Illustration of a scribe writing

Writing is the representation of language in a textual medium through the use of a set of signs or symbols (known as a writing system). A scribe (or scrivener) is a person who writes books or documents by hand as a profession In the Arts media (plural of Medium) are the materials and techniques used by an Artist to produce a work A writing system is a type of Symbolic system used to represent elements or statements expressible in Language. It is distinguished from illustration, such as cave drawing and painting, and the recording of language via a non-textual medium such as magnetic tape audio. An illustration is a visualization such as a Drawing, Painting, Photograph or other work of Art that stresses subject more than Cave paintings are Paintings on Cave walls and ceilings and the term is used especially for those dating to Prehistoric times Painting (pān'tīng in Art, is the practice of applying Color to a Surface (support base such as e Magnetic tape has been used for Sound recording for more than 75 years

Writing began as a consequence of the burgeoning needs of accounting. Around the 4th millennium BC, the complexity of trade and administration outgrew the power of memory, and writing became a more dependable method of recording and presenting transactions in a permanent form (Robinson, 2003, p. 36).

Writing as a category

Writing, more particularly, refers to two things: writing as a noun, the thing that is written; and writing as a verb, which designates the activity of writing. For English usage of verbs see the wiki article English verbs. It refers to the inscription of characters on a medium, thereby forming words, and larger units of language, known as texts. Epigraphy (ἐπιγραφολογία from Greek ἐπιγραφή — "inscription" is the study of inscriptions or epigraphs engraved A glyph is an element of writing Two or more glyphs representing the same symbol whether interchangeable or context-dependent are called Allographs the abstract unit they A word is a unit of Language that carries meaning and consists of one or more Morphemes which are linked more or less tightly together and has a Phonetic A language is a dynamic set of visual auditory or tactile Symbols of Communication and the elements used to manipulate them It also refers to the creation of meaning and the information thereby generated. Information as a concept has a diversity of meanings from everyday usage to technical settings In that regard, linguistics (and related sciences) distinguishes between the written language and the spoken language. Linguistics is the scientific study of Language, encompassing a number of sub-fields Science (from the Latin scientia, meaning " Knowledge " or "knowing" is the effort to discover, and increase human understanding A written language is the representation of a Language by means of a Writing system. A spoken language is a human Natural language in which the Words are uttered through the Mouth. The significance of the medium by which meaning and information is conveyed is indicated by the distinction made in the arts and sciences. For example, while public speaking and poetry reading are both types of speech, the former is governed by the rules of rhetoric and the latter by poetics. Public speaking is the process of speaking to a group of people in a structured deliberate manner intended to inform influence or entertain the listeners A poetry reading is a performance of Poetry, normally given on a small stage in a Café or Bookstore, although poetry readings given by notable poets frequently Speech refers to the processes associated with the production and perception of Sounds used in Spoken language. Rhetoric has had many definitions no simple definition can do it justice Poetics refers generally to the theory of literary Discourse and specifically to the theory of Poetry, although some speakers use the term so broadly as to denote

A person who composes a message or story in the form of text is generally known as a writer or an author. A writer is anyone who creates a written work although the word usually designates those who write creatively or professionally as well as those who have written in many different forms An author is defined both as "the person who originates or gives existence to anything" and that authorship determines responsibility for what is created However, more specific designations exist which are dictated by the particular nature of the text such as that of poet, essayist, novelist, playwright, journalist, and more. A poet is a person who writes Poetry. Etymology From the Ancient greek: ποιέω, poieō: "I make or compose" This article is an abbreviated list of Essayists - individuals notable for writing essays on various topics A novel (from Italian novella, Spanish novela, French nouvelle for "new" "news" or "short story A playwright, also known as a dramatist, is a person who writes dramatic literature or Drama. A journalist (also called a newspaperman) is a person who practices Journalism, the gathering and dissemination of information about current events trends A person who transcribes, translates or produces text to deliver a message authored by another person is known as a scribe, typist or typesetter. Transcription is the conversion into written typewritten or printed form of a Spoken language source such as the proceedings of a court hearing Translation is the interpreting of the meaning of a text and the subsequent production of an equivalent text likewise called a " translation A scribe (or scrivener) is a person who writes books or documents by hand as a profession Typing is the process of inputting text into a device such as a Typewriter, Computer, or a Calculator, by pressing keys on a keyboard. Typesetting involves the presentation of textual material in graphic form on Paper or some other medium. A person who produces text with emphasis on the aesthetics of glyphs is known as a calligrapher or graphic designer. Aesthetics or esthetics ( also spelled æsthetics) is commonly known as the study of sensory or sensori-emotional values sometimes called A glyph is an element of writing Two or more glyphs representing the same symbol whether interchangeable or context-dependent are called Allographs the abstract unit they Calligraphy (from Greek kallos "beauty" + graphẽ "writing" is the art of writing (Mediavilla 1996 17 A graphic designer (also known as a graphic artist and communication designer) is a professional within the Graphic design and Graphic arts industry

