The following essay was written sa part of a second year of a BA at the University of South Australia. Due to ethics concerns, the names of the channel and users have been removed.
Michelle Wauchope - 9400633f
Language and Society - 2nd Essay
This study looks at Investigations 2; it addresses some of the issues of rules and conventions within the interaction.
"...the new 'virtual' communities are no longer defined by geographic or even semiotic (ethnic/ religious/ linguistic) boundaries. Instead, communities are being constructed in cyberspace on the basis of common affiliative interests, transcending boundaries of class, nation, race, gender and language."
http://www.clas.ufl.edu/anthro/cyberanthro/CyberAnthropology .html
This utopian comment on the nature of Cyberspace communities is a common perception made by the media and academics alike. This report refutes this perception. While the potential for such an environment does exist, people inherently carry cultural baggage, thus carry the same boundaries into the realm of cyberspace.
IRC does block some of the boundary markers that users would normally be constricted by. Social indicators - of social position, of age and authority, of personal appearance - are not evident in a computer-mediated context (Byrne, 1994).
While there may be other communities which do transcend these social boundaries, the IRC community of **.**g #g****c not only displays these boundaries, but has invented other methods of showing them which can only be used in the medium of IRC. Thus these boundaries are continued in the IRC medium rather than broken down. This report makes an exploratory study of some of the methods of displaying these boundaries, and other similarities between IRC and face-to-face (FTF) communication.
The Interaction:
The transcript supplied (see app.1) was made on Thursday April 17, 1997 at 9pm Australian Central Standard Time, and shows the public conversation of the IRC channel #g****c on server s*****.**.**g.
The participants were made aware of the transcript through a public topic heading. This topic stated that a transcript was being made, and to ask for more details. Upon request, an e-mail was sent (see app.2).
People who were present during the transcript were also asked in private messages to provide their gender, location, age, educational background, and why they first joined #g****c. This information was as follows:
Users: 18
Male: 10 Female: 8
Oz: 16 International: 2
Age group:
15-20 20-25 25-30 30-35 35+
5 7 4 1 1
Education:
At School Uni Work Unemployed
4 7 5 2
Reason for joining #g****c:
Wanted other like-minded people to talk to: 10
Knew someone here in real life: 5
Came to look and liked it: 3
Nicknames:
Male - S*****e C****r F******l Z*******r X*****r N*****i N******t H*******e K**e C******g
Female - A****a D****y M***w A*******g M****a P*****n M*****a J*******k
There were others present at the time of the transcript who I was unable to contact to obtain their personal details. These people will not be included in my examples, or my theories.
Geographic Boundaries
As sydney.oz.org is an Australian IRC server, the majority of users are Australian, although there is no exclusivity to access this server once IRC access is established. There are other #gothics on other servers, but these contain less Australian users. In this fashion we see that the users chose to make their geographic location part of their identity .
The other concern with IRC that is related to geography is that of time zones. December writes that IRC has "... space and time independence" (December, 1993). While the IRC medium may be time independent through it's accessibility, because IRC is a form of synchronous communication the users are not; they must eat, work and sleep. Due to time zones, when one location (for example, Australia) is active, another (America) has minimal activity on line.
Class boundaries
IRC is restricted to those who have access to the Internet computer network. A reflection of this is the large proportion of #gothic users involved in computing as a career choice . Thus the "users of IRC are a pre-selected community - they have much in common as far as such considerations as social position and education are concerned." (Byrne, 1994).
I would also suggest that age is also a part of this preselected community; only those in a certain age group will be involved in computers as a career, and thus access the knowledge for IRC. Most below and above this select age group either do not have the knowledge or the desire to access IRC.
Interaction on IRC is carried out in the knowledge that users are on a rough equality . This 'equality' is not intrinsic to IRC, it is a by-product of the social structures surrounding computer technology (Byrne, 1994).
Fundamental to IRC is the concept of a channel. Generally the name of the channel indicates the nature of the conversation being carried out within it. #g****c by it's nature of being an expression of a youth subculture also creates class and age boundaries. Most people within this subculture are of a middle class background, also, most people within this subculture are under the age of 30.
Gender Boundaries
Our understanding of 'self' assumes that we cannot change our appearance. However, how an IRC user 'looks' is entirely dependant upon information supplied by that person. It becomes possible to play with identity, and gender.
