GOOD GRIEF! This chapter is full of content! From Greeks to the Akkadians, back to the Greeks to Egyptians, to Socrates to Plato... so much information. Due to this, I have decided to break it up into two parts.
In the first part of the chapter, Wolf argues for three different claims in accordance to the alphabet. Making these claims, she is attempting to answer the question: Does the Alphabet Build a Different Brain? I am in hopes I will also be able to synthesize the question through my writing. (Hopefully, I can do this quickly. I am in Blue Springs, MO for mini vacation to visit my dear friend, Rachel. The ribs are already on the grill and fireworks are going off outside my window. :) )
First Claim
The Alphabet is more efficient than all other writing systems
Specifically, this is the Greek alphabet I am talking about here and within its form of twenty-six letters. Wolf claims that a reduced number of symbols reduces the time and attention required for rapid recognition. This causes the brain to use fewer perceptual and memory resources. I think of it this way... a computer can have several processes occurring at one time. In this instance, twenty-six programs being used. All are opened and being utilized in a variety of ways. They can be organized in different ways and be used interchangeably. The computer can work faster. However, if the same computer needs to have 900 programs opened at the same time. It would be increasingly more difficult for the computer to do the same tasks.
In terms of which parts of the brain are being used, it has been found the alphabet reader learns to rely on more the posterior of the left hemisphere. Whereas, Chinese readers actually recruit areas in both hemispheres. Specifically, a study was conducted in the 1930s by three Chinese neurologists, they focused on a bilingual gentleman who developed alexia (lost the ability to read) after suffering a severe stroke to the posterior portions of his brain. In their conclusions, they found the gentleman was still able to read English although he was completely unable to read Chinese.
In conclusion, it was found that different parts of the brain are used for different aspects of reading. In that, the alphabet does not build a "better" brain, but a brain different than other writing systems due the overall developmental efficiency.
Second Claim
The Alphabet stimulates novel thought the best
Well, how do we define novel thought? I believe it to be the open thoughts within the brain, most of them never being uttered or written down. Wolf gives an meta-view explaining that the promotion of developmental intellectual thought in human history did not originate with the alphabet but within writing itself. She cites Vygotsky (I love LEV! I should make a shirt. Maybe that would be too Big Bang Theory-like...) stating that his beliefs revolve around the idea of putting spoken words and unspoken thoughts into written word releases and by the process, changes the thoughts themselves.
So, Lev, let me see if I am picking up what you are putting down... If I speak or think something, by the time I write it will be different. I could see your point. If I was to make a sign for the jerk in traffic who cut me off on I-70 here in Kansas City, I wouldn't write "You are a jerk!". I might actually delineate something else. Seriously though, when I write my thoughts, I feel like the ideas come to life through the words.
Third Claim
The Alphabet facilitates reading acquisition through Enhanced Awareness of Speech
This section was a little dry and used a lot of big words. So I was kinda confused... Help me out. What I could get is that by having fewer characters in the Alphabet, it is easier for the brain to recognize what is being understood, due to the phonemes (letters that make up sounds). The sounds streamline the efficiency even better. Through this, a conscious, systematic analysis of speech occurs, the letters create the sounds and the sounds create the words.
Things that make you go "Um." Or is that my stomach? Someone save me some ribs!
Until later.
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