Writing is also a distinctly human activity. Human beings, humans or man (Origin 1590–1600 L homō man OL hemō the earthly one (see Humus It has been said that a monkey, randomly typing away on a typewriter (in the days when typewriters replaced the pen or plume as the preferred instrument of writing) could re-create Shakespeare-- but only if it lived long enough (this is known as the infinite monkey theorem). A monkey is any member of either the New World monkeys or Old World monkeys two of the three groupings of Simian Primates the third group being A typewriter is a mechanical or Electromechanical device with a set of "keys" that when pressed cause characters to be printed on a medium A pen (Latin pinna, feather is a Writing instrument used to apply Ink to a surface usually Paper. Feathers are one of the epidermal growths that form the distinctive outer covering or Plumage, on Birds They are considered the most complex integumentary structures William Shakespeare ( baptised The infinite monkey theorem states that a Monkey hitting keys at Random on a Typewriter keyboard for an Infinite amount of time will almost Such writing has been speculatively designated as coincidental. Coincident is a geometric term that pertains to the relationship between two vectors. It is also speculated that extra-terrestrial beings exist who may possess knowledge of writing. Extraterrestrial life is Life originating outside of the Earth. The fact is that the only known writing is human writing.

Means for recording information

Wells argues that writing has the ability to "put agreements, laws, commandments on record. It made the growth of states larger than the old city states possible. The command of the priest or king and his seal could go far beyond his sight and voice and could survive his death" (Wells in Robinson, 2003, p. 35).

Writing systems

The major writing systems – methods of inscription – broadly fall into four categories: logographic, syllabic, alphabetic, and featural. A writing system is a type of Symbolic system used to represent elements or statements expressible in Language. Another category, ideographic (symbols for ideas), has never been developed sufficiently to represent language. An ideogram or ideograph (from Greek idea "idea" + grafo "to write" is a Graphic symbol that represents an Idea A sixth category, pictographic, is insufficient to represent language on its own, but often forms the core of logographies. A pictogram ( also spelled pictogramme) or pictograph is a Symbol representing a Concept, object, activity place or event

Logographies

A logogram is a written character which represents a word or morpheme. A logogram, or logograph, is a Grapheme which represents a word or a Morpheme (a meaningful unit of language In Morpheme-based morphology, a morpheme is the smallest linguistic unit that has semantic meaning. The vast number of logograms needed to write language, and the many years required to learn them, are the major disadvantage of the logographic systems over alphabetic systems. However, the efficiency of reading logographic writing once it is learned is a major advantage. No writing system is wholly logographic: all have phonetic components as well as logograms ("logosyllabic" components in the case of Chinese characters, cuneiform, and Mayan, where a glyph may stand for a morpheme, a syllable, or both; "logoconsonantal" in the case of hieroglyphs), and many have an ideographic component (Chinese "radicals", hieroglyphic "determiners"). A Chinese character, also known as a Han character ( is a Logogram used in writing Chinese (hanzi Japanese ( The Maya script, also known as Maya hieroglyphs, was the writing system of the Pre-Columbian Maya civilization of Mesoamerica, presently For example, in Mayan, the glyph for "fin", pronounced "ka'", was also used to represent the syllable "ka" whenever the pronunciation of a logogram needed to be indicated, or when there was no logogram. In Chinese, about 90% of characters are compounds of a semantic (meaning) element called a radical with an existing character to indicate the pronunciation, called a phonetic. However, such phonetic elements complement the logographic elements, rather than vice versa.

