Birthdays and Phoenicians
Happy birthday, robhu!
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In other news, I did some work today but proceeded to zonk out in a slightly delirious daze. However, I swear there was snow here at one point :)
Remind me to post about the last episode of Primeval sometime too.
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Random synopsis of an article I was reading about the gaps in and then resurgence of literacy in Greece and Cyprus:
It was good in that it looked at the literacy issue in context, and in that it looked for an explanation to someting that people don't always try to explain (or do so rather randomly). However, it contained some factual innacuracies (Cypro-Minoan and the Cypriot Syllabary just aren't the same script) and generally came up with an explanation that felt a bit convoluted and based on rather dodgy (because it's badly defined) theory on the relations between language, ethnicity and identity. The bit that I was really interested in - the argument that sinistroverse writing became popular in Cyprus because of Phoenician influence - was short and needs further discussion, but at the moment I'm not sure I'm prepared to believe it was Phoenician above and beyond all other eastern contact that did it, i.e. I'm not convinced by the self/other Cypriot/Phoenician arguments based on the establishment of identity through language.
If you don't know much about what I do, this might lead you to think I deal with this airy fairy stuff all the time - I don't, I despise it while finding it interesting.
Replied to other stuff tomorrow.
---
In other news, I did some work today but proceeded to zonk out in a slightly delirious daze. However, I swear there was snow here at one point :)
Remind me to post about the last episode of Primeval sometime too.
---
Random synopsis of an article I was reading about the gaps in and then resurgence of literacy in Greece and Cyprus:
It was good in that it looked at the literacy issue in context, and in that it looked for an explanation to someting that people don't always try to explain (or do so rather randomly). However, it contained some factual innacuracies (Cypro-Minoan and the Cypriot Syllabary just aren't the same script) and generally came up with an explanation that felt a bit convoluted and based on rather dodgy (because it's badly defined) theory on the relations between language, ethnicity and identity. The bit that I was really interested in - the argument that sinistroverse writing became popular in Cyprus because of Phoenician influence - was short and needs further discussion, but at the moment I'm not sure I'm prepared to believe it was Phoenician above and beyond all other eastern contact that did it, i.e. I'm not convinced by the self/other Cypriot/Phoenician arguments based on the establishment of identity through language.
If you don't know much about what I do, this might lead you to think I deal with this airy fairy stuff all the time - I don't, I despise it while finding it interesting.
Replied to other stuff tomorrow.