Should you write as you speak?

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Should you be limited to the same vocabulary as you would use when you speak? The same rhythms? The same grammar?

Ought some cat to scriven as the cove in question gabs?

― maryann, Tuesday, 18 June 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

The ethical dilemma we all must ultimately face

― maryann, Tuesday, 18 June 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

um what

― bc, Tuesday, 18 June 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Well, do you ever feel like you sound pompous when you write - because you would never actually use talk that way? Or maybe you feel that the way you write is too clumsy, because you transcribe what you'd say directly onto the page. It's like, the way Thomas Pynchon writes compared to the way Bret Easton Ellis writes. Which do you prefer?

― maryann, Tuesday, 18 June 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

'use talk' is basically just a mistake and means 'talk' but if you think it sounds cool, good.

― maryann, Tuesday, 18 June 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

i use talk diff to wot i work with words like

― mark s, Tuesday, 18 June 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Irving Goffman is a guy who is smart and thought about this for a long time + networked with other people like him about this. As a hobby, I haven't had the time to study him well yet I say ?is the underlying subject is: should you (write/speak)present yourself as you think? Seinfeld to thread!

― The Hegemon, Tuesday, 18 June 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Writing has less influence of the other. This results in your inner voices shining through (more), I think. Which in a way explains when people meet eachother *face to face*, they are sometimes surprised they are differen't (they aren't really though).

― nathalie, Tuesday, 18 June 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

i talk exactly like i write but even less

― unknown or illegal user, Tuesday, 18 June 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

I are exackerly the same in ORAL PONTIFICATION as I am in the written vernacular hooray cheer cheers!

― Sarah, Tuesday, 18 June 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

but faster

― unknown or illegal user, Tuesday, 18 June 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

I like to think Sarah STANDS UP for the words in capitals and then sits down again and then STANDS UP and so on.

― PJ Miller, Tuesday, 18 June 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

I feel written word allows one to be much more verbose, if one so chooses.

― jel --, Tuesday, 18 June 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

I write the word 'dig' (as in, 'to enjoy') but never say it.

― Andrew L, Tuesday, 18 June 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

I like to think Sarah STANDS UP for the words in capitals and then sits down again

I know her, and she does.

― RickyT, Tuesday, 18 June 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Actually, the way I write is probably quite similar to the way I talk. Just as vague.

― jel --, Tuesday, 18 June 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Speech vs Writing: Derrida to thread!

― alext, Tuesday, 18 June 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

COR I always KNEW I was cleverer than I thort!

― Sarah, Tuesday, 18 June 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

(RIckyT's my fact-checking cuz)

― katie, Tuesday, 18 June 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

I was just reading my old diary from when I was seven and it's interesting to note that I referred to people as Mr/Mrs Smith, even though in real life I called adults by their given names. I also wrote people's names in full e.g. Michael instead of Mike. Obviously when I was seven I thought I should be more formal in writing that I was when speaking.

These days my writing is far more like my talking although I avoid abbreviations in writing and I attend to my grammar more than I do when speaking.

My writing is more similar to my internal dialogue than my external one as there are less interruptions.

I like all styles of writing. I think that so long as you write in a way that communicates effectively with your target audience, and with the desired impact, then it is good. If you use language that alienates people when that was not your intention then that is not so good.

― toraneko, Tuesday, 18 June 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

writing can produce information that talking cant, and vice versa they are different brain centres why consolidate. eg.- Cixous

― jm, Tuesday, 18 June 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

i have a formal writing style and a speaking style. my informal writing hovers between the two. i favour none, they are all functional. however i feel more articulate as a writer than as a speaker.

― queenoftheharpies, Tuesday, 18 June 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

How could it be good or better or right or advantageous to not write differently from speech. That would just be artificial. I mean, it would be just as, if not more, contrived to try to constrain oneself to some kind of written equivalent of spoken communication. Spoken language, at least conversation (which is what seems to be what maryann means and/or everyone has interpreted it, as I do) serves a primarily social function, whereas written language (overall, as there are many different forms I guess) is much much more efficacious for passing on information. Now I am already tangled up almost challenging my own points. I had thought this was so clear cut - well, I'm still clear that the answer is a big NO WAY should you write as you speak, but I think I may be missing the thrust of the whole issue, and linguistics is complicated. (ahah!: I expect maryann and others on this board to come at this from a 'literature' angle, whereas I would immediately come at it from a 'linguistics' angle whilst ultimately not having enough expertise to be very helpful ie the story of my life and in fact one of the problems I'm having with conversation at the moment: I am usually irritated at conversations which attempt to "get anywhere" in terms of knowledge and understanding of complex issues, and I guess I think almost everything is a complex issue...ahh fuck, okay, short version of this screwy post = "taking 'Conversational Analysis' in linguistics at uni ruined my life").

