Feb 1, 2013 - 
Communication 
1 Comment
Communication 1 Comment prepare
one langauge feature I have never understood and don’t really know what its called is when people insert numbers in to a word, there is no need for thisnto be put in but I don’t think people do it because its cool or fashionable but to be honest it really does get on my nerves “alr1g4t m8” except from the second word which I understand I don’t get why people would do this but I don’t really have people my age do it I think its those that have got there first phone and try to talk cool.
That is an excellent question, Harry.
In fact, I think you should include your observations about this in your essay – about the reasons people do things (sometimes the reason people use particular words, accents, formulations or type certain ways is exactly as you say – simply to try to demonstrate that they are part of a particular group. Sometimes people do it without realising it, other times they do it deliberately (which I suspect is when it annoys you)
The second word, m8 – that one is officially called a logogram – just in case, and as you say, there are obvious reasons that is used – for brevity. Why do you think people like me don’t use those abbreviations?
CW