Because Internet: Understanding the New Rules of Language

★ ★ ★ 1/2 (rounded up)
This originally appeared at The Irresponsible Reader.
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I'm a linguist, and I live on the internet. When I see the boundless creativity of internet language flowing past me online, I can't help but want to understand how it works. Why did emoji become so popular so quickly? What's the deal with how people of different ages punctuate their emails and text messages so differently? Why does the language in memes often look so wonderfully strange?