The main logographic system in use today is Chinese characters, used with some modification for various languages of China, Japanese, and, to a lesser extent, Korean in South Korea. Another is the classical Yi script. The Yi scripts, also known as Cuan or Wei are used to write the Yi languages Classical Yi Logogram

Syllabaries

A syllabary is a set of written symbols that represent (or approximate) syllables. A syllabary is a set of written symbols that represent (or approximate Syllables which make up Words A symbol in a syllabary typically represents an optional A syllable ( Greek:) is a unit of organization for a sequence of speech sounds A glyph in a syllabary typically represents a consonant followed by a vowel, or just a vowel alone, though in some scripts more complex syllables (such as consonant-vowel-consonant, or consonant-consonant-vowel) may have dedicated glyphs. Phonetically related syllables are not so indicated in the script. For instance, the syllable "ka" may look nothing like the syllable "ki", nor will syllables with the same vowels be similar.

Syllabaries are best suited to languages with relatively simple syllable structure, such as Japanese. Other languages that use syllabic writing include the Linear B script for Mycenaean Greek; Cherokee; Ndjuka, an English-based creole language of Surinam; and the Vai script of Liberia. Linear B is a script that was used for writing Mycenaean, an early form of Greek. Mycenaean is the most ancient attested form of the Greek language, spoken on the Greek mainland and on Crete in the 16th to 11th centuries BC, before the The Cherokee (ᎠᏂᏴᏫᏯ a-ni-yv-wi-ya, in the Cherokee language) are a people native to North America, who at the time of European contact Ndyuká ( in English also called Ndyuká tongo or Okanisi is a Creole language of Suriname. A creole language, or simply a creole, is a stable Language that originates seemingly as a nativized Pidgin. Suriname ( Dutch: Suriname; Sranan Tongo: Sranan) officially the Republic of Suriname (traditionally spelled Surinam by Vai language, alternately called Vy or Gallinas is a Mande language. Liberia, officially the Republic of Liberia, is a country on the west coast of Africa, bordered by Sierra Leone, Guinea, Côte d'Ivoire Most logographic systems have a strong syllabic component. Ethiopic, though technically an alphabet, has fused consonants and vowels together to the point that it's learned as if it were a syllabary. Ge'ez (gez ግዕዝ) also called Ethiopic, is an Abugida script that was originally developed to write Ge'ez, a Semitic language

Alphabets

See also: History of the alphabet

An alphabet is a small set of symbols, each of which roughly represents or historically represented a phoneme of the language. The history of the Alphabet begins in Ancient Egypt, more than a millennium into the History of writing. An alphabet is a standardized set of letters basic written symbols each of which roughly represents a Phoneme, a Spoken language, either In a perfectly phonological alphabet, the phonemes and letters would correspond perfectly in two directions: a writer could predict the spelling of a word given its pronunciation, and a speaker could predict the pronunciation of a word given its spelling. Phonology ( Greek φωνή (phōnē voice sound + λόγος (lógos word speech subject of discussion is the systematic use of sound to encode meaning As languages often evolve independently of their writing systems, and writing systems have been borrowed for languages they were not designed for, the degree to which letters of an alphabet correspond to phonemes of a language varies greatly from one language to another and even within a single language.

In most of the alphabets of the Mid-East, only consonants are indicated, or vowels may be indicated with optional diacritics. Such systems are called abjads. An Abjad is a type of Writing system in which each symbol stands for a Consonant; the reader must supply the appropriate Vowel. In most of the alphabets of India and Southeast Asia, vowels are indicated through diacritics or modification of the shape of the consonant. These are called abugidas. An abugida ( from Ge‘ez አቡጊዳ ’äbugida or Amharic አቡጊዳ ’abugida is a segmental Writing system which Some abugidas, such as Ethiopic and Cree, are learned by children as syllabaries, and so are often called "syllabics". Ge'ez (ግዕዝ, ɡɨʕɨz also transliterated Gi'iz, and referred to as Ethiopic) is an ancient South Semitic Language Canadian Aboriginal syllabic writing', or simply syllabics, is a family of Abugidas {dubious}} used to write a number of Aboriginal Canadian However, unlike true syllabaries, there is not an independent glyph for each syllable.

