This paper divulges into the questionable validity of the necessity of writing and written language. The topic first came about as a class research paper but then developed as the opposite opinion of my original argument.

Did you know that even though humans have been around for the past two million years, it was not until the time 3500-3000 BCE that record keeping, writing, was invented? That means that there are hundreds upon thousands of years of human-oriented history left without primary sources of writing. A combination of oral tradition and symbolic communication fills the void between the first homo erectus and homo sapiens. Writing, written language as a whole, is an invention that humanity could not fathom to be without today. However, imagine a world without writing. If humans in Ancient Mesopotamia did not create cuneiform in 3500 BCE, and hypothetically no writing would ever exist because of that, then how would humanity look as a result of that? Would humans, despite our nature to adapt and overcome situations, be able to progress as successfully and coherently as we already have today? There are a multitude of theories about the origin of language and the evolution of humans to get to the point of creating such language, but not having a written language was never a problem for society. Is writing, written language, necessary in society? The question will also give insight on different kinds of learning/learners thereby relating those concepts to everyday life. With all of this being said, writing is an important invention that has caused humanity to mold it’s existence around it thereby becoming a necessary tool in a functioning society.

In order to discuss the question at hand, it is important to recall where this debate began: the Greek Philosopher Plato in approximately 370 B.C. With his story, "Phaedrus", Plato discusses the topics of rhetoric, writing, and society in a narrative between Socrates and Phaedrus. This narrative manifests the negative view against writing that Walter J. Ong argues can be compared to the rise of modern technology in his book "Orality and Literacy: The Technologizing of the Word". With this negative view of writing established, the discussion fleshes out into styles of learning in order to give a reason for writing to matter. If physical, hands on applications like writing essays and taking physical notes is the popular learning style and if it enhances student's ability to learn, then that will justify writing's necessity. Also within this discussion will be a few more examples to help sway the discussion in a positive direction. For example, the establishment of the King James version of the bible was met with concern due to the new translation into English. With this bible still intact and in use today, clearly it was a positive outcome for written language. Furthermore, there was an experiment that sought to learn if writing had a direct impact on learning to which there was a positive outcome pro-writing. Therefore, this brief overview will allow a more concise trial of the question at hand.

The Greek philosopher, Plato, is the origin behind this entire debate over the necessity of writing. Within his many works that discuss writing, "Phaedrus" and the "Republic" are two that give a deliberate attack on the concept of writing. Within the "Republic", it involves Socrates and Adeimantus creating the ideal republic to live in, with one of the main aspects of change happening in the form of restraining writing. Writing was seen as a source of corruption in the youth because poets like Homer and Hesiod depicted the Greek gods in a negative way. Within this debate, Socrates states:

These takes must not be admitted into our state, whether they are supposed to have an allegorical meaning or not. For a young person cannot judge what is allegorical and what is literal; anything that he receives into his mind at that age is likely to become indelible and unalterable;and therefore it is most important that the tales which the young first hear should be models of virtuous thoughts. (Book II, 20)

Socrates argues that poets and poetry should solely be about the good qualities of life that will encourage readers, in this case the youth, to learn the most “virtuous thoughts.” Poets can create characters that are heroes, which can serve as icons that believe that fighting and dying for the republic is a noble cause. This in turn would allow soldiers to be fearless of death and fighting. Plato also believed that writing should be regulated in order to reduce if not eliminate the threat of corruption in the youth thus the aforementioned “virtuous thoughts.” How do you make an ideal republic? You get rid of any negative source that would cause people to rebel against the republic, be they writing or people.

