What do linguists think of hashtags on social media?

#HashtagsNotWords

There are two main theories about the language state of topic tags. The first statement is that the subject tag is like a compound. Essentially, this is the way to make new words by combining two (or more) existing words together.

The second idea is that subject tags are words, and they are produced by a completely different process than what we have seen before. This notation is a much looser way of forming words with fewer restrictions. Once the # sign is used and there is no space between the parts, a new word is born -- # lovehashtagging, # lazysundayafternoon, # MaoriLanguageWeek.

Our study object labels as words. We recommend recognizing of subject tags as something that literally looks like words but is much more versatile and like keywords in a library catalogue or search engine.

Just because labels are not words in themselves, however, it does not mean they are linguistically boring. On the contrary, we've found that hashtags allow us to express ourselves in creative ways, and they're used for a variety of functions, including showing humour and word puzzle.

The subject tag also shows new ways to use lexical resources from different languages. A mixed tag, as we call it, is a tag containing one or more words from two different languages (by our case, English and Maori New Zealand). Examples include # kiaora4that and #letssharegoodtereostories.

Social media languages will not lead to the end of traditional languages, and they help to increase the understanding between human beings.