Morphological Processes Used in Text Messages

Abstract

Sri Lankan English (SLE) has an exclusive repertoire distinct from other varieties of English used in the Asian subcontinent. SLE morphology used in social media has been discussed in many research studies. This current research study was conducted to identify the morphological processes of Sri Lankan English used in text messaging. This study was conducted to identify the validity of the statement, “The most productive morphological processes in Sri Lankan English are borrowing, compounding and affixation” stated by Gunasekara (2005) in the book “The Postcolonial Identity of Sri Lankan English”. A mixed method approach was employed to obtain data. In the data collection 50 text messages were collected from fifty participants and the selected words are categorized under 10 different morphological processes. Thereby, the most common and productive morphological processes were identified via qualitative basis. According to the findings all the participants use at least one morphological process in their text messages. Moreover Sri Lankan English borrowings are frequently used by the participants and surprisingly the majority of the participants use neologism in their text messages. Yet, the effectiveness of these morphological processes is open for discussion.