On IRC, changing gender seems as simple as changing one's nickname to something that suggests the opposite gender (Byrne, 1994) . However, changing a nickname does not remove the markers of gender that become apparent in IRC and FTF communication. IRC appears to be an arena for experimentation with gender specific social roles, but these roles are the product of external cultures, and the traditional definitions of gender still remain in place.
The nicknames in #g****c, as inventive as they are, still imply a gender, and this gender is reflective of the users. Those who pick a nickname different to their own, have usually made a conscious decision to do this, but they still disclose their gender through markers in conversation.
A few of the ways of creating gender boundaries in the medium of IRC that I noted are the following;
€ Females tend to use extended words:
[21:01]
€ This example also illustrates a phenomenon that was described by one user on #gothic as "hello-slut". Females and males both participate, but the instigator is usually female. This is also interesting, as this type of behaviour is acceptable within the IRC medium, but not in real life - it appears that IRC does relax some of the boundaries of what is considered acceptable social behaviour;
"Protected by the anonymity of the computer medium, and with few social context cues to indicate 'proper' ways to behave, users are able to express and experiment with aspects of their personality that social inhibition would generally encourage them to suppress." (Byrne, 1994)
Subculture Language
The USENET (and computer hacker) culture has developed many words and phrases that serve as stock expressions (December, 1993). They began to develop an anti-language (Montgomery, 1995) to conserve bandwidth mixed with computer orientated jargon. Due to the opening up of the network, and the improvement of technology, much of this jargon is not used in #g****c, but enough of it is to provide a barrier to those not already familiar with the channel.
This language barrier fosters in-group identity, not unlike real life subculture language. It still helps to get the message through as quickly as possible, but this speed is related to typing speed, and not the speed of the technology.
Examples of this language found in #g****c include the following; /kick - remove someone from the channel
k/banned - remove from the channel so they can't come back.
flame - to fling verbal abuse at someone, sometimes in fun.
troll - a user who deliberately tries to be flamed
bbl - be back later (another is "brb" - be right back)
msg - message
ppl - people
IMHO - in my honest opinion
#g****c also has terms related to the subculture nature of the channel; "fangs" being used rather than "thanks" is the most obvious.
December (1994) likens IRC to Citizen's Band (CB) radio, echoing Montgomery's (1995) definition of subculture language. The difference from a purely oral form of this (CB radio) is that IRC provides textual cues not present in CB radio, it does allow for some choice in which community one wishes to speak to, and allows for some representation of physical actions.
The nicknames also act as a subculture indicator. In #g****c, with a high degree of inventiveness within the 'real life' subculture, those with a 'real' name or 'hacker speak' name are treated with more suspicion that just a standard newcomer.
What will be interesting to watch is how many of these new terms will make their way into wider FTF communication. Already, when users meet in real life, they do utilise some of their typed jargon and relexicalization in their oral communication.
Topic Choice
IRC lends itself to discussion not unlike discussion at social gatherings (Byrne, 1994). In the case of #g****c, the topic varies wildly. In the transcript provided, problems with computers and external study generate the most talk. S*****e attempts to control of the floor, posing questions and getting other users to respond , but around this we have conversations about television shows, what users are doing or did that day, general appearance and hair colour.
Other Linguistic Features Of IRC
IRC communicates in a written medium but reproduces aspects of FTF communication by users adapting this written medium to their needs (December, 1993). IRC breaks down the divisions between spoken and written, and synchronous and asynchronous forms of language.
IRC is unable to transmit the non-verbal aspects of speech that conventional synchronous communication demands. Meanings of sentences and behaviour standards normally indicated by non-verbal cues are not clear in pure text (Byrne, 1994). Users are unable to rely on the conventions of gesture and nuances of tone to provide social feedback (December, 1993), so they have used the medium to create these physical cues and regulate behaviour.
These fall into two distinct categories. Firstly, users of IRC have devised systems of symbolism to ensure understanding. Secondly, rules of etiquette - or 'netiquette' have been created. Users who break these can be punished.
Users verbalise physical cues, for instance typing 'hehehe' or 'LOL' (lots of laughs), or in #g****c 'mwhahaha', when normal communication would involve laughter. They also present physical actions or reactions between two asterisks; *giggle* (Byrne, 1994). They also present shouting in capitals ( not for everything, this would be bad netiquette) and stress intonation through punctuation.
[21:02]{C******g} P*****N!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! *hugs* : )
[21:06]{P*****n} aaaaaaaaaahhhhhh R***n!! :)
[21:16]{m****a} hazelwood?????
