#LetsTalkAboutHashtags

Image Courtesy of Space&Time

We’re officially in the era of too many hashtags. Nearly all-social media users stick them in posts as a form of categorization to create trends. Quickly scan Twitter, Instagram, and Tumblr — and now Facebook — and you are bound to see a hashtag attached to a post. This is not only in America; in January France chose to ban the word hashtag due to its overwhelming popularity. Should America follow suit and ban the hashtag or limit its popularity?

Does the use of hashtags affect our writing skills? I am not quite sure. What I’ve observed on several social media platforms is that people often use only single coherent phrases followed by strings of hashtags. This is to often done to convey a message but a writers, I believe this might limit our ability to coherently express ourselves. Chris Messina, a Google employee, pioneered this modern use of hashtags several years ago. Messina thought the old pound symbol could be a good way to “tag” tweets and add order to all Twitter action.

This origin doesn’t matter anymore. Hashtags now act as paralanguages, like shoulder shrugs and intonations which is fine. Although hashtags are occasionally annoying, I think they also serve a great purpose as well. Think back to hashtags like #BostonStrong and #Bringbackourgirls. These hashtags among many others showed the potential for people from all walks of life to rally for good courses. I believe hashtags have become an interesting part of American culture despite the fact that it is often misused. It would certainly be interesting to see what hashtags will be used for in the years to come.