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"The going idea is that texting has, in essence, made graffiti a universal pastime: Barely punctuated, sparsely capitalized and with decidedly creative spelling
by regis 13y ago
"The going idea is that texting has, in essence, made graffiti a universal pastime: Barely punctuated, sparsely capitalized and with decidedly creative spellings throughout, texting means that today's America is reveling in writing badly."
This is an extremely poor and essentially meaningless comparison between graffiti and texting. People spell properly in spray paint on walls all the time. A defining characteristic of graffiti is its engagement with public spaces; I see no real connection between graffiti itself and the words the author used to describe it. To make a better comparison, this description could actually be applied to poetry rather than graffiti.
- kjhughes 13y agoCareful. Dr. McWhorter is relaying "the going idea" here to establish context. He's not espousing that view -- he sees texting as fingered speech, not writing. Or are you objecting to a perceived disparaging of graffiti?
- regis 13y agoI am not actually saying that the author is pushing forward this sort of thinking, but I do think that the author is wrong in saying that this is "the going idea" as I have never heard that comparison before. My objection is to this common idea that graffiti is "low-art" while something like poetry actually seems much more damaging in terms of proper english usage, yet is regarded as "high-art" (historically). I simply fail to see the connection between texting and graffiti and it struck me as odd that this could be a commonly held belief.