davidcayley.com Literacy: The Medium and the Message Part Two
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Feb 21, 2016 
Derek de Kerkhove, co-director at the McLuhan program and commentator on print culture, and Ivan Illich, social critic and historian of medieval reading, explore how book culture transformed perception. They discuss monastic vocal reading, the 12th-century book revolution, word separation, alphabetic ordering, and how literacy reshaped interiority, science, and textual interpretation.
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Vai Script Shows Reading Once Required Mumbling
- Paul Sanger recounts the Vai syllabary and its lack of spaces, requiring readers to mumble aloud to reconstruct meaning.
- He parallels this with Augustine's amazement at Ambrose's silent reading, showing silent reading was once rare.
Book Layout Created Silent Private Reading
- The 12th-century book added word spacing, chapters, indices, and marginalia, enabling silent, private, and consultable reading.
- Ivan Illich argues these layout changes transformed the book into a new technical tool supporting individual thought and reference use.
Literacy Reshaped Social Conscience
- Alphabetic literacy spread as a social model even to nonreaders, shaping practices like confession and judgment imagery in churches.
- Ivan Illich links the book-of-life iconography and annual confessional duties to new alphabetic notions of being 'recorded' and judged.