This demonstrates the importance of the physical to interpret behaviour. This stylised description of action is not a literal description of the speakers' physical actions, which is simply typing. Rather they represent actions were the virtual reality of IRC an actual reality (Byrne, 1994).
The users of IRC have developed a system of presenting textual characters commonly known as 'emoticons' or 'smileys' (December, 1993) for the description of physical condition. Emoticons are used to denote pleasure or amusement or to soften a sarcastic comment (Byrne, 1994).
:-) or : ) a smiling face
;-) or ; ) a winking, smiling face
:-( or : ( an sad face
:-P or : P someone sticking out their tongue
Also, when users need to direct their comments to specific users, rather than use eye-contact, they use their nickname followed by a colon.
[21:02]{f******l} m****a: howd the job thingy go??
Because FTF communication relies on memory, the speech is often redundant and copious. In speech acts, the listener may be distracted. The speaker must repeat the speech in order to insure the listener has heard and makes heavy use of fillers and back-channeling. On IRC, while there is no real need for fillers, takes place in the form of prompt questions from users.
[21:02]{C******g}A*****n: aw....a cold?
Users replicate conversation by keeping comments short, and replicate back-channeling pauses. These are unnecessary in a text, but in FTF and IRC show participation from the listener.
[21:24]{f*******l} hmmmmmm
Occasionally text is 'lost' so the writer, or some other member of the speech community will repeat it :
[21:56]{S*****e} (repeat) K*****h. Picture if you will: you're being observed by N******t. What does he see?
[21:57]{S*****e} [We're having time linearity problems in here in #g****c at the moment. You may experience some moments more than once.]
"Speed of response and wit are the stuff of popularity and community on IRC" (December, 1993). The person who is a slow typist, who demands time to reflect before responding, will be disadvantaged, even considered to be less intelligent. However, spelling mistakes are not accorded the same penalties as they are in normal text; "wau", and "thingy" are used to colour the text with personality.
Conclusion
While IRC offers the potential for a utopian environment, users continue to operate within social boundaries. Because of the textual/oral nature of the medium, many of these boundaries are recreated through the language used by the users.
It will be interesting to watch whether or not these boundaries disappear or become more defined as the medium becomes more accessible to the wider public. The field of IRC communication is definitely an area for more intense research and study.
References.
Byrne, Elizabeth, 1994, The Formation of Relationships on Internet Relay Chat (IRC) Honours thesis University of Western Sydney
Mizrack, Steve, Cyber Anthropology. http://www.clas.ufl.edu/anthro/cyberanthro/
CyberAnthropology.html
accessed 10 May 1997
Montgomery, Martin, 1995, An Introduction to Language and Society 2nd ed., Routledge, London
December, John, 1993, Characteristics of Oral Culture in Discourse on the Net. Paper presented at the twelfth annual Penn State Conference on Rhetoric and Composition, University, Park, Pennsylvania, July 8, 1993.
http://www.december.com/john/papers/pscrc93.txt
accessed 9 May 1997
Appendix 1.
Hi,
because you have e-mailed me, I guess you're wanting to know more about what I am doing, and why I am taking transcripts.
I am currently a second year student at the University of South Australia, and am taking a subject called "Language In Society". As part of this subject, I am undertaking a socio-linguistic investigation.
There is a 15 minute presentation where I discuss certain findings and a 1000-1500 word report. This will only be seen by my lecturer and myself, however it will be available to all people involved in the creating the transcripts. I may also choose to make it more widely available later, but this will not happen unless I have permission from the people in the study.
The transcripts will help me to investigate features in language, such as unwritten behavioural rules, tone, register and subjects, which are peculiar to IRC, and especially #gothic. It will be interesting as very few studies have been done into the linguistic side of IRC. Things such as online identities, nicks and the fact that IRC is the only medium for real time typed conversation, only add to these things.
I will be taking two transcripts, one on Wednesday 16th April from 7.30 - 9.30 Australian Eastern Standard Time (So thats 7 - 9 for you Addles and NT ppl - sorry Perthites and other countries, I have no idea of times for you). The other will be on the following Wednesday, the 23rd April.
Please come on line during these times, the more people online the better the conversations, the easier my report will be.
Yours sincerely - michelle, (a.k.a drodgy)
Another point is the response to regular users who deliberately hide their gender. Users can be ostracised from the community if they are deemed to have broken IRC rules (December, 1993). IRC has mechanisms for the enforcement of acceptable behaviour. But the backlash against men pretending to be women is greater than women pretending to be men . I believe that this helps to explain why the majority of ambiguous nicknames are used by women in #g****c.