The Development of Writing Cave Drawings About 20,000 years ago; to record events Pictograms Ideograms Logograms Rebus Writing Syllabic Writing Alphabetic Writing

Pictograms A form of picture writing Using pictures to represent particular images in a consistent way (symbol = picture of a thing) A conventional relationship must exist between the symbol and its meaning Not arbitrary; language independent Not represent words or sounds in a lang. Examples: star = sun = bathroom signs =

Ideograms A system of “idea writing” more abstract relationship (symbol = an idea, but not a concrete object) more arbitrary (in terms of form & meaning) more derived forms Not represent words or sounds in a lang. Example: for “sun”, also “heat” Egyptian writing for water: 明 = “bright”

Logograms A system of word writing Examples advantage and disadvantage symbols represent words or morphemes in a particular language [sound + meaning] grapheme = a concept; the smallest unit in a writing system Examples cuneiform writing: used by the Sumerians, referred to as the earliest writing system cuneiform = wedge-shaped (Yule 11) Chinese characters (but only represent meaning of words, not of sounds of spoken lang.) advantage and disadvantage

Rebus Writing A process (or a way) of using existing symbols to represent the sounds of lang. borrow the symbol, take over the sound, but forget the meaning reduce the number of symbols needed in a writing system Examples a non-English example: in language games:

Syllabic Writing (Syllabary) Every symbol represents one syllable grapheme = syllable e.g., Japanese (which also uses logographic characters—Kanji) Examples in Japanese Hiragana: ひと　（hito） 　の　（no） くるま （kuruma ） Katakana: 　　 Kanji: 人の車 たまご　（tamago） “egg”

Alphabetic Writing Symbols represent single phonemes Examples grapheme = phoneme (i.e., symbols represent single phonemes) definition of “letter” (each written symbol) vs. “alphabet” (a set of written symbols) (Yule 13) Examples alphabets representing mainly consonants: e.g., Arabic, Hebrew alphabets representing both consonants & vowels: e.g., Greek

Conclusion Cave drawings pictograms ideograms logograms (phonological) rebus writing syllabic writing alphabetic writing Writing systems seem to have gone from syllabaries to alphabets representing mainly consonants, to alphabets representing both consonants and vowels. This reflects the phonemic nature of lang., so can be considered a natural development—though not a necessary one or a “better” one.