Derrick de Kerckhove Charles 1. Lumsden (Eds.)

The Alphabet and the Brain The Lateralization of Writing

With 59 Figures

Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg GmbH

Associate Professor DERRICK DE KERCKHOVE Co-Director The McLuhan Program in Culture and Technology University of Toronto 39A Queen's Park Circle Toronto, Ontario M5S IAI, Canada

Associate Professor CHARLES 1. LUMSDEN Sociobiology Research Group Department of Medicine University of Toronto Medical Sciences Building, Room 7313 Toronto, Ontario M5S lA8, Canada

ISBN 978-3-662-01095-2 ISBN 978-3-662-01093-8 (eBook) DOI 10.1007/978-3-662-01093-8

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data. The Alphabet and the Brain. I. Alpha-bet. 2. Writing. 3. Neuropsychology. 4. Laterality. 5. Cerebral Dominance. l. De Kerckhove, Derrick. II. Lumsden, Charles 1., 1949-QP399.A435 1988 152.3'35 87-23351 ISBN 978-3-662-01095-2

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© Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 1988 Originally published by Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 1988 Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 1988

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Preface

This book is a consequence of the suggestion that a major key to-ward understanding cognition in any advanced culture is to be found in the relationships between processing orthographies, lan-guage, and thought. In this book, the contributors attempt to take only the first step, namely to ascertain that there are reliable con-stancies among the interactions between a given type of writing and specific brain processes. And, among the possible brain processes that could be investigated, only one apparently simple issue is being explored: namely, whether the lateralization of reading and writing to the right in fully phonemic alphabets is the result of formalized but essentially random occurrences, or whether some physiological determinants are at play.

The original project was much more complicated. It began with Derrick de Kerckhove's attempt to establish a connection between the rise of the alphabetic culture in Athens and the development of a theatrical tradition in that city from around the end of the 6th century B.c. to the Roman conquest. The underlying assumption, first proposed in a conversation with Marshall McLuhan, was that the Greek alphabet was responsible for a fundamental change in the psychology of the Athenians and that the creation of the great tragedies of Greek theatre was a kind of cultural response to a con-dition of deep psychological crisis. Thus, if a causal connection could be shown between alphabetic literacy and the development of theatrical phenomena, then theatre could be understood as a privi-leged cultural medium to work out cognitive and emotional solu-tions to the reorganization of the Greek and later the whole West-ern mind set. It should be noted that the subsequent Western theatrical tradition ranges all the way from the late Middle Ages and the Renaissance to our present "audio-visual era."

The editors hope to return eventually to this line of investi-gation. However, at the time, it appeared impossible to deal ad-equately with such vast issues without first establishing a scientific basis for the hypothesis. It became necessary to narrow the focus of the research to a single core issue, that of the lateralization of the Greek alphabet. Even so, as simple and straightforward as this question may appear, it does not automatically evoke un-controversial evidence or answers.

VI Preface

Obviously, it was difficult to be informed and persuasive in the exact sciences with a background in literature and the sociology of art. A first attempt at bringing scientists and humanities scholars to bear upon the issue took the form of a day colloquium on "neuro-cultural research," that is, research focusing on the interactions be-tween the human nervous system and technological or cultural en-vironments, at St. Michael's College (University of Toronto), in May 1982. The second effort was made during a colloquium on McLuhan in December 1983 at the Canadian Cultural Centre in Paris. A special section of the colloquium was devoted to neuro-cultural research, and specifically to the issue of literacy and the brain, with papers from Professors lean-Pierre Changeux, Michel Imbert, Andre Roch Lecours, Derrick de Kerckhove, Lynd For-guson, and Anthony Wilden. The proceedings of the colloquium were eventually published by the Canadian Commission for Unesco. Though the publication was well received, it did not attract much attention from the scientific community because it stood somewhere between the humanities and the exact sciences.

The solution came from joining forces with Charles Lumsden, who took interest in the project because he saw in the specific issue under discussion a possible indicator of a co-evolutionary pattern between genetic and cultural trends and constraints. Indeed, the area of interface between the human body and mind and the social environments created by human technologies may be best repre-sented by writing systems, if only because writing is a formal code which represents language outside the human body, presumably along some of the lines of linguistic representations within the body - i. e., thought.

