5-Revised Inquiry Question

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Colin Kovacic Kovacic 1

Professor Jan Rieman

English 1103

October 27, 2011

Revised Inquiry Question

a) My new working inquiry question is not quite clear yet. Ive narrowed it down to one oftwo options though: Literacy among the ancient Maya or my own interest in hieroglyphic

languages. For the former the question would be something like this: How did the ancient

Maya develop their own writing system? For the latter: What is it about hieroglyphs that

fascinate me? Why am I so distracted by such a complex literary system?

b) My preliminary question dealt with the origin of writing in general, be it in Egypt, Sumer,China, or Mesoamerica. I thought it would be interesting to explore how and why

different people developed literacy. From there I narrowed down the immense topic

down to a specific people: the Maya. However, in the process of changing I realized that I

was constantly getting distracted by books on how to write hieroglyphs as opposed to why

the Maya invented them in the first place. So, due to a suggestion from you, I began to

think about the possibility of doing my inquiry project on my own interest in ancient

hieroglyphs. Im not sure exactly where I would go with that, but it was such a

fascinating option I couldnt just toss it aside.

c) My first question arose out of one of my Writing to Explores actually. When I wrote theone about writing personified I developed the idea as writing as a being that bestowed

its power to worthy civilizations. Obviously I dont think this is how the Maya got their

system of writing but still the idea of where writing came from interests me. My question


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also came somewhat from our study of literary sponsors. In a way, Id be looking into the

original sponsor of literacy for the Maya; the first reason they ever had for learning to

read and write. Its not really what I wanted to focus on (Im a little sponsored out) and

I wouldnt use the word sponsor a whole lot in my paper/productbut its still a genuine

inspiration for the question.

My second possible question was pulled directly from you. I like the idea, Im not

sure what exactly it relates to at the moment (I havent thought about it a lot) but its not

something Im going to let go of.

d) As with my original inquiry, this one interests me because I am genuinely fascinated bylanguage and hieroglyphic systems of writing are the crme de la crme of my hobby.

Maya hieroglyphs are much more picturesque than Egyptian ones and they are each

perfectly square, which seems more aesthetic (Im somewhat artistic, so this matters to

me). I also know a good bit about Egyptian hieroglyphs, so it would be interesting for me

to research a system I dont know much about. My other possible inquiry deals directly

with me. Obviously finding out more about myself is going to interest me, and if I dont

do so then who will?

e) What I found interesting about this topic is that Maya hieroglyphs were not wellunderstood until the 1980s. Thus all of the books Ive found have been pretty recent.

Another interesting quirk is that most of those books arent written by one author. In fact,

the authors werent even necessarily writers. The books were just compilations of

lectures given by various doctors and professors at different universities. Obviously all

the lectures relate to one another in some form, and the books all make perfect sense and


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are very coherent but still, it just goes to show just how fresh this area of expertise is. The

books that were not in this format were post-2000 which is very recent, considering

Egyptian hieroglyphs have been understood for almost 200 years. So my point is that I

might not have a lot of resources if I pursue this topic. Im sure Id have more than

enough for the project, but nonetheless Id be reading about things that professionals

dont even understand yet. Its a little daunting to say the least.

As for how I got to this question, well it was just an evolution of my previous

question. Ive discussed that in length in earlier sections though, so I wont be redundant

by repeating myself here.

f) The first questions that arose in relation to this dealt with the grammar and syntax ofhieroglyphs; linguistic questions basically. I wanted to know how I could write in Maya

hieroglyphs; is there a phonetic alphabet? What is the proper way/is there a proper way to

draw them? Thats my linguistic/artistic side coming out. Another question is where were

the glyphs used? I know there were stone monuments and codices but were there other,

more daily uses for them? Interesting questions, they all are, but my first question really

seems to be the most appropriate for the purposes of this project.

g) The only thing I really want to jot down now is the possibility of creating a reproductionof a codex for the product. That would be incredibly cool and appropriate for this inquiry

question!

h) As I said, most of my research has been in books and most of those books are new. Ifound out that this is a subject very few people study and that has only just recently been

deeply understood. Besides that I have also found that multiple writing systems existed in


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Mesoamerica and that not all the civilizations there had writing (although that didnt

diminish their power). Ive learned a little about the typical writing styles of the Maya

(for example, hieroglyphs are written top to bottom with two columns of glyphs that are

read left to right) and also that the original glyphs were emblems that represented

common commodities and places (this also applies to other writing systems that

developed in other parts of the world, an interesting parallel).

i) Basically, I still need to know how the Maya started using glyphs! I havent really gotteninto that yet. Ive glanced through chapters that were about the subject, but I havent

really gotten a firm grip on anything yet. Also (and I keep forgetting about this) I need to

think about my own interest in glyphs to see if I could maybe look into that deep enough

to get a project out of it. Maybe I can, maybe I cant, but at the moment I dont know at

all.

Im most likely going to look for this information in the library. Theres a ton of

resources available there and I dont really know where I would find any other sources on

Maya writing (except the internet of course, and Id like to keep internet use to a

minimum for this project. Published sources just seem so much more reliable). If I decide

to pursue self-exploration for the project then I guess Ill have to find the information

within myself. Although a good psychological resource would help a lot as well, be it in

book form or person form if I can find one!

Documents

5-Revised Inquiry Question