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Writing and Civilization: From Ancient Worlds to Modernity  By  cover art

Writing and Civilization: From Ancient Worlds to Modernity

By: Marc Zender, The Great Courses
Narrated by: Marc Zender
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Publisher's summary

At just over 5,000 years old, writing is actually a relatively recent invention. It has become so central to the way we communicate and live, however, that it often seems as if writing has always existed.

But the question remains: Who invented writing, and why?

In these 24 fascinating lectures, you'll trace the remarkable saga of the invention and evolution of "visible speech," from its earliest origins to its future in the digital age. Your guide is an accomplished professor and epigrapher who whisks you around the globe to explore how an array of sophisticated writing systems developed, then were adopted and adapted by surrounding cultures.

Along the way, you'll visit the great early civilizations of Egypt, Mesopotamia, China, Japan, and the Americas, and you'll see how deciphering ancient scripts is a little like cracking secret codes - only far more difficult.

You'll be spellbound as you hear accounts of the breathtaking moments when the decipherment of ancient scripts broke centuries of silence. And you'll marvel at fascinating objects once shrouded in mystery, including the iconic Rosetta stone.

Writing and Civilization offers the chance to not only discover the history of ancient writing systems, but also the rare opportunity to actually hear those scripts read aloud and to learn the meaning of their messages hidden in plain sight.

PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying reference material will be available in your My Library section along with the audio.

©2013 The Great Courses (P)2013 The Teaching Company, LLC

What listeners say about Writing and Civilization: From Ancient Worlds to Modernity

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    5 out of 5 stars

Not recommended on Audible

If you aren't familiar with the Great Courses series, you might not be aware that they are developed originally as video recordings of lectures. However, only the audio portion of the lectures is available through Audible. For many courses, this is not a large issue as each course comes with a pdf supplement that usually provides missing visual aids referenced in the lectures. Unfortunately, in Writing and Civilization a great deal of the visual aids referenced in the lectures are not provided in the pdf supplement. In particular the lectures on the decipherment of Egyptian Hierogplyphs, Cuniform, and Mayan Hieroglyphs are almost useless. The meaning of Prof. Zender's excellent descriptions is completely lost since it is impossible to see the examples that he refers to during these lectures. If you are interested in this subject, I recommend avoiding this course on Audible and purchasing the DVDs through the Great Courses website instead.

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29 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    4 out of 5 stars

A Spellbinding survey of writing systems

It has happened more than once that I had to consider either buying the ‘Audible’ audio version of a ‘Great Courses’ course or the downloadable video version of the same course. What was I thinking not buying this a course on writing in video format with an accompanying .pdf guide!? The content of Prof Marc Zender’s ‘Writing and Civilization: From Ancient Worlds to Modernity’ is so gripping, it left me spellbound. (That said, I do have a thorough background in Semitic and Classical Languages… but he was able to broaden my understanding of writing systems.)

He takes the listener through a journey of writing signs and systems in 24 lectures which are intricately connected and completely mesmerising! I think this course is probably one of the best structured courses I have listened yet. Starting with the basic concept of writing, dispelling myths surrounding Futhark (the runic alphabet), he proceeds to more difficult scripts such as that of the Chinese. Subsequently the listener is introduced to the decipherment of different ancient writing systems, such as Egyptian hieroglyphs, Cuneiform and later on Mayan hieroglyphs. By comparing the properties of different systems of writing, he is able to illustrate some fascinating universal aspects of writing. (He convincingly argues and illustrates that writing systems were invented at different times in different places, but also that some peoples borrowed their writings from others.) Prof Zender discusses failed attempts of decipherment, the reasons thereto, as wells as invented scripts and languages such as those of JRR Tolkien.

This course is a highly accessible as well as an excellent overview of writing over the ages. It is presented professionally. Yet I refrain from giving it 5 stars under ‘story’ and overall because not being able to see the examples that Prof Zender used, kept me an outsider to complete insights. While I do understand that Audible does not provide the accompanying .pdf guide to any of ‘The Great Courses’ not being able to follow the Mayan or Egyptian hieroglyphic examples in the course felt utterly frustrating. I believe that a shortened .pdf file without all the contents of the regular guide could be made available to give the listener the best value for his/her money.

