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Article published In: Literacies in Contact
Edited by Manuela Böhm and Constanze Weth
[Written Language & Literacy 23:2] 2020
► pp. 180–193

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Writing and identity

 | University of Duisburg-Essen
Published online: 2 February 2021
DOI logo with link
https://doi.org/10.1075/wll.00039.cou
Abstract
This essay explores the relationship between writing and an emblematic notion of our age, identity. It describes the symbolic functions of writing for three planes on which it is instrumentalized as a marker of identity, religion, nation and language. The discussion revolves around scriptures as a means of codifying religion, the practical and symbolic functions of writing for modern nation states, and the question of how writing affects linguistic systems, with regard to individual speakers, communities of speakers, and languages themselves. It thus appraises writing as a culture technique without which god, nation, and self wouldn’t be what nowadays we think they are.
Article outline
  • 1.Prologue
  • 2.God
  • 3.Nation writ large
  • 4.Languagehood
  • P.S.
  • Notes
  • References
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Cited by (1)

Cited by one other publication

Coulmas, Florian
2022. Identity. In Handbook of Pragmatics [Handbook of Pragmatics, ], ► pp. 171 ff. DOI logo

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