If mLearning needs a gateway or “killer app” to get people in the west to appreciate it, we have to get beyond games and text correct? Well, leave it to Japan, where now entire stories are being created and delivered to cell phones. These stories are written for the form factor of the phone, using kanji, so the stories are told in a basic manner with short sentences. In a refreshing comment, Toru Ishikawa, a professor of Japanese literature at Tokyo’s Keio University notes
“The size of the screen also necessitates that [authors] use short, simple sentences with basic words. If that’s how you measure the quality of literature, then yes, the prevalence of writing like this will water down Japanese literature.
“But it could also encourage writers to be inventive with language in new ways. Language must always evolve.”
Maybe some English academics should be looking at things in a similar manner.
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