In "Phaedrus", Plato discusses, as previous hinted at, the topics such as rhetoric and writing as seen through an innocent conversation between Socrates, his mentor, and Phaedrus. Although that this work stars Socrates as a protagonist and it is supposed to be his words, because Socrates never published any of his own words, analysts are stuck with reading the words through Plato's perspective. Therefore, when it states that Socrates is arguing something, it can be counter-argued that it is Plato whom is arguing the point. "Phaedrus" begins with the two leaving Athens, making their way out into the countryside, to which they start talking about Lysias's speech about love. Socrates was deeply interested in Lysias's words because Lysias was a rhetorician. Much later in the narrative, Socrates brings up the topic of writing vs oral speech and how writing is inferior to oral speech. Writing as Socrates puts it: “...can give no answer to a question, and has only a deceitful likeness of a living creature. It has no power of adaptation, but uses the same words for all. It is not a legitimate son of knowledge”. Written speech, therefore is only inhibits human function; writing, as Socrates just stated, cannot defend itself, along with an inability to be original as well as being unable to answer a question if asked. It cannot think for itself and needs it's author in order to give meaning or just answer the question. Another criticism of writing in this passage is how writing hurts and limits human memory and increases forgetfulness. It takes away from the long standing oral tradition that has taken root in history. As another analysis proved: “Socrates criticizes writing essentially because it is not speech: it cannot discern between audiences and cannot respond to questions or criticism. The philosopher, then, would only use dialectic writing—and even then, only for his own amusement”. This is significant to the question at hand because it gives context to the notion that writing is not necessary. That if we were to believe the words of Plato, because Socrates never published anything, then written language should be abolished. Ironically, Plato's argument fails it's importance because it is conveyed through writing. This is a reminder of the debate between written and oral speech. Plato chose to use writing in order to convey his ideas because the message needed to be everlasting and visually based to which it could be passed down. This contradiction undermines Plato's argument in a way that diminishes the negative foundation that has already been established.

In a random span from 1900 CE to now, the English language alone has seen hundreds upon hundreds of words added to the "Oxford English Dictionary". This is seen as quarterly updates that are published on their website. While not all of these words may be listed, it is extraordinary to see that for some updates, the quarter will add 500 new words to the dictionary. (June) Given that many of these words and phrases are the new slang trends that appear over generations, these new terms of social communication are more technology born than physically written. Terms like “bae”, “lol” and “dude” are not acceptable in formal writing and the standards of that writing seem to become more concise as time goes on. This adheres to the theoretical situation of a world without written language, because of the simple fact that social trends would be known by society and could not be taught in a classroom. From the question “is writing necessary”, the message to take away would possibly cause some reevaluation of that next essay a student may have to write, or that text being sent while the teacher is explaining said essay to the student. Subsequently, while this subtopic shows how language is ever changing, sometimes daily, it furthermore proves that language will evolve with or without writing. It isn't through writing that these new words are added to the English language: it is through social interaction.

In additional to that important book, the King James Version (KJV for short) of the Bible is also an example of writing gone wrong in it's time. The KJV was quietly commissioned by King James I of England in 1604 to which came a few issues. It was no surprise at the time that this version was overshadowed by some of the many other English versions of the Bible, namely the Geneva Bible. Brian Talbot, a reverend, scholar, and minister of a church in Scotland, points out the few struggles that this version went through in order to be recognized as reputable version. As previously stated, the KJV was quietly commissioned, the preliminary problem to the whole situation. Even the company who printed sometime between 1611 and 1612, Stationer's Company, wrote off the KJV as “simply a revision of the Bishops’ Bible, the Anglican church’s official Bible”. Another important thing to note is the time between when it was first commissioned and when it was first published in print. While it may simply be the time frame in which it was translated and written, seven to eight years is a long time that makes written language seem like a small priority, especially when it has been commissioned by the King of England and it is the Bible: the life blood of Christianity. To add insult to injury about this publication, “the very first time it was included in a formal list of English-language Bible versions was as late as 1645, where it was referred to as ‘the last translation procured by King James’ or ‘the new translation’, and uniquely, ‘the reformed and revised edition of the Bible'”. In 1645, according to the quote, it finally gained the full recognition to be included on this list which is a full 41 years after being commissioned and 33 years after it was first in print. Clearly, this version was not popular. However, there are more problems: the outdated language, distinguishing the KJV from the Geneva Bible, and the foot notes throughout the KJV. The last of these reasons is the most critical because it was the Royalists who had the most problems with them. The KJV was designed to be essentially be a Bible for the lay man, one that included foot notes about certain information within it in order to help people study and learn. According to the Royalists, “these notes were more commonly used to ill purposes than formerly and that that was the cause why the High Commission was more careful and strict against them than before”. In other words, important people were afraid that these foot notes would corrupt readers and skew the lessons that they should be learning. This whole issue with the KJV is an example that helps to paint writing and written language in a negative light to which shows that it is not necessary. Reverends and other religious leaders would be able to give the sermons that they saw fit and they could be told orally compared to being printed through text.

