"We two know the script; we have become good friends" [electronic resource] : Linguistic and social aspects of the Women's Script literacy in southern Hunan, China.

1991

1 online resource (449 p.)

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A case of literacy based on the Women's Script, a script derived from but different from Chinese characters, is reconstructed through field work and documentary research. The script's milieu is described and its ideological and technological aspects are discussed. The style and genres of its literature are traced to Han and Yao origins. Both its linguistic and social features are found to be related to the social position of women. Socially, it is suggested to have been used by women to strengthen female bonds as female status declined and the marriage system changed from a flexible to a rigid patrivirilocal residence pattern under Han patriarchy in South China. Linguistically, its phonetic nature was linked to the low status of women, the informal uses it fulfilled, and the low status of the language it represented. An expanded definition for digraphia is proposed based on the divergent semantic and sound representational uses of scripts and their concomitant social factors. It is reaffirmed that cultural factors outweigh technological factors in determining the practice of literacy.

Books / Online / Dissertations & Theses

English

July 12, 2011

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Yale University, 1991.

Yale University.