Archives on this blog are going to be removed soon - no particular reason short of I'm going to need somewhere to post I'm willing to let my family read soon, both when I'm on my trip and because they're now aware I journal, and well. There you go, you see? Accordingly, if there's something I said you simply must see again, grab it now. (Unlikely as that seems.) A girl must have some privacy from her parents, after all.

Now that the end of semester crunch is done with, I'm going to be placed to start doing stuff here again. Because the Good Lord knows I'm a wordy wench, and now I'll actually have things to say that don't relate solely to History.

I finally picked up a copy of the soundtrack to Rent. It intensifies my desire to see this performed at some point, but I rather like a lot of the music as it is. And I like the way its overall message is positive. Even if it does have a track called "Today 4 U", which I like except for the title.

I hate the substitution of things like 4 and U for "for" and "you". Because, really, it's not THAT much harder to type the proper words, now is it, and it's got the significant advantage of not being a vicious crime against a poor defenceless language.

I'm not sure whether it's something I should feel bad for or proud of - sure, I'm resolute in maintaining my own standards of grammar and spelling online. In online journal, e-mail, and instant message conversation alike I use proper words, proper spelling, and complete sentences. Go me. But I also think less of people who don't, because, well, I associate a lot of it with being an absolute twinkie. (I'm more or less resigned to people who don't use their shift keys, but that's my line of tolerance.)

It's not so much that I think people who don't use proper words in chat or e-mail are too stupid to use it when they choose to. But it's a sign of something negative that they don't care enough, or respect the process of communication enough to communicate properly.

Besides, you then get the kids who start using IM colloquialisms in formal schoolwork and so on. Which is just beyond me - I mean, who doesn't get the difference between formal academic writing and EVERY OTHER KIND of writing? Take a sentence from one of my recent essays.

"Without a means of linking fascism to the background of European social philosophy and sociopolitical development, fascism remains to an extent impenetrable; it is here that he uncovers the foundation for fascism's existence as a metapolitical phenomenon, a manifestation of the process of Europe's political progress."

Now.

In what UNIVERSE do I talk or write like that normally? Normally I use far fewer polysyllabicisms, and I use less elaborate sentence structure. Now, there's a difference between written and spoken English; written allows longer sentences, and more involved clauses, like this sentence for example, which I wouldn't even attempt to construct if i were speaking off the cuff. And which, you'll note, is still distinctly less involved than that other one.

It's the important distinction between categories of language, is all. It's a pet peeve of mine. If you are intending to communicate with another human being, unless you know them well, it is a sign of elementary respect to communicate with them using actual, real language.