It is surprising that it has taken so long to address the issue of formal codes in terms of evolutionary biology. It is even more sur-prising that in the heyday of talks about the "two sides of the brain," when scientists and media would vie to find ways to divide the world in left and right, few people seemed to have been very concerned with the fact that in the West, people write from left to right, as if it were a natural thing. Regarding the particular im-pression that Western cultures were prone to favour what were deemed to be "left-hemisphere" approaches to general information processing, problem solving, and social organization, there were a lot of conjectures, but precious little firm evidence to support claims. This is partly why both editors felt to an equal degree the need to explore the issue by concentrating their attention on the structural features of the single most important system of processing information in their own cultural environment.

We have called upon scholars from different fields to ask their opinion on the principal issues relevant to the basic hypothesis. The

Preface VII

key areas were provisions in the human body for different levels of biological adaptation, historical development of orthographies, re-lationships between the structure of specific languages and the structure of their writings systems, relevant neuropsychological in-vestigations to date, and finally, the working out of the basic hy-pothesis from different angles.

Thus, what began as an unpublished monograph on theatre and the alphabet in Athens has now become a collection of scientific essays. Our first words of thanks must go to the contributors, who devoted time, effort, and attention to an issue that was presented to them often as a challenge outside the immediate focus of their specialty. And before anything else, the editors would like to pay tribute to many people who, for editorial or other reasons, do not appear among the contributors, but who have helped the project along at various stages. Two workshops, one in Paris at the Canadi-an Cultural Centre and the other in Toronto at the McLuhan Pro-gram were held in April and July 1985 during the planning stages of the book. Our thanks go to Professors Michel Imbert, Lynd For-guson, Brian Stock, Sandra Witelson, as well as to the regretted Paul Kolers, all of whom attended these workshops and have sub-sequently spent valuable time with us to guide the project along the way. Other supporters and collaborators of the project have includ-ed, at different times, in different places, sometimes in person, sometimes by mail, Professors Jean Saint-Cyr, Morris Moscovitch, Jacques Mehler, Louis Holtz, Denise Schmandt-Besserat, and Al-fonso Caramazza. The editors have also benefited from suggestions and comments from Professors Karl Pribram, Diane McGuinness, Anthony Wilden, Marcel Kinsbourne, E. B. Hunt, and Daniel Schacter. A special mention should go to Sally Grande, who, as an informal volunteer researcher in the literature on the brain, sharing a fascination for literacy iIi early Greek culture with the editors, has provided much needed support and information especially in the early stages of neuro-cultural research. Some of the contributors themselves have gone extra lengths. Professor Insup Taylor, Jean-Luc Nespoulous, and David Olson, for example, carefully reread manuscripts pertaining to their fields in order to offer valuable suggestions. Professor Bhatt kindly provided translations for the papers of Jean-Pierre Changeux, Claude Hagege, Robert Lafont, Baudouin Jurdant, Jean-Luc Nespoulous, Andre Roch Lecours, and Collette Sirat.

In addition to the diligent work of our publishing team at Springer including Thomas Thiek6tter, Janet Hamilton, and Susan Kentner, the production of the book required considerable prep-aration and revisions. For these, we are especially thankful to Ann Stilman, our copy editor, Cassie Rivers, who helped with proof-

VIII Preface

reading and indexing and Sylvia Wookey, who, along with the Membrane Biology Group and Ann Hansen at the McLuhan Pro-gram did much of the time-consuming administrative and office work.

Another aspect of book production today is the rising cost of pre-production. We want to thank last, and certainly not least, insti-tutions and individuals who have supported the project financially and without whom it could not have been carried to term.