Sometimes the term "alphabet" is restricted to systems with separate letters for consonants and vowels, such as the Latin alphabet. Because of this use, Greek is often considered to be the first alphabet. The Greek alphabet (Ελληνικό αλφάβητο is a set of twenty-four letters that has been used to write the Greek language since the late 9th or early

Featural scripts

A featural script notates the building blocks of the phonemes that make up a language. For instance, all sounds pronounced with the lips ("labial" sounds) may have some element in common. In the Latin alphabet, this is accidentally the case with the letters "b" and "p"; however, labial "m" is completely dissimilar, and the similar-looking "q" is not labial. In Korean hangul, however, all four labial consonants are based on the same basic element. However, in practice, Korean is learned by children as an ordinary alphabet, and the featural elements tend to pass unnoticed.

Another featural script is SignWriting, the most popular writing system for many sign languages, where the shapes and movements of the hands and face are represented iconically. SignWriting is a system of writing Sign languages It is highly featural and visually iconic both in the shapes A sign language (also signed language) is a Language which instead of acoustically conveyed Sound patterns uses visually transmitted sign patterns Featural scripts are also common in fictional or invented systems, such as Tolkien's Tengwar. Note some of the tengwar used in this article may not display properly unless tengwar fonts are installed

Historical significance of writing systems

Olin Levi Warner, tympanum representing Writing, above exterior of main entrance doors, Thomas Jefferson Building, Washington DC, 1896. Olin Levi Warner ( April 9, 1844 - August 14, 1896) an American sculptor and artist was noted for the striking bas relief portrait medallions A tympanum (plural tympana is the semi-circular or triangular decorative wall surface over an entrance bounded by a Lintel and Arch. The oldest of the three United States Library of Congress buildings the Thomas Jefferson Building was built between 1890 and 1897

Historians draw a distinction between prehistory and history, with history defined by the advent of writing. The cave paintings and petroglyphs of prehistoric peoples can be considered precursors of writing, but are not considered writing because they did not represent language directly.

Writing systems always develop and change based on the needs of the people who use them. Sometimes the shape, orientation and meaning of individual signs also changes over time. By tracing the development of a script it is possible to learn about the needs of the people who used the script as well as how it changed over time.

Tools and materials

The many tools and writing materials used throughout history include stone tablets, clay tablets, wax tablets, vellum, parchment, paper, copperplate, styluses, quills, ink brushes, pencils, pens, and many styles of lithography. Tablets of Stone, Stone Tablets, Tablets of Law, or Tablets of Testimony (in Hebrew: Luchot HaBrit - "the tablets the covenant" Small tablets made out of clay were used from 5500 BC Tărtăria tablets and later from 4th millennium BC onwards as a writing medium in Sumerian A wax tablet ( tabula) is a Tablet made of wood and covered with a layer of Wax. Vellum (from the Old French Vélin for "calfskin" is mammal skin prepared for writing or printing on single pages scrolls codices or books Parchment is a thin material made from Calfskin, Sheepskin or goatskin. Paper is thin material mainly used for writing upon printing upon or packaging Copperplate refers to the use of inscribed sheets of copper in printing A stylus (plural styli or styluses) is a Writing utensil. The word is also used for a computer accessory ( PDAs) Quill is a high level object oriented Programming language created by the Dutch software company Quintiq. Ink brushes ( in Japanese fude) are used in Chinese calligraphy. A pencil is a Writing or Drawing instrument consisting of a thin stick of Pigment (usually Graphite, but can also be coloured pigment or A pen (Latin pinna, feather is a Writing instrument used to apply Ink to a surface usually Paper. Lithography is a method for Printing using a plate or stone with a completely smooth surface It is speculated that the Incas might have employed knotted threads known as quipu (or khipu) as a writing system. Quipu or khipu (sometimes called talking knots) were recording devices used in the Inca Empire and its predecessor societies in the Andean

For more information see writing implements. A writing implement or writing instrument is an object used to produce Writing.

