User:Remsense/writing

Medieval era and modernity

The sociolinguistic phenomenon of diglossia arises when the written language used within a society significantly diverges from the spoken language it previously corresponded to, typically as the result of accumulated language changes in ordinary speech not being reflected in writing. The gap between the two forms can ultimately come to distinguish two registers of what is considered the same language system – with the written classical language as the formal, prestigious register, and the spoken vernacular language as an informal, even incorrect register.^[1] Throughout the late medieval and early modern periods, written vernacular languages were developed, competing with and increasingly displacing classical languages used around the world. Examples, dealing both in the norms of writing and speech, include Italian, Spanish, German, French, and English replacing Latin in Western Europe, written vernacular Chinese replacing Literary Chinese, and the Turkish language reform that stripped Ottoman Turkish of most of its Persian and Arabic influences.^[2] Often, deliberate language planning and pushes for mass literacy represented one component in broader nation building movements.^[3] Two instances where diglossia remains prominent concern vernacular versus written forms of Arabic, and the continued relevance of classical Sinhalese in Sri Lanka.^[4]

Organization of phrases, sentences, and paragraphs

Punctuation

Perspectives about writing

Antiquity

Several mythical accounts of the invention of writing are attested from Bronze Age Mesopotamia. The oldest known is contained in Enmerkar and the Lord of Aratta, a story likely compiled from earlier oral traditions in the Sumerian city of Ur during the Ur III period (c. 2200–2100 BC). It credits earlier humans from nearby Uruk with inventing writing during the semi-legendary first dynasty of Uruk (c. 2800–2700 BC) – which aligns relatively closely with the time and location of its invention identified by modern scholarship.^[6] In the later Inana and Enki myth, written during the Old Babylonian period (c. 1894–1595 BC), writing is one of several dozen me (elements divinely decreed as essential for human civilization) initially kept from humanity by the god Enki, but ultimately bequeathed to Uruk by his daughter Inana.^[7] Over time, writing became associated with several deities worshipped across the Near East, including the Babylonian Nabu and Egyptian Thoth.^[8] In China, the invention of writing was traditionally credited to Cangjie, a scribe of the legendary Yellow Emperor, and was celebrated for protecting humans from being cheated by malevolent demons.^[9]

In one sequence of Plato's dialogue Phaedrus (c. 370 BC), Socrates criticizes writing, citing the Egyptian narrative where Amun laments its creation by Thoth for enabling forgetfulness in humans, instead of making them wiser as Thoth intended.^[10] Socrates goes on to make additional critiques, namely that a text cannot be constructively engaged with in dialogue like another person can, and that the writer of a text lacks control over its interpretation by detached and distant readers.^[11]

Middle Ages

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Modern era

Athanasius Kircher

Jean-Jacques Rousseau considered writing merely a "supplement to speech".^[13] Hermann Paul

Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel

Ferdinand de Saussure Leonard Bloomfield

Ignace Gelb Jacques Derrida

Semiotics

Social and metalinguistic aspects

Literacy

Literacy – broadly, the ability to read and write – was comparatively rare in premodern societies, and thus social transformation stemming from the literate elements of society was relatively limited in scope and controlled by preexisting structures of political power. A wide range of aptitudes can be acquired in both reading and writing, with circumstances historically often resulting in individuals acquiring one skill to some extent and not the other.^[14]

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Dyslexia

Orthography and language policy

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Related systems

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Clear parallels have been identified between writing systems and systems of mathematical and musical notation, regarding how devices (e.g. beams that indicate duration of musical notes, parentheses that indicate order of operations in mathematical expressions) organize basic elements into constituent structures. Said structures are likewise fluidly interpreted and understood by practitioners of sufficient skill in the corresponding disciplines.^[20]