is historical precedence for the concept: illustrated manuscripts emphasised key words and phrases in this way.
2. You note Mark Twain was able to convey the full range of human emotion through his words alone. We are already agreed that today's e-mail writers are not Mark Twains.
3. E-mails are not only written hastily, they are read hastily. I make it a point to embolden any questions or requests for specific action within my business e-mails. I have found this to be more effective, by a large amount, than not doing so.
4. Text books today routinely employ icons to identify key knowledge, or special cases, etc. This helps the reader follow what is being communicated, and surely this is an important goal for the writer.
5. Another matter of historical precedent. You are allready using visual devices. Capital letters at the start of a sentence, periods at the end. Numbered lists, such as this one. Text broken into paragraphs, and blocks and chapters. The smilie and the formatting is a simple extension of these.

I suspect the majority of the readers of your post (and of my reply) will think 'pedantic twerps', then continue to directly abuse the English language, and thus, indirectly, their own arguments. A minority will decide to attack the language of this very post. For this minority I have placed a small number of typographical, syntactic, and stylistic errors within my text. Happy hunting.

[Repo Man]

Mark Twain is overrated?

[Ophiolite]

Mark Twain is overrated?

Did you actually mean to say , Mark Twain is overrated???!!!??
I attributed tiassa's assessment to nervous exhaustion after completing his mammoth post!!!! (Gratuitous exclamations added as an ironic reference to a central theme of tiassa [Superflous explanation, of gatuitous exclamations added as a substantive confirmation that tiassa's reservations may have validity {Final set of bracketed remarks added in case anybody was missing the point}])

[spuriousmonkey]

Well, let this fall within the category of "I suspect the majority of the readers of your post (and of my reply) will think 'pedantic twerps". There always has to be a first one. Or a second.

It is kind of ironic that Tiassa comes up with a post on poor writing skills. The inability of put forward a position in a concise manner is also a trademark of either poor writing, or contempt of the reader.

[Tiassa]

I will check in, despite being ridiculously tired, to clarify the Mark Twain issue.

Yes, I think Mark Twain is overrated. Like I said, though, "just a bit". That Huck Finn, for instance, is taught in schools at all indicates that Twain is overrated to the point that people feel they can disrespect him. According to the author, there's quite a few teachers in this country who need to be shot.° On that particular point, however, Twain deserves much praise.

Additionally, to exploit Mark Twain in such an exaggerated manner as does Kaitlin Duck Sherwood deifies him as a standard of perfection, and despite Twain's self-confidence, such a notion would on a good day tickle him as ludicrous.

I'm of the opinion that Twain would consider himself overrated in the modern day.

Doesn't mean he's not good. Doesn't mean he's not among the best. A writer whose stories and advice are priceless to me wrote an entire novel as homage to Twain, and stated it up front. But were Twain alive I highly doubt the modern author would have admitted it; Twain would have laughed derisively, and then thanked him nonetheless.

Besides, you can't be as influential as Twain without being overrated.
____________________

Notes:

° quite a few teachers ... who need to be shot - "Persons attempting to find a motive in this narrative will be prosecuted; persons attempting to find a moral in it will be banished; persons attempting to find a plot in it will be shot." (Mark Twain, "Author's Warning", Huckleberry Finn) Maybe Twain should have used some exclamation marks. Maybe if he capitalized the last part of that and put six or so exclamation marks at the end, people would have either taken the warning seriously, or at least understood what it meant. (Some of the critical analysis of the warning cracks me up.) The only analysis I personally give of Huck Finn is to point to that warning and advise that it be taken seriously. As it is, we've spent over a century arguing about what Twain really meant. I tend to treat all of Twain's work that way, too, unless otherwise advised by the author.

[sideshowbob]

In the "olden days", before "artificial" communication methods, people used to talk face to face. Emotions were conveyed by subtle facial responses, tones of voice, etc.

The telegraph used a different communication "style" - more terse and staccato - but it didn't have much influence on the way people communicated directly.

It was the telephone that had a major influence on styles of communication. Facial expressions were no longer visible and tones were not always reproduced accurately. It became necessary to repeatedly ask, "Do you mean...?" and questions of that sort. (I wave my arms a lot when I talk on the phone, which I don't so in face to face conversations.)

We had all gotten used to that style of communication - and maybe forgotten that it was already fundamentally different from face to face conversation - when computer communications came along.

Now it is possible to communicate quicky and easily, in written form but in vocal style. It is possible to go back and edit yourself before you click Send, but most of us don't bother to do it. Editing is written style, not vocal.

