From oral to written knowledge and back again

So poems are one of those odd forms of expression that move through both oral and written knowledge.  Most poems today are written down, but the structure of poetry is made up by rhythm, alliteration, meter, breaks, etc.—all of which are only perceived through sound and oral expression.  This is why one of my English teachers told me that poetry is meant to be read aloud, and why there are poetry reciting competitions such as Poetry Out Loud (I had the opportunity to participate in this in high school).

But it’s not just poetry that is able to convey more meaning when experienced orally; this also applies to written speeches and plays.  We all witnessed this through our memorization of King Benjamin’s Speech; each of us acknowledged that we gained a better understanding and appreciation for what we said because we had to both memorize the speech and present it orally.  In our lecture today, Thursday October 13, 2011, we talked about Plato’s written speech bashing the Sophists for writing their speeches.  We would not have gained as much understanding of that speech if we had simply read it to ourselves from a book.  By having it read aloud, we were able to recognize its oratory significance and experience it as Plato’s contemporaries would have experienced it.  This promoted greater interaction between the speaker and the class, as we able to hear the arguments as if they had been made in real time.  I get a lot more out of a play that I see preformed than I do from simply reading it.  A couple of years ago, I read Hamlet for the first time and only caught on to about half of what was going on. Later the same year, I saw it preformed in the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, and finally was able to understand the actions and feelings of the characters in the play.

The power in oral communication has lead to scriptures being read aloud during several different religions sermons.  As we discussed in class, for years the Catholic Church maintained masses spoken only in Latin, a dead language that the general populace.  Without writing, Latin could not have been preserved, but, in the Catholic Church, very few people other than those in the clergy understood the language.  This is also why many people were resisted to a Bible being printed in a common language, as it would give more people access to the word and those people in turn would be able to communicate their ideas, orally, to others. As Kacee pointed out earlier, monks would chant portions of the Qur'an even after the teachings had been written down.

For written knowledge to reach the general public in Assyria, it would have to be transmitted orally because only a few scribes could read and write.  The creation story was written down and preserved by the elite, but the emotion of the story could only be seen through the Akitu festival and its celebration of life.  Passion is not transferred well through writing, as writing distances a person from their audience.