All said, ‘Writing and Civilization: From Ancient Worlds to Modernity’ is a brilliant course, splendidly arranged, highly engaging, well presented and highly relevant for anyone interested in languages and its writing systems.

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26 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars

Another Wonderful Course!

I enjoy listening to Audible's The Great Courses series of books. This one started out slow... lot's of background information... but the narrator is excellent and at the 30% mark, I was hooked!

There are so many interesting facts and so much information about how languages and writing styles came and went, and I would have enjoyed this much more if there had been lecture handouts with graphs and images, but still all in all a great course/lecture.

The one thing that shocked me was learning that The Common Core State Standards for English Language Arts & Literacy proposed in 2009, and now adopted by 45 of the United States, does not mandate cursive instruction. Only keyboarding is required.

So, what happens when/if there's a time, generations from now, when something happens - like a solar flare - that shuts down electrical grids and there are no keyboards to type on? How will people communicate? Also, think about what that means. Cursive is a dying art form, and someday your grand-kids will be asking you to show them what writing looks like.

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9 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Loved it!

Where does Writing and Civilization: From Ancient Worlds to Modernity rank among all the audiobooks you’ve listened to so far?

Definitely in the top 20.

What did you like best about this story?

Fascinating detail about how writing systems from all over the world and their commonalities and differences

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7 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    1 out of 5 stars

Boooring and wrong.

What disappointed you about Writing and Civilization: From Ancient Worlds to Modernity?

Look, I was the kid who proudly owned a book called "Number Words and Number Symbols " and read every word and diagram with relish. I expected similar delight from "Writing and Civilization." But the professor manages to cut the material up into unrelated pieces seen through technical, theoretical, and methodological lenses so he is constantly jumping cultures and eras.
It lacks coherence. There is no story here.
I learned Chinese from the roots of the writing up to modern spoken Mandarin well enough to chat comfortably with students from Taiwan. In the first lesson Zender treats the "dialects" (which are mutually incomprehensible languages) of Chinese as similar to the dialects of English (which are mutually comprehensible). Written Chinese for centuries allowed people in different regions to communicate in writing although they could not communicate orally. Zender apparently did not understand this.

What do you think your next listen will be?

Nothing by Zender, and likely not a "Great Course." I started Walter Mosley's latest novel "And Sometimes I Wonder About You" for light "reading" It complements my research in biological neural networks.

Did Professor Marc Zender do a good job differentiating all the characters? How?

No.
He manages to underestimate the problems with Japanese writing, where a single character can have several Chinese pronunciations and a number of _unrelated_ Japanese pronunciations, depending on context. That's one reason I gave up on Japanese.

What character would you cut from Writing and Civilization: From Ancient Worlds to Modernity?

The question is irrelevant to this book but his approaches seem incoherent.

Any additional comments?

No

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5 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Fine lectures, but visuals required

I was initially entranced by these lectures. But fairly early on I realized that the lecturer was referring to visual representations of the writing systems under discussion. Of course, these are not available while listening. That's why I give performance and story get 5 stars, but my Overall rating is 3 stars. Much as I like the topic and the presenter, I can't recommend this lecture series to Audible listeners.

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4 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars

Lacking pictures

I found this quite enlightening. A fine course.
But half of it was wasted because you really needed pictures of the scripts and comparisons to really enjoy the course. I kept listening though it became somewhat lengthy because of this.
The other half was a more historic account of the creation and ideas of script in ancient times and descriptions of various types of script. That part was very nice and interesting.

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3 people found this helpful

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    3 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars

Reduced from very good to mediocre by a lack of course notes

In the latter part of the audible book professor Zender uses course notes to explain script detail. The lack of said notes makes this part of the audio book frustrating to listen to.

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3 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars

Boringly named - totally mindblowing

History buffs need to buy this book. It will change your view on so many things.
period.

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2 people found this helpful

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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

One of the best great courses

I've listened to around thirty great courses series from audible now and this is one of the best. The information density is quite high, and the professor weaves an engaging series of narrative history on decipherment along with linguistics. I found its execution very similar in style to the set on ancient Egypt. The lack of visible slides (such as a grid of symbols or an inscription that's being described) is an issue because they are referenced frequently, but not a deal breaker.

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1 person found this helpful