I guess what I'm driving at is that most people never did have the writing skills that are imagined to be declining. The "written" communication that we see on the computer is really vocal communication, but in written form.

And I think that smilies can be very useful to take the place of some of the face to face non-verbal communication. For example, if I say , you know that I am saying, "Please take this in a friendly way." If I say , you know that I am saying, "Please don't take me too seriously at all."

To summarize, I don't think in terms of a decline in written language. I think in terms of a return to a more immediate, personal form of communication (even if it is conducted through an impersonal medium.)

[whitewolf]

I think it's important to keep e-mails and posts on boards like this one in "vocal" form unless the post is a scientific or literary assertion in itself. The written form should be reserved mainly for literary works. Nobody has the time or the patience to deal with the written form in quick cases like communication via internet.

What do you suggest we read instead of Twain? By the same token, most authors whose works we read in school are overrated.

Edit: Sentence structure isn't enforced past 7th grade. I went to school in America starting with 8th grade, and haven't heard anything on sentence structure yet. My vocabulary may be large, but I have no clue how sentences are done in English. Vocabulary is taught throughout HS and is tested in SATs. The first time I saw my sentences corrected was in college.

[Fraggle Rocker]

The last report I saw on the subject, which was in the last century, said that the average American is capable of reading at what we used to call the sixth-grade level -- but would put forth the effort to do so only if he were really interested in the material. A writeup on a particularly exciting sporting event or a road test of a car he was thinking of buying, for example. Otherwise he stayed at the fifth grade level.

Check the level of advertising copy, that's your bellwether of a population's reading ability. I'd say fifth-grade describes it pretty well.

What it didn't say, but must also be true, is that he writes at that same level.

I don't know about college graduates, but considering that all but the most exclusive universities offer remedial English to freshmen in order to accept all those average high school graduates, it's doubtful that they're turning out very many Mark Twains these days. Even highly intelligent people like software developers are simply not taught how to write. At least they often recognize their weakness and are happy to get help. For years I have had a standing offer to edit and proof anything from anybody, and I get a lot of takers. It's sad though, the number of times I've had to take an entire page back to the writer and say, "I'm sorry, but I have no idea what you're trying to say."

By the way, that offer is extended to everyone here. I need to renew it occasionally as it scrolls off the list.

[ScRaMbLe]

I'm guilty as hell of writing in "txt speak". For me personally, I think it arose more from mobile phone text messaging than the internet. With the older phones you only had a set number of characters in which to convey your message. So shortcuts such as "kinda" "sorta" "u" "gr8" even "tonite" would save you one or two characters, which, over the entire message might allow you to fit an entire extra sentence in.
However, I've lost count of the number of times a message has been misinterpreted, because I cut too many corners for the sake of saving an extra 20c on that second page of the message. End result being that I had to send another message to clarify myself and in some cases a third to repair any damage done!

I agree with some of the others posts, in that, in forums such as this, vocal form is a much more useful way of communicating. Perhaps not for writing a thesis or for giving instruction but for general communication it sits fine with me.
As already mentioned, in face to face communication most of the actual "communicating" is done aside from that actual words spoken. Body language, facial expression, emphasis, eye contact, touch, timing and even tempo of a spoken sentence. All these things which help convey context are missing from the written format.
I write the way I speak. For instance, I use "..." to emphasise a pause if I was actually speaking what I've written.
I generally write "f**k" if I'm saying it with a smile and "fuck" if something has actually irritated me.
Emoticons are just an extension of this and I consider them an effective tool in conveying the context of what I'm trying to say. It doesn't mean I regard the reader as having a Homer Simpson intellect, it means I value the communcation with them enough that I don't want to be mis-interpreted. Almost anything written is is open to interpretation depending on the mindset of the individual reader. Just because you're experiencing a particular emotion when you're writing something, doesn't mean the reader is in the same frame of mind when they read it. Emoticons help bridge that.

So in short... LONG LIVE THE EMOTICON!

[whitewolf]

E-mail a Detriment to Written Communication?
Writing skills declining in corporate America

Should read as:
IS Email a Detriment to Written Coomunication?
Writing skills ARE declining in corporate America.
Am I right? My point is that even newspaper reporters don't write in perfect literary language, and nobody says anything about that. The main reason for different writing style that we see in newspapers is preservation of space and overall appearance of type on the page.

[glaucon]

Should read as:
IS Email a Detriment to Written Coomunication?
Writing skills ARE declining in corporate America.
Am I right? My point is that even newspaper reporters don't write in perfect literary language, and nobody says anything about that. The main reason for different writing style that we see in newspapers is preservation of space and overall appearance of type on the page.