― haloist, Wednesday, 19 June 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

I am more conversational in my writing.

― N., Wednesday, 19 June 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

i'm with you re: spoken conversations that attempt to go into deep analysis, liz. i've often found that when people try to do this is conversation it just turns into a big one upmanship competition, but you actuyally DO get somewhere with written language.

― di, Wednesday, 19 June 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

I actually have this conflict when I try and review something. I feel when I start writing the review I end up correcting myself about 3 times until I find a tone which seems colloquial enough. I can't convey passion with big wurdz, or at least I don't think I ever have.

― Ronan, Wednesday, 19 June 2002 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

three months pass...

this thread was disappointingly short

― Josh (Josh), Wednesday, 16 October 2002 02:53 (twenty-three years ago)

I write as I tend to think which I hope is simillar to how I talk or else there are issues I need to sort out.

Ned writes exactly how he talks which is amusing me. Complete with emicon winks and flounces.

― Mr Noodles (Mr Noodles), Wednesday, 16 October 2002 02:58 (twenty-three years ago)

does he manipulate the stuff on his face to do them like mark s?

― Josh (Josh), Wednesday, 16 October 2002 03:29 (twenty-three years ago)

does the stuff on his face = features?

― rainy (rainy), Wednesday, 16 October 2002 03:33 (twenty-three years ago)

Those things, that lurk there and do actions.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Wednesday, 16 October 2002 03:35 (twenty-three years ago)

anything that is on his face rainy. ANYTHING

― Josh (Josh), Wednesday, 16 October 2002 03:44 (twenty-three years ago)

pie sauce?

― rainy (rainy), Wednesday, 16 October 2002 03:48 (twenty-three years ago)

nobody likes it when i speak how i write

― boxcubed (boxcubed), Wednesday, 16 October 2002 03:52 (twenty-three years ago)

If it's good pie.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Wednesday, 16 October 2002 03:53 (twenty-three years ago)

now you're getting the hang of it rainy

― Josh (Josh), Wednesday, 16 October 2002 04:02 (twenty-three years ago)

Yes Ned & Toraneko do write like they speak. Also funny was that when I met Tim on the same day that I met those 2, every time that he expressed any thought about music, my mind would locate the memory of the expanded literary version of that thought from Skykicking or ILM.

― Keith McD (Keith McD), Wednesday, 16 October 2002 04:39 (twenty-three years ago)

i write loads of things i never say, yo. it's all part of me pretending to be far more interesting than i actually am. but hey look, i've come to terms with it, yo.

― g-kit (g-kit), Wednesday, 16 October 2002 08:31 (twenty-three years ago)

should definetely gie ti a go. it might improve my writing.

― Julio Desouza (jdesouza), Wednesday, 16 October 2002 17:06 (twenty-three years ago)

three years pass...

bump.

― The Brainwasher (Twilight), Friday, 4 August 2006 06:40 (nineteen years ago)

I try and talk like I would write, as if I'm on Just a Minute or I've morphed into Stephen Fry.

― Johnny B Was Quizzical (Johnney B), Friday, 4 August 2006 09:28 (nineteen years ago)

i'd never say "bump" in real life

― ken c (ken c), Friday, 4 August 2006 10:30 (nineteen years ago)

"what's the name of the Mr. Man who's all wrapped up in bandages?"

ken c: "Mister".

― MarkH (MarkH), Saturday, 5 August 2006 10:56 (nineteen years ago)

Ken writes how I tell him to.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Saturday, 5 August 2006 13:41 (nineteen years ago)

Both writing and speaking are activities that can be practised as forms of art. Although there is a certain overlap between the materials and techniques of each of these arts, they are quite distinct from one another. I see no reason to twin them. There is no gain in that approach, only loss.

― Aimless (Aimless), Saturday, 5 August 2006 16:26 (nineteen years ago)

i write as i speak.
it is totally art.

