Social Media Applications are inevitable in today’s people’s lives, especially for university students who
cannot be separated with their gadgets. It is undeniable that the use of social media changes the way people
communicate with each other, from oral communication to written text communication. This study tries to
find out whether social media usage influences the language used in communication, especially among
university students. Another question addressed by this study is whether students with ethnic language
background still maintain their ethnic languages when communicating using social media. Forty (40)
English Department students of Bina Nusantara University were conveniently selected as participants for
this study. They were given a questionnaire consisting of two parts, the first relating to the language use in
daily communication and the second relating to the language use in social media communication. Research
revealed that social media affect the way students communicate to each other. There is a shift in the use of
language from ethnic language to Indonesian. Yet, a shift from Indonesian to English will not happen in a
short time
