The social and cultural contexts of historic writing practices. edited by Philip J. Boyes; Philippa M. Steele; Natalia Elvira Astoreca

Writing is not just a set of systems for transcribing language and communicating meaning, but an important element of human practice, deeply embedded in the cultures where it is present and fundamentally interconnected with all other aspects of human life. The Social and Cultural Contexts of Historic Writing Practices explores these relationships in a number of different cultural contexts and from a range of disciplinary perspectives, including archaeological, anthropological and linguistic. It offers new ways of approaching the study of writing and integrating it into wider debates and discussions about culture, history and archaeology. Table of Contents List of contributors Acknowledgements Abbreviations 1. writing practices in socio-cultural context Philip J. Boyes, Philippa M. Steele and Natalia Elvira Astoreca 2. Towards a social archaeology of writing practices Philip J. Boyes 3. The lives of inscribed commemorative the transformation of private personal memory in Mesopotamian temple contexts Nancy Highcock 4. A cognitive archaeology of concepts, models, goals Karenleigh A. Overmann 5. The materiality of the Cretan Hieroglyphic textile production-related referents to hieroglyphic signs on seals and sealings from Middle Bronze Age Crete Marie-Louise Nosch and Agata Ulanowska 6. Visual dimensions of Maya hieroglyphic meanings beyond the surface Christian M. Prager 7. Visibility of runic writing and its relation to Viking Age Society Sophie Heier 8. Words beyond how to decrypt the secret writings of the masters of psalmody (Yunnan, China)? Aurlie Nvot 9. A script good to drink. The invention of writing systems among the Sora and other tribes of India Ccile Guillaume-Pey 10. Why did people in medieval Java use so many different script variants? A.J. West 11. Cultures of rethinking the spread and development of writing systems in the Bronze Age Mediterranean Theodore Nash 12. Script, image and culture in the Maya a southeastern perspective Kathryn M. Hudson and John S. Henderson 13. Writing and elite status in the Bronze Age Aegean Sarah Finlayson 14. Why ? Personhood and agency in the earliest Greek inscriptions (800550 BCE) James Whitley 15. Names and authorship in the beginnings of Greek alphabetic writing Natalia Elvira Astoreca 16. Marking identity through graphemes? A new look at the Sikel arrow-shaped alpha Olga Tribulato and Valentina Mignosa Bibliography Writing is not just a set of systems for transcribing language andcommunicating meaning, but an important element of human practice,deeply embedded in the cultures where it is present andfundamentally interconnected with all other aspects of human life.The Social and Cultural Contexts of Historic WritingPractices explores these relationships in a number ofdifferent cultural contexts and from a range of disciplinaryperspectives, including archaeological, anthropological andlinguistic. It offers new ways of approaching the study of writingand integrating it into wider debates and discussions aboutculture, history and archaeology