Of the institutional support received, we would like to acknowl-edge that of the University of Toronto's General Research Grant and the Connaught Development Fund Grant for general editorial expenses. A travel grant from the Canadian Ministry of External Affairs also contributed to the Paris meeting. Some expenses for supplies and secretarial help were borne by the McLuhan Program in Culture and Technology, the Canadian Cultural Centre in Paris, and the Membrane Biology Group at the University of Toronto. Let them be thanked for this. Weare also truly indebted to the people who have taken enough personal interest in the project to help sup-port it financially. Among these, may we thank in closing Ms. Catherine Harris, Professor Robin Harris, Mrs. Dorothy Dunlop, and the late Janet Underwood.

Toronto, May 1988 DERRICK DE KERCKHOVE CHARLES J. LUMSDEN

Contents

General Introduction 1

Part I Biological Foundations 15

Introductory Remarks . . . . . . 15

Chapter 1 Gene-Culture Coevolution: Culture and Biology in Darwinian Perspective . CHARLES 1. LUMSDEN (With 4 Figures) 17

Chapter 2 Learning and Selection in the Nervous System JEAN-PIERRE CHANGEUX ......... 43

Chapter 3 Neuronal Group Selection: A Basis for Categorization by the Nervous System LEIF H. FINKEL (With 3 Figures) . . . . . .. 51

Part 2 The Evolution of Writing Systems

Introductory Remarks . . . . . . . . . .

Chapter 4 Writing: The Invention and the Dream CLAUDE HAGEGE ...... .

Chapter 5 The Origin of the Greek Alphabet JOSEPH NA VEH ....... .

Chapter 6 Relationships Between Speech and Writing Systems in Ancient Alphabets and Syllabaries

71

71

72

84

ROBERT LAFONT . . . . . . . . . . . . .. 92

Chapter 7 Graphic Systems, Phonic Systems, and Linguistic Representations PARTH M. BHATT (With 2 Figures) . . . . . . 106

x Contents

Part 3 Writing Right and Left 121

Introductory Remarks . . . . . . 121

Chapter 8 Canons of Alphabetic Change WILLIAM C. WATT (With 4 Figures) . . . 122

Chapter 9 Logical Principles Underlying the Layout of Greek Orthography DERRICK DE KERCKHOVE ....... .. 153

Chapter 10 The Material Conditions of the Lateralization of the Ductus COLETTE SIRAT (With 16 Figures) . . . . .. 173

Chapter 11 Psychology of Literacy: East and West INSUP TAYLOR (With 2 Figures)

Part 4 Neuropsychological Considerations

Introductory Remarks . . . . ..

Chapter 12 The Biology of Writing

202

235

235

ANDRE RoCH LECOURS and JEAN-Luc NESPOULOUS 236

Chapter 13 Language Processing: A N euroanatomica1 Primer PATRICIA ELLEN GRANT (With 7 Figures) 246

Chapter 14 Orthography, Reading, and Cerebral Functions OVID lL. TZENG and DAISY L. HUNG . . 273

Chapter 15 Literacy and the Brain ANDRE RoCH LECOURS, JACQUES MEHLER, MARIA-ALICE PARENTE, and ALAIN VADEBONCOEUR 291

Chapter 16 The Processing of Japanese Kana and Kanji Characters EDWARD A. JONES and CHISATO AOKI (With 10 Figures) ............. 301

PartS Brain, Lateralization and Writing: Initial Models 321

Introductory Remarks . . 321

Chapter 17 The Bilateral Cooperative Model of Reading M. MARTIN TAYLOR (With 10 Figures) . . 322

Contents XI

Chapter 18 Right Hemisphere Literacy in the Ancient World JOHN R. SKOYLES .......... 362

Chapter 19 The Role of Vowels in Alphabetic Writing BAUDOUIN JURDANT . . . . . . . . . 381

Chapter 20 Critical Brain Processes Involved in Deciphering the Greek Alphabet DERRICK DE KERCKHOVE (With 1 Figure) 401

Chapter 21 Mind, Media, and Memory: The Archival and Epistemic Functions of Written Text DAVID R. OLSON 422

General Conclusion 442

Index . . . . . . 445

List of Contributors

PARTH M. BHATT is Assistant Professor in the Department of French and an associate researcher at the Experimental Phonetics Laboratory at the University of Toronto. The focus of his work is on applied phonetics and neurolinguistics. Among his publications, Prosodie et lesions cerebrales is to appear shortly. Experimental Phonetics Laboratory, New College, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario M5S lAI, Canada

