Okay, gang, here we go! I’m starting up another Western Civ User’s Guide. This time around we’re looking at reading and writing. If you’re a loyal follower, you know we’re all about the history of ideas here at Western Civ User’s Guide world headquarters. In this book I want to explore 2 themes. One, how an ancient invention—the alphabet—was so essential that it’s endured down to our own time. Two, that the history of Western Civ can be seen as a series of culture-changing transfers of power from privileged elites (usually played in the movies by the late Alan Rickman) to the broader population (regular shmoes). For example, the alphabet and later moveable type brought literacy to huge amounts of people; the printing press and later the internet increased the distribution of information.
In case anyone’s fuzzy about what exactly Western Civilization is, here are links to a couple of brilliant explanations:
https://johnmanders.wordpress.com/2019/01/13/what-is-a-civilization/
https://johnmanders.wordpress.com/2019/01/16/where-in-the-world-is-western-civilization/
As usual, there will be lousy gags and badly-drawn cartoons squeezed in between bits of actual history. This is interactive—chime in if you have information to share. I heartily thank you weirdos for following. See you next post!
Pingback: AGAIN! | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Back in caveman days | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Counting your chickens before numbers | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: How to start up a civilization | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Putting the pot in Mesopotamia | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Chicken scratchings | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Stylin’ with the stylus | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Writing gets complicated | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Ideograms | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Learn to be a scribe! Earn big money! | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: The birth of Western Lit | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: The Bull of Heaven | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Darius the Great | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: The Persian Postal Service | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Crytograms | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Meanwhile, in Egypt… | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Down by the river | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: The first pharaoh | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Writing of the gods | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Papyrus | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Papyrus pens | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Ink | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Logograms | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Milton Glaser and logograms | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: So let it be written | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: But what does it mean? | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Alexander whups the Persians | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Ptolemy I Soter | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Carpet bombshell | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: The Battle of Actium! | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Bireme | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Merry Christmas! | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: The new religion | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: In hock Señor Wences | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: It’s official! | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: That old wheel of fortune | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Napoleon’s soldiers discover something big | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Cartouche is not something you get from a long automobile trip | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: The hardest cryptogram evurrrr | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Phoenicians | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Copper and Tin | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Twenty-two little letters | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: A win for the shmos | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Abjad | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: The purple people | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Carthage | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: How my sketches evolve | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Tfel-ot-thgir (right-to-left) | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: The Hebrew alphabet | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Guest blogger: Ilene Winn-Lederer | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Things go sideways for Israel | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: The alefbet | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Those really ancient Greeks | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: I ax a question | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Whatever happened to Linear A? | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Linear B | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Homer busts a dactyl | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Vowels | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Homer starts the Vowel Movement | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Boustrophedon: as the ox plows | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Alpha to Omega | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: We need a gag writer! | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Greece’s savage conqueror | John Manders' Blog
Pingback: Serifs | John Manders' Blog