David Kolb produced a theory/survey called the Learning Styles Inventory, hereby abbreviated LSI. This is a survey that is designed to place the one taking it into their specific category of learning. More specifically this theory says that learning falls onto two axis: perceiving and processing. Perceiving is how we process new information and this ranges from concrete experience to abstract conceptualization. On the other axis, processing is “how we make sense of things” which ranges from active experimentation to reflective observation. This creates four quadrants which are final level of classification in this theory. They are, in order of how they appear on the chart: Accommodators, Divergers, Convergers, Assimilators. While each is important to talk about in their own right to a degree of detail, the ones that matter are the “right side” quadrants, Assimilators and Divergers.

Assimilators are theorists who enjoy working with ideas and constructing models. They tend to be concise and logical and are more concerned with abstract concepts than their practical or human implications. They learn well with lectures and papers. Divergers. Divergers are reflective learners who prefer to learn by observing and making sense of experiences. They enjoy lectures and benefit from recording their thoughts in a learning log. Divergers are imaginative and tend to be interested in people and their emotions (Kolb 268).

These quadrants are the more abstract and thoughtful people, the ones who would benefit most using writing to it's fullest potential.

With this established, it can be applied to an experiment, done by Brett Williams, Ted Brown and Jamie Etherington, that attempted to discover the learning style preferences of undergraduate social work students at an Australian university. A total of 606 questionnaires were distributed and only 116 returned, which will lead to much smaller results than what could have been possible. The main point of this experiment was to also learn how students want to learn which can allow educators to augment their teaching style to help benefit the most students and have them learn in the easiest of manners. However, if the results from this experiment prove nothing then the “passive absorption” from students in traditional style lectures proves to be the most suffice way of teaching. This experiment utilizes a few different learning style questionnaires one of which is the LSI by Kolb. The results were: “23 Accommodators, 17 Divergers, 34 Assimilators and 42 Convergers”. Out of 116, 51 people, approximately 44%, fell into the categories pertaining to the desired quadrants. While these results are good, they are not great. What is to be taken here is that there are more people that do not benefit from writing over the amount that do. Therefore, according to the logic of the experiment, writing is not a beneficial factor in the learning or academic process.

The debate between Stephen Gosson and Sir Phillip Sidney regarding poetry, one publishing The School of Abuse while the other An Apology for Poetry. It began with Gosson's attack on poetry thus the aptly named The School of Abuse. Gosson's attack begins by comparing poets to the past Syracusans and how they prepare a feast. He says that they put out all of this food with no concept of what should be eaten first or how it should be eaten. This insinuates that there is no form and thereby no hierarchy. Writing begins like this, with no form. Gosson states: “Many good sentences are spoken by Davus to shadow his knavery and written by poets as ornaments to beautify their works and set their trumpery to sale without prospect”. This presents itself as poets relying off of past events in order to make their work now look good. It is a sort of cycle in which they imitate the past in order to look good but the past was constructed to assert meaning into the present, or the future in that case. This attack on poetry is very platonically influenced to which Gosson goes to the length to belittle poets, and anyone who imitates them, as inferior. “The scarab flies over many a sweet flower and lights in a cowshard”. The imitators miss so many good opportunities to correctly use their talents and abilities but by being poets, they are abusive. That they fly over the good points and focus on the bad. Abuse in this case means misuse, or used wrongly/incorrectly. Gosson calls for a similar concept as Plato in which we should glorify historical heroes in order to teach the good qualities and traditions of society. Gosson also belittles poets by calling them effeminate, unprofitable, immoral, materialistic and sinful. In a time of Puritan views, poets “distract” people from god by “dazzling their senses.” However, while in some cases during his discussion he is somewhat true, the fact that he writes in a euphuistic style, which is based on heavy references, it is somewhat poetic in a way and takes the edge off of the attack.