First off, why should we be so concerned with 'Corporate America'? I for one would dance with glee if it all fell down due to incompetence.
Second, preservation of space (and time) is usually how any style of communication changes. We all see this on a daily basis perusing posts here, reading e-mail, or using IM. The problem, as I see it, is that we've forgotten to place some kind of importance on context. While it may be fine to leave you're friend a voice mail saying 'Yo dude, no dice man, it aint happenin.', that would not be the best way to tell your boss you're not coming in to work that day.
:-)

[Ophiolite]

Remarkable. Scrutinise the posts on this thread and I am confident you will find a higher standard of all the various aspects of 'good writing' tiassa refers to than on other threads. Everyone ( with the courageous exception of spuriousmonkey) appears to have made an extra effort. A good opportunity for some social science research, perhaps!

[Tiassa]

What do you suggest we read instead of Twain?

Sherwood Anderson (Winesburg, Ohio), perhaps. Or maybe Sarah Orne Jewett (Country of the Pointed Firs). There does arise an issue with historical continuity within the literary curriculum, but then again I once took a semester final that covered One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest and The Scarlet Letter. So much for continuity.

[ScRaMbLe]

Remarkable. Scrutinise the posts on this thread and I am confident you will find a higher standard of all the various aspects of 'good writing' tiassa refers to than on other threads. Everyone ( with the courageous exception of spuriousmonkey) appears to have made an extra effort.

C'mon, we tried sooo hard, I even sat up straight while typing... So where's my frickin gold star already?

A good opportunity for some social science research, perhaps!

Why, because everyone wanted to avoid the simple irony of spelling bad in a "bad spelling" thread? Yeah...That'll fill tomes.

[Tiassa]

First off, why should we be so concerned with 'Corporate America'? I for one would dance with glee if it all fell down due to incompetence.

People already pay for education with tax dollars. That $3b isn't coming off the investors' share, and that means consumers pick up the tab. "People" get to pay for education a second time.

I'm of the opinion that poor communication skills in general have more to do with sharpening political boundaries and rhetoric in the United States. In lieu of comprehending, frustrated people just lash out at each other.

In this sense, looking at what's going on in corporate America gives us a glimpse at how pervasive the problem is. This really is a cultural problem. Yes, I went off on netspeak, but I don't see how netspeak is going to solve the problem at large. Carving out a new and specialized form of written expression doesn't do much for the folks who are incapable of learning the more mundane rules of writing.

• • •

people already pay for education with tax dollars that isnt coming from the investors pockets.....consumers instead will pick up the tab that means people get to pay for education a second time. i think poor communication skills are behind all the angry shit between people in the US.....they dont understand so they just lash out. looking at corporate america like this shows how fuked up things are getting.....making a bunch of new fascist rules won't help the people too stupid to figure out the normal rules.

• • •

Cuz People Already Pay For Education With TAX DOLLARS!!!!! That money ISN'T COMING FROM INVESTORS CONSUMERS WILL PAY FOR IT IN THE END!! poor skills cause *most* of peoples problems. they don't get it so they get pissed off. corporate america shows how bad things are.....MAKING NEW RULES DOESNT HELP THINGS ANYWAY!!!!

• • •

I don't know why that was so fun. Perhaps because it's so exaggerated, yet not. It was actually rather difficult to do the second and third versions.

• • •

As a note for Ophiolite, it's rather sad that I've corrected at least two syntactical clusterf@cks in my own posts that come from writing essential one-drafters and revising only the glaring mistakes spotted on the fly. Shame, shame, shame.

One revision that came along the way was to go back and yank most of my use of italic type. Long story. If some think there's too much going on in the topic post as there is, well, they ought to be relieved to some degree that I cut out several digressive paragraphs. Like the meandering portion about why I was going back and cutting out the italics.

Have you a theory, though, on the social science? Two possibilities that strike me are either that people are willingly and freely conforming to a standard "in the spirit" of the topic, or else they really do expect someone to come headhunting if they make too many mistakes. Sounds like a coin flip, but I won't insist that it must be either heads or tails. It might be, oh, say, Neptune.

[sideshowbob]

Two possibilities that strike me are either that people are willingly and freely conforming to a standard "in the spirit" of the topic, or else they really do expect someone to come headhunting if they make too many mistakes.

Speaking only for myself:
You can check any or all of my posts on sciforums and decide for yourself whether I put more or less effort into this topic.
In fact, I did do it in one draft, with only a quick reread to pick up on obvious spelling errors, etc. Some people have an ability to do that. Some do not. Maybe some others put more effort in and communicate better. Maybe some others put less effort in and communicate better.
The quality of communication does not necessarily correlate directly with the amount of effort expended or with the quality of the writing itself.

