It means a culture based on written language. Literacy is the ability to read and write. Not the ability to use language.
best, Ursula Andreas Ramos wrote:
So a pre-literate culture would attach more value to words than a literate culture? Doesn't a literate culture, by definition, mean a culture based on language?yrs, andreas www.andreas.com ----- Original Message ----- From: "Ursula Stange" <Ursula@xxxxxxxxxx> To: <lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> Sent: Wednesday, October 03, 2007 11:15 AM Subject: [lit-ideas] Re: Must the Word be Literate?Excuse me? Non-literate cultures often attach even more meaning to words. Recitation of ancestral lineage comes to mind. Prayers come to mind. Mythology comes to mind. Medicine comes to mind. Everything had to be memorized -- in words. Otherwise the past disappeared. And those who did the memorizing were revered as the repository of that past. And they sought someone in the next generation who could repeat the miracle. Ursula, revering the miracle...Andreas Ramos wrote:Many preliterate societies have now been studied by anthropologists. One or more could report (better yet document by providing a transcription) an origin myth that starts along the lines suggested by the Gospel of John: "In the beginning was the Word..."If a culture is preliterate, why would it attach significant meaning to words?We prioritize words because we live in a literate culture (well, some of us). We've learned how to externalized (store), share, and edit our experiences and knowledge. For us, it's not "words, words, mere words."But non-literate cultures will find that other experiences have more meaning for them. Language isn't important for them.yrs, andreas www.andreas.com ------------------------------------------------------------------ To change your Lit-Ideas settings (subscribe/unsub, vacation on/off, digest on/off), visit www.andreas.com/faq-lit-ideas.html------------------------------------------------------------------ To change your Lit-Ideas settings (subscribe/unsub, vacation on/off, digest on/off), visit www.andreas.com/faq-lit-ideas.html------------------------------------------------------------------ To change your Lit-Ideas settings (subscribe/unsub, vacation on/off, digest on/off), visit www.andreas.com/faq-lit-ideas.html
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