“Lolcateze: U Lernz it Or U Eatz Mai Dust Sucka” — is that the language of the future? What is it and wherever did it occur from? You just observed an example of what has occur to be identified as Lolcatese. Lolcatese had its origins on primitive Bulletin board devices which predate the online. Named immediately after the acronym LOL, “laughing out loud”, Lolcatese is starting off to evolve into a individual language all its have, finish with grammar and spelling conventions, and even pronunciation hints, despite the fact that Lolcatese is primarily a created language. Grammar law enforcement do not just take Lolcatese critically as a language — these types of is the destiny of Pidgins, Patois’ and Creoles in general. But they may perhaps have to, and with the net, it might be sooner than any of us imagine!
Pupils of grammar may perhaps observe that in Lolcatese:
- posts are gone
- the phrases “to” and “for” are replaced by digits,
- pronoun circumstance is generally accomplished away with — “she” turns to “her”, for instance
- deliberate misspellings, derived from widespread typos, these types of as “the” for “the” are de rigeur
- verb conjugation (as if verbs in English weren’t simple enough previously) is simplified,
- verbs of becoming disappear and are simply just implied and recognized as in Russian or ebonics.
- non-typo pronunciation centered respellings, this kind of as “iz” for “is” are widespread
- snowclone expressions, based mostly on gamer-speak or other well-known tradition, predominate
Lolcatese is a lot easier to master than English. It seems to be evolving as the lingua franca of the world-wide-web for social interaction. The young will deliver it ahead with them as they age into the mainstream of culture. It will infiltrate very first to international trade, tunes and athletics, then little by little the rest of culture(ies) will catch up. In as very little as a different era, there will be children born who create Lolcatese just before English. For these persons it will be their mother tongue as significantly as created languages go, and they will press its expressive electrical power as it graduates from turning into a prepared pidgin (composed by no one particular natively) to a prepared creole (a pidgin derived language that acquires indigenous writers more than time). Will producing backwash and impact their spoken language? That stays to be viewed.
Prediction for the long run: Your grandchildren may obtain high faculty diplomas published in a regarded formalized and progressed version of Lolcatese.