― rrrobyn monsters with heat fever+stroke (rrrobyn), Saturday, 5 August 2006 16:50 (nineteen years ago)

Ah! But think how much richer your art could be by mining their divergent veins.

― Aimless (Aimless), Saturday, 5 August 2006 17:45 (nineteen years ago)

Spurious dichotomy ahoy!

― Son of Spam (noodle vague), Saturday, 5 August 2006 17:54 (nineteen years ago)

i know what you're saying aimls, and i do do that. but also, dichotomies, bianaries make me so uneasy. i am bothered by this idea that communication and art haven't moved further beyond that - i think they're on their way and have been for a while.

xpost!

― rrrobyn monsters with heat fever+stroke (rrrobyn), Saturday, 5 August 2006 17:59 (nineteen years ago)

not that there's anything wrong with divergency, but more that there are fewer distinctions btwn the forms than we might think. as in, yes, we choose different forms to communicate different things in different ways, but under all that is the drive to speak, write, communicate and the reasons for this.

that is big. i know.
(and i'm in an 'eff you bad/lazy academic writing, i don't even know who you ARE' mood.)

― rrrobyn monsters with heat fever+stroke (rrrobyn), Saturday, 5 August 2006 18:04 (nineteen years ago)

Because of course speech isn't wholly spontaneous, or colloquial, and its rhythms and vocab are more or less writerly depending on the situation. Contrariwise, writing often can and should aspire to the imagined qualities of speech. Innit?

― Son of Spam (noodle vague), Saturday, 5 August 2006 18:08 (nineteen years ago)

I fail to detect a spurious dichotomy here. Writing and speaking are two arts which share a certain overlap in both materials and techniques, exactly as I wrote above.

First, consider genuine speech as it is spoken on a daily basis. Any person who has made or read transcriptions ordinary speech can tell you that, while it may have various rills or runs that closely resemble written language, everyday speech relies upon a foundation of intonations and emphases that cannot be mimicked in writing without the most painstaking and artificial effort.

What an auditor can follow with little or no trouble may bewilder a reader. Speakers clip short their sentences and their ideas in order to edit on the fly or pursue new ideas. They sprinkle their speech with auditory clues to their thought process. A writer who reproduces these quirks does so only at the peril of appearing doubly artificial and purposely opaque.

A writer, while bereft of these spoken devices, has the inestimable benefit of second thoughts. A writer may gather their thoughts or words at whatever pace suits them and a paragraph may take a week to find its ideal shape. Punctuation, which was first formed to guide the reader's pauses for breath, has branched out to provide an apparatus for the eye and brain alone, where a form of wit is permitted that has no spoken counterpart.

The rules and expectations for each art form are different. The means, methods and materials can be different. What, in speech, would be pretentious, passes in writing as an admirable exactitude.

No doubt anyone can develop their writing to have an informal and colloquial tone similar to their normal speech, or develop their speech to have a weight and rectitude that impresses the listener as if the speaker were consulting a scroll, but even then these resemblances will be incomplete and the effect of art. They shall give the impression of one or the other, without the precision of an exact reproduction.

Spurious dichotomy? Not hardly.

― Aimless (Aimless), Saturday, 5 August 2006 19:55 (nineteen years ago)

Who are you Aimless? Jonathan Swift?

― Damn, Atreyu! (x Jeremy), Saturday, 5 August 2006 19:57 (nineteen years ago)

That was so beautiful I almost believed you.

― Son of Spam (noodle vague), Saturday, 5 August 2006 20:00 (nineteen years ago)

Only when I want to overawe people with the size of my belly and jowls.

xpost

― Aimless (Aimless), Saturday, 5 August 2006 20:02 (nineteen years ago)

Swift is King Troll and ironically he wd probably have demanded the same qualities from speech as from writing, the crazy Tory fucker.