Sidney was inspired to write his An Apology for Poetry in defense against this attack which was somewhat aimed at him. Despite what Gosson believes, Sidney states that poetry is derived from nature, not materialistic possession. In the beginning of the letter, Sidney describes horsemanship and the rider's ability to multitask and be talented in many things.”He (John Pietro Pugliano) said soldiers were the noblest estate of mankind, and horsemen the noblest of soldiers. He said they were the masters of war, and ornaments of peace, speedy goers, and strong triumphers both in camps and courts”(Sidney 56). This paves the way to begin to compare poets to horsemen because of the equal ability to multitask. Poets, as Sidney describes, are not limited by any parameters because they create from nature and their imagination is the source of their power. Poets are also the ones who give context to the world, they create descriptions of what they see around them as well as descriptions of people. They are not just poets, but crafts people.

“Nature never set forth the earth in so rich tapestry as divine poets have done, neither with pleasant rivers, fruitful trees, sweet-smelling flowers, nor whatsoever else may make the too-much-loved earth more lovely. Her world is a brazen, the poets only deliver a golden”. As stated, without poetry, we would have no concept of these images. They would only be rivers, and trees and flowers and not something worth remembering. Only through poetry, Sidney says, can the good values and traditions of society be taught and passed down. Poetry can craft the new ideas of an ideal person only to further describe their outcomes because of their morals, no other implement can. Look at Homer's epic hero Odysseus, who goes through trial after trial proving his worth and his merit. The kind of hero whose glory should be passed down through further generations and is through poetry. Also noteworthy is the fact that Sidney makes reference that poetry can bridge the gap in between philosophers and historians. “Therefore, compare we the poet with the historian and with the moral philosopher, and if he go beyond them both, no other human skill can match them”. While the historian say the facts but there is no reason to learn from it, and philosophers spout words that you have to have understood them once before in order to understand them again, poetry bridges the gap by being an accessible resource for us to learn from. Poetry is not knowledge, it is practicality and to which not just talks but acts.

Writing is a necessary evil of our society and the banishment of written language, would be detrimental to society or at least today's society that is not dependent on oral tradition. Up to this point in the overall discussion, there has only been fragments describing their place in the whole picture therefore, it is time to discuss the whole picture. What is writing? According to Sidney, writing, or at least poetry is “this purifying of wit, this enriching of memory, enabling of judgment, and enlarging of conceit, which we commonly call learning”. Writing does this, it is not just learning but the enrichment of memory. Writing creates this narrative that enhances the quality of life. It is through written language that all of the attacks on poetry discussed here are conveyed. Why? Because only through writing can they be conveyed effectively and understood fully. However, there are always more questions to be asked as a result of the topics brought up today. How much influence did Plato's theory of an ideal republic have on society? The same to be asked about both Gosson's and Sidney's works. The question was never answered here but: what if writing was banned? How would the world change and could this happen in the near future? One could delve deeper into any of the sources discussed here and arrive at a different conclusion than this one, however for the present, this is the current form of that conclusion. From the discussion of the necessity of writing hopefully came forth a new found respect for written language and some of the struggles it went through in order to get where it is taken for granted today.

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