Young Professional ESOL Learners Confront Competing Demands of Social Media and ESP

Abstract

English language learners from non-English speaking nations are confronting an increasingly challenging environment as they try to develop language skills to meet the competing demands of contemporary social media on one hand and those of English for Specific Purposes (ESP) on the other. Social media's explosion onto the global scene has created the need for non-English speakers to in effect learn two diverging contextual and communication patterns within what is supposed to be a common language. English, at least a form of English, dominates social media communications on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, and a whole host of abbreviated format international social media platforms. Moreover, these platforms have developed communications mechanisms that do not even conform to normally accepted, conversational patterns of spoken or written English. The English of some social media platforms is informal, littered with special and unique abbreviations, grammarless, decidedly unstructured and abruptly short. The vocabulary is explicitly simple in most cases, consisting mostly of one and two syllable words. The introduction of the "emoji" graphics (now totaling over 2600 according to Unicode Standard, the emoji lexicographer) has added image elements to the phonetic root language vocabulary. The near total lack of punctuation, further

Examining the factors influencing English teaching and learning in rural settings throughout Europe and the United States

“…The introduction of the "emoji" graphics (now totaling over 2600 according to Unicode Standard, the emoji lexicographer) has added image elements to the phonetic root language vocabulary and the near total lack of punctuation, complicates the process of learning to communicate effectively to other than a select audience or specific groups of people. (Boothe & Wickstrom, 2019). By teaching language skills across the curriculum, students can strengthen their knowledge and understanding of English in a variety of subject areas and topics.…”