I don't know if I managed to communicate it effectively, but I meant to say that I don't think there is a decline in writing "quality".
I think there is a change in writing style, which makes more people capable of communicating better.

Most of us are not Mark Twain, but in Twain's day, most were not Mark Twain either.

[Dreamwalker]

So, writing skills decline in corporate America? This does not really surprise me, but it is not the only place where you can see this. It is not an occurence that can be found in the countries that use English. Germany has the same problem, and it is a great problem for the land of the poets and thinkers. In school I was sometimes surprised that people were unable to write coherent, complex or precise texts, not even thinking about all the grammatic mistakes.
But where should one look for the reason? Certainly, the present rise of electronic communication is an apparent and convenient factor to lay all the blame on. But also the resulting lack in old-styled communication could be an aspect of those problems. Why write a normal letter if you can just give the person a call or speak to them over instant messenger services? Mediums where the lack of factual context and style can be substituted with the sheer display of emotions?
At this point, the emoticons that can be found everywhere on the internet come into play. Those icons or symbolic combinations are very widespread. But those are just a result; people lack the words to express their emotions, or the will and time it takes to express them in the written word.
Another point are abbreviations, net-speak or whatever you want to call word-modifications like: m8; cu; l8r, and similar things. I have to confess that I use them myself periodically. Alas, I am trying to abstain from them, they slip into texts nearly unconsciously; perhaps they are contagious? In any event, I do not like them. But I use other abbreviations: e.g.; etc., and others, that are more widely accepted. Call it hypocritical on my part, but I think that the first examples I gave are useless and annoying.

Another thing that was mentioned is the sentence structure. Well, I was confronted with that in the third or fourth grade since it is very basic for a language; at least for German. Still, it seems that many people have a very selective memory and they tend to forget some of these basic skills.

Enough examples and occurences from school. Now it is university; I thought that people that study literature and linguistics should be able to write and speak correctly, or scientifical, if that is more to you writing. But I should not have expected that much, after all, those are the same people that populated the schools. And they also lack vocables, I can understand this lack in a second or third language, I have the same problem, but my tolerance stops when they have a limit access to the vocables of their mother tongue.
And I am still speaking about those people that study literature, and it is mainly German literature, and linguistics/Germanistic that show a lack of words. And this, I think, is a big problem.

I will not even start to complain about the communicative skills of the people that graduated or dropped out of lower school forms. That would make me write several pages and some people might not be willing to read such a long text, especially when it is devoid of emoticons, bold/italic words and exclamation marks.

The biggest question is, can this problem be solved? And if so, how? More weight should be put on writing and reading skills, and the people have to practice those skills constantly. Also, vocables should be tought to the pupils, that is something that does not happen after the first or second grade.

Anyway, this is long enough for now, I know that many of you do not have the time or the nerve/ability to read such a long and undoubtly monotone text. If you find any grave mistakes in my choice of words or sentence structure, please keep in mind that this is not my primary language. (Still it is much better than many texts I have read on the internet.)

[ScRaMbLe]

Have you a theory, though, on the social science? Two possibilities that strike me are either that people are willingly and freely conforming to a standard "in the spirit" of the topic, or else they really do expect someone to come headhunting if they make too many mistakes. Sounds like a coin flip, but I won't insist that it must be either heads or tails. It might be, oh, say, Neptune.

Both. On one side, perhaps people simply appreciated the time and thought you put into the post and wanted to respond in kind out of respect for your effort.

On the other, given the current state of the forums, perhaps people felt they were leaving themselves open to attacks from others seeking to raise themselves up by pointing out something trivial like a misplaced semi-colon etc... which, i might add, i have no f**king idea how to use. (no shit scramble) If this makes my opinions somehow less valid to a select few, then I guess I'll learn to live with it.

I will not even start to complain about the communicative skills of the people that graduated or dropped out of lower school forms. That would make me write several pages and some people might not be willing to read such a long text, especially when it is devoid of emoticons, bold/italic words and exclamation marks.

Subtle.

[Dreamwalker]

Subtle.

Well, some poeple tend to miss subtle implications. Also, I do not want to show me as elitist and those who only graduated from lower school forms as morons. Fact is, most people that finnish those lower school forms (one way or the other) are not really well spoken and have problems reading a simple timetable... not to speak of newspaper articles. There is a reason why Germany is at the bottom of the new international education rating. And I looked at the tests the pupils had to solve, they were quite easy. In any event, subtlety leads to misinterpretation, and there are some things that should be said outright.
Whatever, I suppose I write to much to respond to a single word, so I better shut up.