Chapter 12: Blueprints and Borrowed Letters
RJ Stangherlin | English 5: Guns, Germs, and Steel | Salisbury High School
Writing =>
  • sharpest distinction in progression from savergy to civilized because of confined distribution of writing
  • the progression: agriculture=>metallurgy=>complex technology=>centralized government=>writing = civilized because writing was RARE and VALUED
  • institutional:
    • recordkeeping
    • royal propaganda
    • bureaucracy
    • agricultural production/surpluses
  • writing developed in societies that were:
    • stratified
    • sedentary food producers
    • had complex and centralized governments
  • writing spread [like germs] by:
    • trade
    • conquest
    • religion
    • espionage
      • to similar economies and politically organizied societies==>WHY?
        • receptivity of societies to technology literacy
        • when societies are ready and capable of using the product = they require a perceived need
        • note four factors for acceptance [pp. 247--249]
  • barriers to spread of writing:
    • geography
    • ecological and water barriers
    • remoteness/isolation
  • two important terms:
    • blueprint copying: occurs when a society copies an existing writing
    • idea diffusion: uses the idea of writing but needs to reinvent it
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