― Son of Spam (noodle vague), Saturday, 5 August 2006 20:04 (nineteen years ago)

eleven years pass...

yes

― infinity (∞), Tuesday, 5 December 2017 23:22 (eight years ago)

On ilx or like what

― moyesery loves kompany (darraghmac), Tuesday, 5 December 2017 23:29 (eight years ago)

ya think so eh

― infinity (∞), Tuesday, 5 December 2017 23:32 (eight years ago)

I'm broadly for it ya

― moyesery loves kompany (darraghmac), Tuesday, 5 December 2017 23:35 (eight years ago)

dunnit make readin a lil ard tho

― infinity (∞), Tuesday, 5 December 2017 23:37 (eight years ago)

― moyesery loves kompany (darraghmac), Tuesday, 5 December 2017 23:38 (eight years ago)

aye awrite met ah'll payure type in ma accent aw eh time it'll be crackin'

― -_- (jim in vancouver), Tuesday, 5 December 2017 23:39 (eight years ago)

Not accent as such

― remember the lmao (darraghmac), Tuesday, 5 December 2017 23:39 (eight years ago)

imo you don't speak in your accent for the purposes of the question, your accent is a function of your mouth not your typing

― remember the lmao (darraghmac), Tuesday, 5 December 2017 23:40 (eight years ago)

Lessin you type with your mouth tbf

― remember the lmao (darraghmac), Tuesday, 5 December 2017 23:40 (eight years ago)

Absolutely not, unless you speak as I do, which is the best way to speak, if you know what you’re talking about.

― El Tomboto, Tuesday, 5 December 2017 23:41 (eight years ago)

Wtf are you typing about

― remember the lmao (darraghmac), Tuesday, 5 December 2017 23:41 (eight years ago)

found the keener eh

― infinity (∞), Tuesday, 5 December 2017 23:42 (eight years ago)

I find it disrespectful

― ur-oik (rip van wanko), Tuesday, 5 December 2017 23:47 (eight years ago)

that missing period is disrespectful

― infinity (∞), Tuesday, 5 December 2017 23:51 (eight years ago)

In any context?

― remember the lmao (darraghmac), Tuesday, 5 December 2017 23:51 (eight years ago)

Should is not a fun word

― brimstead, Tuesday, 5 December 2017 23:52 (eight years ago)

Should is an awful word brimstead otm

― remember the lmao (darraghmac), Tuesday, 5 December 2017 23:52 (eight years ago)

Should is a harmless subjunctive. Ought is more fitting for your opprobrium.

― A is for (Aimless), Tuesday, 5 December 2017 23:57 (eight years ago)

They are the same word

― remember the lmao (darraghmac), Tuesday, 5 December 2017 23:58 (eight years ago)

Grammar is mostly junk btw

― remember the lmao (darraghmac), Tuesday, 5 December 2017 23:58 (eight years ago)

If it should come to pass that should becomes indistinguishable from ought, then much past writing will be rendered unintelligible to those whose linguistic sensibilities have been blunted in that unfortunate way.

― A is for (Aimless), Wednesday, 6 December 2017 00:01 (eight years ago)

If it happens it happens

― remember the lmao (darraghmac), Wednesday, 6 December 2017 00:03 (eight years ago)

Plenty historical literature requires the learning of a strange idiom it's an important part of assuming the place and time of the setting therefore should should go the way of aught, which it ought, then I for one should be very grateful which indeed we all ought be

― remember the lmao (darraghmac), Wednesday, 6 December 2017 00:05 (eight years ago)

Should oughtn’t be used in place of ought, and shouldn’t should never be substituted for oughtn’t either.

― El Tomboto, Wednesday, 6 December 2017 00:10 (eight years ago)

was that a pregnancy joek

― ur-oik (rip van wanko), Wednesday, 6 December 2017 00:13 (eight years ago)

Why don't youse two just cry into each others otters

― remember the lmao (darraghmac), Wednesday, 6 December 2017 00:14 (eight years ago)

I would but West Mids dialect doesn't translate to the page very well

― ultros ultros-ghali, Wednesday, 6 December 2017 01:47 (eight years ago)

yow'm roight

― after "after cease to exist" (Noodle Vague), Wednesday, 6 December 2017 02:17 (eight years ago)

Dudes, english only pls

― infinity (∞), Wednesday, 6 December 2017 02:21 (eight years ago)

http://www.blackcountrytshirts.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/old-testament.gif

― after "after cease to exist" (Noodle Vague), Wednesday, 6 December 2017 02:29 (eight years ago)

http://www.blackcountrytshirts.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/scabby-apron.gif

― after "after cease to exist" (Noodle Vague), Wednesday, 6 December 2017 02:30 (eight years ago)

thought this was a multitasking thread at first, disappointed

― fuck you, your hat is horrible (Neanderthal), Wednesday, 6 December 2017 02:33 (eight years ago)

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