JEAN-PIERRE CHANGEUX is Professor at the College de France, Director of Research at the Neurobiology Laboratory at the Institut Pasteur and a member of the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique. Along with colleagues A. Danchin and P. Courrege, he has developed the theory of selective stabilization of developing synapses. Among his many publications, L'Homme neuronal has achieved international acclaim. Institut Pasteur, 28, rue du Docteur Roux, Paris 75724, France

DERRICK DE KERCKHOVE is Associate Professor of French and Co-Director of the McLuhan Program at the University of Toronto. As an associate researcher at the Centre for Culture and Technology with Marshall McLuhan, he began exploring relationships between cultural artifacts and neurology in the early 1970s. He is the author of several papers on the alphabet and on the neurocultural effects of literacy and the new media. McLuhan Program, 39A Queen's Park Crescent, Toronto, Ontario M5S lAl, Canada

LEIF H. FINKEL is Assistant Professor at the Rockefeller University and a researcher at the Neurosciences Research Institute. His prin-cipal scientific interest is in elaborating models of selective mecha-nisms in the nervous system. The Neurosciences Research Institute, The Rockefeller University, 1230 York Avenue, New York, New York 10021, USA

PATRICIA ELLEN GRANT is a research fellow in the Departments of Physics and Medicine at the University of Toronto. Her research in-

XIV List of Contributors

terests include the mathematical modeling of neural systems and cognitive processes. Membrane Biology Group, Room 7313, Medical Sciences Building, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario M5S lA8, Canada

CLAUDE HAGEGE is Directeur d'etudes at the Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes, Professor of Linguistics at the University of Paris (Sorbonne), and a researcher at the Centre National de la Re-cherche Scientifique. He is the author of several books on linguis-tics and the anthropology and sociology of language, including La structure de langues (1982) and the recent L 'homme de paroles (1985). 102, Boulevard Kellermann, 75013 Paris, France

EDWARD A. JONES is Associate Professor in the Department of Psy-chology at Laboure College in Boston. His extensive research in the culture, psychology, and literacy of the Japanese (often in collabo-ration with Chisato Aoki, doctoral candidate in psychology) is to appear in a book, The Human Reaction, in 1988. 72 Fells Avenue, Medford, Massachusetts 02155, USA

BAUDOUIN JURDANT is Director of the Groupe d'etudes et de re-cherches sur la science at the Universite Louis Pasteur in Stras-bourg. He is also Executive Co-Editor of the international mul-tidisciplinary journal, Fundamenta Scientiae. His principal research area is in the relationships between cognitive processes, money, and literacy in classical antiquity. GERSULP, 4, rue Blaise Pascal, 67451 Strasbourg, France

ROBERT LAFONT is Professor in the Faculte des Arts et des Lettres at the University Paul-Valery (Montpellier III) and Director of Re-search at the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique. In that capacity, he directed the work and publication of Anthropologie de !'ecriture (1984). An earlier publication in language studies was Le travail et la langue (1978). Arts et Lettres, Universite Paul Valery Montpellier III, Route de Mende, B.P. 5043, 34032 Montpellier CEDEX, France

ANDRE ROCH LECOURS is Professor in the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Montreal and the Director of the Centre de Re-cherches at the Centre Hospitalier C6te-des-neiges, also in Mont-real. Among his principal publications are L 'aphasie, Aphasiology, Biological Perspectives on Language and, with 1. L. Nespoulous, Bio-logical Foundations of Gestures. Centre Hospitalier C6te-des-neiges, 4563, rue Queen Mary, Mont-real, P.Q. H3W 1 W5, Canada

