Whatchanade? Rapid Language Change in a Private Email Sibling Code

Abstract

This study reports on a case of rapid change in a private language code developed by two sisters. The code’s beginnings as a spoken family code did not result in much development. Only years later when the sisters began using the rather idiosyncratic and inconsistent code in emails to each other did it begin to achieve a degree of structural stability. The social and technological aspects associated with email facilitated this stabilization, allowing the code to develop both pragmatically and structurally over a very short time. This case has implications for the nature of linguistic change in intimate and other intensive communicative situations, as well as for the potential role of technological mediation in accelerated language change.