History of early writing

Main article: History of writing

By definition, history begins with written records; evidence of human culture without writing is the realm of prehistory. The history of writing encompasses the various Writing systems that evolved in the Early Bronze Age (late 4th millennium BC) History is the study of the past particularly the written record Those who study history as a Profession are called Historians Etymology Stone Age Paleolithic See also Paleolithic, Recent African Origin, Early Homo sapiens, Early human migrations "Paleolithic"

The evolution of writing was a process involving economic necessity in the ancient near east. Archaeologist Denise Schmandt-Besserat determined the link between previously uncategorized clay "tokens" and the first known writing, cuneiform. Denise Schmandt-Besserat is a French-American Archaeologist and retired professor of Art and archaeology of the Ancient Near East. ^[1] The clay tokens were used to represent commodities, and perhaps even units of time spent in labor, and their number and type became more complex as civilization advanced. For other uses see Time (disambiguation Time is a component of a measuring system used to sequence events to compare the durations of A degree of complexity was reached when over a hundred different kinds of tokens had to be accounted for, and tokens were wrapped and fired in clay, with markings to indicate the kind of tokens inside. These markings soon replaced the tokens themselves, and the clay envelopes were demonstrably the prototype for clay writing tablets. ^[1]

Mesopotamia

The original Mesopotamian writing system was derived from this method of keeping accounts, and by the end of the 4th millennium BC,^[2] this had evolved into using a triangular-shaped stylus pressed into soft clay for recording numbers. Mesopotamia (from the Greek meaning "land between the rivers" is an area geographically located between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers largely corresponding The 4th millennium BC saw major changes in human culture It marks the beginning of the Bronze Age and of Writing. This was gradually augmented with pictographic writing using a sharp stylus to indicate what was being counted. Round-stylus and sharp-stylus writing was gradually replaced by writing using a wedge-shaped stylus (hence the term cuneiform), at first only for logograms, but evolved to include phonetic elements by the 29th century BC. A logogram, or logograph, is a Grapheme which represents a word or a Morpheme (a meaningful unit of language Around the 26th century BC, cuneiform began to represent syllables of spoken Sumerian. Sumerian ( " native tongue " was the language of ancient Sumer, spoken in Southern Mesopotamia since at least the 4th millennium BC Also in that period, cuneiform writing became a general purpose writing system for logograms, syllables, and numbers, and this script was adapted to another Mesopotamian language, Akkadian, and from there to others such as Hurrian, and Hittite. Hurrian is a conventional name for the language of the Hurrians (Khurrites a people who entered northern Mesopotamia around 2300 BC and had mostly Hittite or Nesili is the Extinct language once spoken by the Hittites, a people who created an empire centered on ancient Hattusas (modern Scripts similar in appearance to this writing system include those for Ugaritic and Old Persian. The Ugaritic language, discovered by French archaeologists in 1928 is known only in the form of writings found in the lost city of Ugarit, near the modern The Old Persian language is one of the two attested Old Iranian languages (besides Avestan)

Turkmenistan

An unknown civilization in Central Asia 4,000 years ago, hundreds of years before Chinese writing developed. An excavation near Ashgabat, the capital of Turkmenistan, revealed an inscription on a piece of stone that was used as a stamp seal. ^[3]

China

In China historians have found out a lot about the early Chinese dynasties from the written documents left behind. China ( Wade-Giles ( Mandarin) Chung¹kuo² is a cultural region, an ancient Civilization, and depending on perspective a National From the Shang Dynasty most of this writing has survived on bones or bronze implements. The Shang Dynasty ( Chinese: 商[[wiktionary 朝|朝]] or Yin Dynasty ( 殷[[wiktionary 代|代]] was according to traditional sources the Markings on turtle shells have been carbon-dated to around 1500 BC. Turtles are Reptiles of the Order Testudines (all living turtles belong to the Crown group Chelonia) most of Historians have found that the type of media used had an effect on what the writing was documenting and how it was used. In the Arts media (plural of Medium) are the materials and techniques used by an Artist to produce a work

There have recently been discoveries of tortoise-shell carvings dating back to c. 6000 BC, but whether or not the carvings are of sufficient complexity to qualify as writing is under debate. ^[4][5] If it is deemed to be a written language, writing in China will predate Mesopotamian cuneiform, long acknowledged as the first appearance of writing, by some 2000 years.

