if it is an iphone 4 or 4s you can go to settings>messages and turn iMessage on-iMessage allows you to txt other Idevices over wifi-with the email thing, I have no clue-if you have your email account set up on your iphone, and have a good wifi connection you should be able to send/receive emails-you could always just go to the website (yahoo,msn,..) and log into your account from there til you get a better answer