Digital media users and Facebook hashtags' misinterpretations

Abstract

PurposeThis paper examines reasons of pragmatic functions' misinterpretation of three types of Facebook hashtags: long, short and multiple mixed hashtags.Design/methodology/approachFocus group interviews of 15 English language learners, who are also active users of Facebook and hashtags, are conducted. Thematic analysis is performed through the software Nvivo for arriving at reliable findings.FindingsThe findings show that unknown vocabulary in contents and lowercasing in long and short hashtags are major factors that cause misinterpretation. Also, the symbol of underscore and appropriate usage of upper and lowercasing of alphabets should be adopted in hashtag writing for the improvement in communication and successful conveyance of the intended meaning.Originality/valueThis paper contributes to the online hashtag writing style by finding reasons for the misinterpretations of different types of hashtags. Hashtags have been developed for adequate communication (Livingstone, 2012), but in Pakistan, hashtags are practiced as a “fashionable” trend and thus result in misinterpretation and inadequate communication among readers even of the same background (Tariq and Sarfraz, 2018). Moreover, this study focuses on the trend of hashtagging that is common among university students and particularly second-language learners because they are active users of Facebook and adopt the latest trends quickly.

Language Analysis and the Role of Facebook Hashtags in Pakistan

“…This study concludes that lower casing in writing style, lack of knowledge and inadequate vocabulary create misinterpretation among English language learners in Pakistan. Results of the study confirmed that the use of Facebook is limited to informal language learning where hashtags are used to add style (Tariq and Sarfraz, 2018) in social media posts while attaining language learning benefits are far behind.…”

“…The present study explores that several language factors such as abbreviation, acronym, capitalization, case sensitivity (lower and upper casing of letters), symbol of underscore, different languages complete words, alteration between two or more languages (code-switching), and digits are used in three types of hashtags on Facebook as highlighted by Tariq et al (2020).…”

“…For example: an Urdu or a Hindi speaker may read #pia hashtag as Pia (word used for drinking in Urdu) or Piya (name of a girl in Hindi). Moreover, in a long hashtag, capitalization of a following word may not appear as English language rule as in English language space is used but in a hashtag, using a space means breaking hashtag as mentioned by Harper (2014) so to show space in one long hashtag, underscore is appropriate as it was highlighted in previous studies (Blattner et al, 2016; Tariq et al, 2020). It helps readers to know that another word is coming and their minds may comprehend it accurately.…”

“…In Pakistan, Facebook hashtags can play a significant role in digital communication because it is quite popular among social media users and youngsters. Tariq et al (2020) paved the way to analyze Facebook hashtags’ misinterpretations where factors of three types in Facebook hashtags were highlighted. There is still need to explore several factors depending upon Facebook Hashtags’ types and their structures presented in this study as they can contribute to the literature of communication process and the role of hashtags on Facebook for learning purposes.…”

“…The present study aims to contribute to ICT related “communication model” named as hashtags (Adamska, 2015) in a Pakistani context. Tariq et al (2020) (see Table 1) paved the way to analyze Facebook hashtags’ misinterpretations where factors of three types were highlighted. Several factors, depending upon Facebook hashtags’ types and their structures presented in this study, can contribute to the literature of the communication process and the role of hashtags on Facebook.…”