Evolution Starts With Reading 20221212f
by Wingsdomain Art and Photography
Title
Evolution Starts With Reading 20221212f
Artist
Wingsdomain Art and Photography
Medium
Photograph - Alternative Medium
Description
Evolution Starts With Reading 20221212f
The history of reading dates back to the invention of writing during the 4th millennium BC. Although reading print text is now an important way for the general population to access information, this has not always been the case. With some exceptions, only a small percentage of the population in many countries was considered literate before the Industrial Revolution. Some of the pre-modern societies with generally high literacy rates included classical Athens and the Islamic Caliphate. Scholars assume that reading aloud (Latin clare legere) was the more common practice in antiquity, and that reading silently (legere tacite or legere sibi) was unusual. In his Confessions, Saint Augustine remarks on Saint Ambrose's unusual habit of reading silently in the 4th century AD. During the Age of Enlightenment, elite individuals promoted passive reading, rather than creative interpretation. Some thinkers of that era believed that construction, or the creation of writing and producing a product, was a sign of initiative and active participation in society – and viewed consumption (reading) as simply taking in what constructors made.[443] Also during this era, writing was considered superior to reading in society. They considered readers of that time passive citizens, because they did not produce a product. Michel de Certeau argued that the elites of the Age of Enlightenment were responsible for this general belief. Michel de Certeau believed that reading required venturing into an author's land, but taking away what the reader wanted specifically. This view held that writing was a superior art to reading within the hierarchical constraints of the era. Before the mid 18th century, children's books in England usually had religious or instructional (school books, conduct books) themes, but by the mid to late 18th century books were designed to delight and novels would come into popularity. By the end of the 18th century literature made for children were flourishing, with perhaps as many as 50 books being printed every year in major cities. In 18th-century Europe, the then new practice of reading alone in bed was, for a time, considered dangerous and immoral. As reading became less a communal, oral practice, and more a private, silent one – and as sleeping increasingly moved from communal sleeping areas to individual bedrooms, some raised concern that reading in bed presented various dangers, such as fires caused by bedside candles. Some modern critics, however, speculate that these concerns were based on the fear that readers – especially women – could escape familial and communal obligations and transgress moral boundaries through the private fantasy worlds in books. Also during the 18th century in England, reading novels was often criticized as a time-wasting pastime, when contrasted with the cultural seriousness carried by reading history, classical literature or poetry. Chapbooks were small, cheap forms of literature for children and adults that were sold on the streets, and covered a range of subjects such as ghost stories, crime, fantasy, politics and disaster updates. They provided simple reading matter and were commonplace across England from the 17th to the 19th century. They are known to have been passed down the generations. Their readership would have been largely among the poor, and among children of the middle class. Reading became even more pronounced in the 19th century with public notes, broadsides, catchpennies and printed songs becoming common street literature, it informed and entertained the public before newspapers became readily available. Advertisements and local news, such as offers of rewards for catching criminals or for the return of stolen goods, appeared on public notices and handbills, while cheaply printed sheets – broadsheets and ballads – covered political or criminal news such murders, trials, executions, disasters and rescues. Technological improvements during the industrial revolution in printing and paper production; and new distribution networks enabled by improved roads and rail helped push an increased demand for printed (reading) matter. Besides this, social and educational changes (such as wider schooling rates) along with increasing literacy rates, particularly among the middle and working classes, helped boost a new mass market for printed material. The arrival of gas and electric lighting in private homes meant that reading after dark no longer had to take place by oil lamp or candlelight. In 19th century Russia, reading practices were highly varied, as people from a wide range of social statuses read Russian and foreign-language texts ranging from high literature to the peasant lubok. Provincial readers such as Andrei Chikhachev give evidence of the omnivorous appetite for fiction and non-fiction alike among middling landowners. -wikipedia
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December 12th, 2022
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