List of Contributors xv

CHARLES J. LUMSDEN is Associate Professor of Medicine at the Uni-versity of Toronto and a member of the Membrane Biology Group at the same university. Approaching the theme of human evolution from the vantage points of several disciplines ranging from physics to population genetics, he is the author (with E. O. Wilson) of Genes, Mind and Culture: The Coevolutionary Process (1981) and Promethean Fire: Reflections on the Origin of Mind (1983). Sociobiology Research Group Department of Medicine, Room 7313, Medical Sciences Bldg, University of Toronto, Toronto, On-tario M5S lAB, Canada JOSEPH NAVEH is Professor at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem where he works on ancient Hebraic and Aramean epigraphs and in-scriptions. He is the author of several books on ancient Semitic writings, including Early History of the Alphabet: An Introduction to West Semitic Epigraphy and Palaeography (1982). Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel

JEAN-Luc NESPOULOUS is Professor in the Department of Linguis-tics and Philology at the University of Montreal and a senior re-searcher at the Centre Hospitalier Cote-des-neiges. Among his publications are Etudes neurolinguistiques, Neuropsychologie de l'ex-pression orale, and, with A. R. Lecours, Biological Foundations of Gestures. Centre Hospitalier Cote-des-neiges, 4563, rue Queen Mary, Mont-real, P.Q. H3W 1 W5, Canada

DAVID R. OLSON is Professor of Applied Psychology in the Centre for Applied Cognitive Science at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, as well as Co-Director of the McLuhan Program in Cul-ture and Technology at the University of Toronto. His major re.-search concerns the relation between oral conversational language of pre-school children and formalized language of written texts. Re-cent bookS include Spatial Cognition (with E. Bialystok, 1983). McLuhan Program, 39A Queen's Park Crescent, Toronto, Ontario, M5S lA1, Canada

COLETTE SIRAT is Directeur d'etudes at the Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes and Research Director at the Institut de recherche et d'histoire des textes and the Centre National de la Recherche Scien-tifique. She has published many books on ancient Semitic writings as well as on the methodology of deciphering and classifying anci-ent orthographies. Among her principal publications are Les pa-pyrus en caracteres hebrafques (1986) and (with M. Beit-Arie) Les manuscrits en caracteres hebrafques portant des indications de date jusqu'd 1540 (3 vols, 1972, 1979, 1986). Institut de recherche et d'histoire des textes, Centre Felix Grat, 40, Avenue d'Iena, 75116 Paris, France

XVI List of Contributors

JOHN R. SKOYLES did his graduate work in philosophy, logic and scientific method at the London School of Economics and has con-ducted independent research on the development of the alphabet and other writing systems during the past decade. He has published research papers and reviews in Nature, New Ideas in Psychology, Principia Scientiae and other journals. 6 Denning Road, London NW3 ISV, United Kingdom

INSUP TAYLOR is a faculty member at the McLuhan Program in Culture and Technology at the University of Toronto. Her research focuses on the relationships between literacy and psychology, with a special emphasis on Eastern and Far Eastern orthographies. She is the author, with M. M. Taylor, of The Psychology of Reading (1983). McLuhan Program, University of Toronto, 39A Queen's Park Cres-cent, Toronto, Ontario, M5S lAl, Canada

M. MARTIN TAYLOR is Senior Experimental Psychologist at the De-fence and Civil Institute of Environmental Medicine, Toronto. He specializes in perception, human-computer interaction, and auto-matic speech recognition. Co-editor (with F. Neel and D.G. Bouw-huis) of Structure of Multimodal Dialogue (1988), he is the author, with I. Taylor, of The Psychology of Reading (1983). DCIEM, Box 2000, Downsview, Ontario, M3M 3B9, Canada

OVID J. L. TZENG is Professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of California at Riverside, where he also directs the Center for Orthography, Reading and Dyslexic Studies. A senior scientist at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies, he is the author of many research articles on orthography and brain processes (sev-eral in collaboration with Daisy Hung, also a research associate at the Salk Institute). He has co-edited (with H. Singer) Perception of Print (1981). Department of Psychology, University of California at Riverside, Riverside, California 92502, USA

WILLIAM C. WATT is Associate Professor in the School of Social Sciences at the University of California (Irvine). Author of several research papers in semiotics, he focuses his attention on the history and development of ancient writings, tracing the evolution of writ-ing systems in their present form. School of Social Sciences, University of California at Irvine, Irvine California 92717, USA