The Millennial Language and its Impact on Tertiary Learners

Abstract

The aim of this research is to find out the changes between the languages that millennials use in the social media platforms or in their regular life and the language they use in their academic life that are highly influenced by the Millennial language and social media culture. Language is an ever-evolving phenomenon. With the Millennials, it is evolving even faster. Different social networking sites being the main medium of communication, this generation has created a new kind of language that includes acronym, abbreviations, slang, emoji, shortening of words, coined words etc. It surely reflects their digital culture and linguistic creativity. Being at the forefront, Generation Z is shaping a new language, on one hand by adding new words, terms and phrases, and on the other hand by distorting the standard form of the language. The coexisting nature of this language where its potential benefits and drawbacks are quite evident on its learners making it more interesting to study further. Therefore, this research study aims to explore the changes that occurred in the English language over the past decade due to the social networking sites mostly used by millennials and its impact on the learners of this generation. This study used a mixed method approach to achieve the research objective, which includes a survey on the university students at the undergraduate level. The collected data shows that learners have negative impact in their academic life because of the language used in social media, even though the language helping learners gaining new knowledge about the English language. To learn the standard English, use of formal English in social media could be beneficial for the learners of the language.