Egypt

The earliest known hieroglyphic inscriptions are the Narmer Palette, dating to c. Egyptian hieroglyphs (ˈhaɪərəʊɡlɪf from Greek grc-Grek ἱερογλύφος " sacred carving " also hieroglyphic = grc-Grek The Narmer Palette, also known as the Great Hierakonpolis Palette or the Palette of Narmer, is a significant Egyptian archeological find dating from 3200 BC, and several recent discoveries that may be slightly older, though the glyphs were based on a much older artistic tradition. The hieroglyphic script was logographic with phonetic adjuncts that included an effective alphabet. A logogram, or logograph, is a Grapheme which represents a word or a Morpheme (a meaningful unit of language Egyptian hieroglyphs (ˈhaɪərəʊɡlɪf from Greek grc-Grek ἱερογλύφος " sacred carving " also hieroglyphic = grc-Grek

Writing was very important in maintaining the Egyptian empire, and literacy was concentrated among an educated elite of scribes. A scribe (or scrivener) is a person who writes books or documents by hand as a profession Only people from certain backgrounds were allowed to train to become scribes, in the service of temple, pharaonic, and military authorities. The hieroglyph system was always difficult to learn, but in later centuries was purposely made even more so, as this preserved the scribes' status.

The world's oldest known alphabet was developed in central Egypt around 2000 BC from a hieroglyphic prototype, and over the next 500 years spread to Canaan and eventually to the rest of the world. The Middle Bronze Age alphabets are two similar Undeciphered scripts dated to be from the Middle Bronze Age (2000-1500 BCE and believed to be ancestral This article is about the country of Egypt For a topic outline on this subject see List of basic Egypt topics. Hieroglyph ( Greek grc-Grek ἱερογλύφος " sacred carving " or hieroglyphics ( = grc-Grek τὰ ἱερογλυφικά Canaanites redirects here For the 1940s social and political movement in Israel, see Canaanites (movement.

Indus Valley

Main article: Indus script

Ten Indus scripts discovered near the northern gate of Dholavira (perhaps 5000 years old)

The Indus Valley script is a mysterious aspect of ancient Indian culture as it has not yet been deciphered. The term Indus script (Harappan script refers to short strings of symbols associated with the Harappan civilization ( Indus Valley Dholavira, an ancient metropolitan city, and locally known as Kotada Timba Prachin Mahanagar Dholavira, is one of the largest and most prominent archaeological sites The Indus Valley Civilization (Mature period 2600&ndash1900 BCE abbreviated IVC, was an ancient Civilization that flourished in the Indus River basin All known inscriptions are short.

Phoenician writing system and descendants

The Phoenician writing system was adapted from the Proto-Caananite script in around the 11th century BC, which in turn borrowed ideas from Egyptian hieroglyphics. The Phoenician alphabet is a continuation of the Proto-Canaanite alphabet, by convention taken to originate around 1050 BC Egyptian hieroglyphs (ˈhaɪərəʊɡlɪf from Greek grc-Grek ἱερογλύφος " sacred carving " also hieroglyphic = grc-Grek This writing system was an abjad — that is, a writing system in which only consonants are represented. An Abjad is a type of Writing system in which each symbol stands for a Consonant; the reader must supply the appropriate Vowel. A writing system is a type of Symbolic system used to represent elements or statements expressible in Language. This script was adapted by the Greeks, who adapted certain consonantal signs to represent their vowels. The Greek alphabet (Ελληνικό αλφάβητο is a set of twenty-four letters that has been used to write the Greek language since the late 9th or early The Cumae alphabet, a variant of the early Greek alphabet gave rise to the Etruscan alphabet, and its own descendants, such as the Latin alphabet and Runes. The Cumae alphabet, was a western variant of the early Greek alphabet, used between the 8th to 5th centuries BC Old Italic refers to several now extinct Alphabet systems used on the Italian Peninsula in ancient times for various Indo-European (predominantly Italic Other descendants from the Greek alphabet include the Cyrillic alphabet, used to write Russian, among others. The Greek alphabet (Ελληνικό αλφάβητο is a set of twenty-four letters that has been used to write the Greek language since the late 9th or early The Cyrillic alphabet (səˈrɪlɪk also called azbuka, from the old name of the first two letters is actually a family of Alphabets, subsets of which are used by Russian ( transliteration:,) is the most geographically widespread language of Eurasia, the most widely spoken of the Slavic languages The Phoenician system was also adapted into the Aramaic script, from which the Hebrew script and also that of Arabic are descended. The Aramaic alphabet is an Abjad, a Consonantal Alphabet, used for writing Aramaic. The Hebrew alphabet (אָלֶף-בֵּית עִבְרִי alephbet ’ivri) consists of 22 letters used for writing the Hebrew language. The Arabic alphabet is the script used for writing several languages of Asia and Africa such as Arabic, Persian, and Urdu.

