The Shape of Script: How and Why Writing Systems Change (School for Advanced Research Advanced Seminar Series)
| Author | : | |
| Rating | : | 4.59 (771 Votes) |
| Asin | : | 1934691429 |
| Format Type | : | paperback |
| Number of Pages | : | 346 Pages |
| Publish Date | : | 2016-02-26 |
| Language | : | English |
DESCRIPTION:
69, 2013 . As Houston rightly argues in his Preface, The study of writing needs to be brought back into the fold of anthropology, not as a marginal or recondite specialty but because it is an indispensable tool by which knowledge is transmitted. --Andrew Robinson, author of The Story of Writing, Lost Languages, The Man Who Deciphered Linear B, and Cracking the Egyptian CodeThis collection of essays addresses a rarely treated but strategic set of questions. The individual contributions present an impressive wealth of data and analyses. It shows that the study of the evolution of script systems constitutes the best way to understand how aesthetics and script use can shape each other in a cultural tradition, and more generally, how the visual appearance of signs can influence the social use of language. --Ca
"One of the misconceptions about writing is that a particular system of script comes into existence, remains the same, and then 'dies,'" said Houston."This notion radically and wrongly dehistoricizes systems of writing. Houston has spent decades studying the nature of writing systems, which "are so very basic as nodes of connection among many aspect
Five Stars Excellent book
The contributorswho study ancient scripts from Arabic to Roman, from Bronze Age China to Middle Kingdom Egyptutilize an approach that views writing less as a technology than as a mode of communication, one that is socially learned and culturally transmitted.. This book builds on earlier projects about the origins and extinctions of script traditions throughout the world in an effort to address the fundamental questions of how and why writing systems change