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Author: Johanna Drucker
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 0226815811
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 387
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Book Description
"Though there are many books about the history of the alphabet, virtually none address how that history came to be. In Inventing the Alphabet, Johanna Drucker guides readers from antiquity to the present to show how humans have shaped and reshaped their own understanding of this transformative writing tool. From ancient beliefs in the alphabet as a divine gift to growing awareness of its empirical origins through the study of scripts and inscriptions, Drucker describes the frameworks-classical, textual, biblical, graphical, antiquarian, archaeological, paleographic, and political-within which the alphabet's history has been and continues to be constructed. Drucker's book begins in ancient Greece, with the earliest writings on the alphabet's origins. She then explores biblical sources on the topic and medieval preoccupations with the magical properties of individual letters. She later delves into the development of modern archaeological and paleographic tools, and she concludes with the role of alphabetic characters in the digital era. Throughout, she argues that, as a shared form of knowledge technology integrated into every aspect of our lives, the alphabet performs complex cultural, ideological, and technical functions, and her carefully curated selection of images demonstrates how closely the letters we use today still resemble their original appearance millennia ago"--
Author: Johanna Drucker
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 0226815811
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 387
Get Book Here
Book Description
"Though there are many books about the history of the alphabet, virtually none address how that history came to be. In Inventing the Alphabet, Johanna Drucker guides readers from antiquity to the present to show how humans have shaped and reshaped their own understanding of this transformative writing tool. From ancient beliefs in the alphabet as a divine gift to growing awareness of its empirical origins through the study of scripts and inscriptions, Drucker describes the frameworks-classical, textual, biblical, graphical, antiquarian, archaeological, paleographic, and political-within which the alphabet's history has been and continues to be constructed. Drucker's book begins in ancient Greece, with the earliest writings on the alphabet's origins. She then explores biblical sources on the topic and medieval preoccupations with the magical properties of individual letters. She later delves into the development of modern archaeological and paleographic tools, and she concludes with the role of alphabetic characters in the digital era. Throughout, she argues that, as a shared form of knowledge technology integrated into every aspect of our lives, the alphabet performs complex cultural, ideological, and technical functions, and her carefully curated selection of images demonstrates how closely the letters we use today still resemble their original appearance millennia ago"--
Author: Charles V. Kraitsir
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Alphabet
Languages : la
Pages : 72
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Book Description
Author: Barry B. Powell
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 9780521589079
Category : Foreign Language Study
Languages : en
Pages : 312
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Book Description
A challenging and fascinating enquiry into the genesis of alphabetic writing.
Author: Marc-Alain Ouaknin
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Art
Languages : en
Pages : 392
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Book Description
Traces the origins of the alphabet beginning with the first pictograms of 5,000 years ago, describing the changes the alphabet has gone through in different countries and cultures.
Author: Don Robb
Publisher: Charlesbridge Publishing
ISBN: 1570916098
Category : Juvenile Nonfiction
Languages : en
Pages : 51
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Book Description
See how the Roman alphabet began and how it has changed through the years.
Author: Judith Flanders
Publisher: Basic Books
ISBN: 1541675061
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 364
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Book Description
From a New York Times-bestselling historian comes the story of how the alphabet ordered our world. A Place for Everything is the first-ever history of alphabetization, from the Library of Alexandria to Wikipedia. The story of alphabetical order has been shaped by some of history's most compelling characters, such as industrious and enthusiastic early adopter Samuel Pepys and dedicated alphabet champion Denis Diderot. But though even George Washington was a proponent, many others stuck to older forms of classification -- Yale listed its students by their family's social status until 1886. And yet, while the order of the alphabet now rules -- libraries, phone books, reference books, even the order of entry for the teams at the Olympic Games -- it has remained curiously invisible. With abundant inquisitiveness and wry humor, historian Judith Flanders traces the triumph of alphabetical order and offers a compendium of Western knowledge, from A to Z. A Times (UK) Best Book of 2020
Author: David Sacks
Publisher: Vintage Canada
ISBN: 0307371034
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 415
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Book Description
Letters are tangible language. Joining together in endless combinations to actually show speech, letters convey our messages and tell our stories. While we encounter these tiny shapes hundreds of times a day, we take for granted the long, fascinating history behind one of the most fundamental of human inventions -- the alphabet. The heart of the book is the 26 fact-filled “biographies” of letters A through Z, each one identifying the letter’s particular significance for modern readers, tracing its development from ancient forms, and discussing its noteworthy role in literature and other media. We learn, for example, why the letter X has a sinister and sexual aura, how B came to signify second best, why the word “mother” in many languages starts with M, and what is the story of O. Packed with information and lavishly illustrated, Letter Perfect is not only accessible and entertaining, but essential to the appreciation of our own language.
Author: Wilbur Dick Nesbit
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Alphabet books
Languages : en
Pages : 50
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Book Description
Humorous alphabet book for historians with each letter standing for a historical figure. Each letter is accompanied by a biographical poem and caricature of the historical caricature.
Author: Edward Clodd
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Alphabet
Languages : en
Pages : 226
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Book Description
Author: Douglas Petrovich
Publisher: Hendrickson Academic
ISBN: 9789652208842
Category : Alphabet
Languages : en
Pages : 0
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Book Description
For about 150 years, scholars have attempted to identify the language of the world's first alphabetic script, and to translate some of the inscriptions that use it. Until now, their attempts have accomplished little more than identifying most of the pictographic letters and translating a few of the Semitic words. With the publication of The World's Oldest Alphabet, a new day has dawned. All of the disputed letters have been resolved, while the language has been identified conclusively as Hebrew, allowing for the translation of 16 inscriptions that date from 1842 to 1446 BC. It is the author's reading that these inscriptions expressly name three biblical figures (Asenath, Ahisamach, and Moses) and greatly illuminate the earliest Israelite history in a way that no other book has achieved, apart from the Bible.
