How we talk vs. how we write

Spoken language has always differed from written language. Humans have been talking to each other for eons, but we've been writing for just a few thousand years. And for most of those few thousand years, only a handful of educated people could read or understand what had been written.

When people wrote, whether it was poetry, a book that would eventually become a part of the Bible or a letter home, it would inevitably be in more formal and proper language than what they spoke in normal conversation. Shakespeare probably didn't sound like Shakespeare when he went home at night. When we are writing, we have time to think about what we are saying. We can go back and make corrections. We can dress up our language to make a good impression.

In the movie The Green Book, a rough nightclub bouncer is hired by an educated black pianist to drive him on a concert tour. Along the way Tony Vallelonga writes stumbling letters to his wife, but then Don Shirley, the musician, helps him dress up those letters in eloquent prose. The wife isn't fooled. She knows Tony has had help. Still the letters make the desired impression.

Over the past half century or so, thanks to e-mail and a variety of other factors, the differences between spoken English and written English have narrowed, yet still differences exist, and probably will continue to do so.

Here are some ways in which how we talk differs from how we write:

1. Shorter sentences. Complex sentences are rare in normal conversation.

2. Incomplete sentences. One of my previous blog posts tells of my difficulty in getting a good quote as a newspaper reporter because my sources often didn't complete their sentences.

3. Simpler words. You can't look up a word in a thesaurus when you're talking on the phone.

4. More slang, more profanity.

5. Repetition. When we can't think of what to say next, we repeat what we've said before.

6. The use of conversation fillers like "you know" and "like" and "ummm."

7. Context. When you are writing, you have to explain the context. What or who exactly are you writing about? In conversation, however, the other person probably already knows or even shares the context. They may be in the same room. They see what you see and hear what you hear.. That's why reading the Watergate transcripts is so confusing. Had you been in the Oval Office at the time knowing what Richard Nixon and his henchmen knew, it would have made perfect sense. In the same way, a transcript of your conversation with a friend probably wouldn't make much sense to a stranger reading it.

8. Impermanence. What we say disappears into the air, while what we write has a bit of a shelf life. Anyway this use to be true. Now one never knows when one's words are being recorded. This is especially true of politicians and other well-known individuals. They need to always be careful about what they say, and this too may be serving to bring spoken language and written language closer together.