Writing Without Words

Alternative Literacies in Mesoamerica and the Andes

Nonfiction, Reference & Language, Foreign Languages, Native American Languages
Cover of the book Writing Without Words by , Duke University Press
View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart
Author: ISBN: 9780822379263
Publisher: Duke University Press Publication: May 16, 1994
Imprint: Duke University Press Books Language: English
Author:
ISBN: 9780822379263
Publisher: Duke University Press
Publication: May 16, 1994
Imprint: Duke University Press Books
Language: English

The history of writing, or so the standard story goes, is an ascending process, evolving toward the alphabet and finally culminating in the "full writing" of recorded speech. Writing without Words challenges this orthodoxy, and with it widespread notions of literacy and dominant views of art and literature, history and geography. Asking how knowledge was encoded and preserved in Pre-Columbian and early colonial Mesoamerican cultures, the authors focus on systems of writing that did not strive to represent speech. Their work reveals the complicity of ideology in the history of literacy, and offers new insight into the history of writing.
The contributors--who include art historians, anthropologists, and literary theorists--examine the ways in which ancient Mesoamerican and Andean peoples conveyed meaning through hieroglyphic, pictorial, and coded systems, systems inseparable from the ideologies they were developed to serve. We see, then, how these systems changed with the European invasion, and how uniquely colonial writing systems came to embody the post-conquest American ideologies. The authors also explore the role of these early systems in religious discourse and their relation to later colonial writing.
Bringing the insights from Mesoamerica and the Andes to bear on a fundamental exchange among art history, literary theory, semiotics, and anthropology, the volume reveals the power contained in the medium of writing.

Contributors. Elizabeth Hill Boone, Tom Cummins, Stephen Houston, Mark B. King, Dana Leibsohn, Walter D. Mignolo, John Monaghan, John M. D. Pohl, Joanne Rappaport, Peter van der Loo

View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart

The history of writing, or so the standard story goes, is an ascending process, evolving toward the alphabet and finally culminating in the "full writing" of recorded speech. Writing without Words challenges this orthodoxy, and with it widespread notions of literacy and dominant views of art and literature, history and geography. Asking how knowledge was encoded and preserved in Pre-Columbian and early colonial Mesoamerican cultures, the authors focus on systems of writing that did not strive to represent speech. Their work reveals the complicity of ideology in the history of literacy, and offers new insight into the history of writing.
The contributors--who include art historians, anthropologists, and literary theorists--examine the ways in which ancient Mesoamerican and Andean peoples conveyed meaning through hieroglyphic, pictorial, and coded systems, systems inseparable from the ideologies they were developed to serve. We see, then, how these systems changed with the European invasion, and how uniquely colonial writing systems came to embody the post-conquest American ideologies. The authors also explore the role of these early systems in religious discourse and their relation to later colonial writing.
Bringing the insights from Mesoamerica and the Andes to bear on a fundamental exchange among art history, literary theory, semiotics, and anthropology, the volume reveals the power contained in the medium of writing.

Contributors. Elizabeth Hill Boone, Tom Cummins, Stephen Houston, Mark B. King, Dana Leibsohn, Walter D. Mignolo, John Monaghan, John M. D. Pohl, Joanne Rappaport, Peter van der Loo

More books from Duke University Press

Cover of the book The Dead Letter and The Figure Eight by
Cover of the book Present Tense by
Cover of the book Shakespeare, Brecht, and the Intercultural Sign by
Cover of the book Watering the Revolution by
Cover of the book My Life as a Spy by
Cover of the book Vampires, Mummies and Liberals by
Cover of the book Crossing Borders, Claiming a Nation by
Cover of the book The Long War by
Cover of the book William J. Seymour and the Origins of Global Pentecostalism by
Cover of the book Protection of Global Biodiversity by
Cover of the book Speculate This! by
Cover of the book Dying in Full Detail by
Cover of the book The Intimate University by
Cover of the book Absolute Erotic, Absolute Grotesque by
Cover of the book Called by Stories by
We use our own "cookies" and third party cookies to improve services and to see statistical information. By using this website, you agree to our Privacy Policy