The Tifinagh script (Berber languages) is descended from the Libyco-Berber script which is assumed to be of Phoenician origin. Tifinagh ( in Neo-Tifinagh Tifinaɣ in Berber Latin alphabet, tifinaɣ is an Alphabetic script used by some Africans to write their language

Mesoamerica

A stone slab with 3,000-year-old writing was discovered in the Mexican state of Veracruz, and is an example of the oldest script in the Western Hemisphere preceding the oldest Zapotec writing dated to about 500 BC. ^{[6] [7] [8]}

Of several pre-Colombian scripts in Mesoamerica, the one that appears to have been best developed, and the only one to be deciphered, is the Maya script. The pre-Columbian era incorporates all period subdivisions in the history and prehistory of the Americas before the appearance of significant European influences Mesoamerica or Meso-America (Mesoamérica is a Region extending approximately from central Mexico to Honduras and Nicaragua, defined The Maya script, also known as Maya hieroglyphs, was the writing system of the Pre-Columbian Maya civilization of Mesoamerica, presently The earliest inscriptions which are identifiably Maya date to the 3rd century BC, and writing was in continuous use until shortly after the arrival of the Spanish conquistadores in the 16th century AD. Maya writing used logograms complemented by a set of syllabic glyphs, somewhat similar in function to modern Japanese writing.

Creation of text or information

Creativity

Main articles: Creativity and Creative Writing

Author

Main article: Author

Writer

Main article: Writer

Critiques

Writers sometimes search out others to evaluate or criticize their work. Creativity is a mental process involving the generation of new Ideas or Concepts, or new associations of the creative mind between existing ideas or concepts Creative writing is considered to be any writing Fiction or Non-fiction, that goes outside the bounds of normal professional, Journalistic, An author is defined both as "the person who originates or gives existence to anything" and that authorship determines responsibility for what is created A writer is anyone who creates a written work although the word usually designates those who write creatively or professionally as well as those who have written in many different forms To this end, many writers join writing circles, often found at local libraries or bookstores. A writing circle is a group of like-minded writers needing support for their work either through Writing critiques Workshops or Classes, or just encouragement A library is a collection of information sources resources and services and the structure in which it is housed it is organized for use and maintained by a public body an institution With the evolution of the Internet, writing circles have started to go online. The Internet is a global system of interconnected Computer networks

See also

References

Further reading

• A History of Writing: From Hieroglyph to Multimedia, edited by Anne-Marie Christin, Flammarion (in French, hardcover: 408 pages, 2002, ISBN 2-08-010887-5)
• In the Beginning: A Short History of the Hebrew Language. By Joel M. Hoffman, 2004. Chapter 3 covers the invention of writing and its various stages.
• Origins of writing on AncientScripts.com
• Museum of Writing: UK Museum of Writing with information on writing history and implements
• On ERIC Digests: Writing Instruction: Current Practices in the Classroom; Writing Development; Writing Instruction: Changing Views over the Years
• Children of the Code: The Power of Writing - Online Video
• Rogers, Henry. 2005. Writing Systems: A Linguistic Approach. Oxford: Blackwell. ISBN 0-631-23463-2 (hardcover); ISBN 0-631-23464-0 (paperback)
• Ankerl, Guy [2000]. Global communication without universal civilization, INU societal research Vol. 1: Coexisting contemporary civilizations : Arabo-Muslim, Bharati, Chinese, and Western. Geneva: INU Press, pp. 59-66, 235s. ISBN 2-88155-004-5.  
• Robinson, Andrew "The Origins of Writing" in David Crowley and Paul Heyer (eds) Communication in History: Technology, Culture, Society (Allyn and Bacon, 2003).

External links

• Language, Writing and Alphabet: An Interview with Christophe Rico Damqatum 3 (2007)
• Why write? - a history of writing and the alphabet from the British Library