Sarah Nuber- Ong Text

I was reading the Ong text and I would just like to comment on some of what I have been reading. The text points out that, today, when we think of an oral culture, we tend to think of a primitive group of people that are less intelligent than we are. It is hard to think of an oral culture as being anything but primitive because in our culture literacy has lead to much advancement since it came into existence. This is not the case at all, oral cultures had to rely on other methods of thinking in order to recall their thoughts, and they did not have it easy by being able to write what they were thinking. Ong states that in order to recall memorable thoughts without any knowledge of writing one must do their thinking in mnemonic patterns, and this makes it easier to recall thoughts orally. Ong states, “your thoughts must come into being in heavily rhythmic, balanced patterns, in repetitions or antitheses, in alliterations and assonances, in epithetic and other formulary expressions, in standard thematic settings, in proverbs which are constantly heard by everyone so that they come to mind readily and which themselves are patterned for retention and ready recall, or in other mnemonic forms” (p 34). It seems that these oral cultures should get more credit for the way that they recall thoughts because it is much harder than being able to write it down. Being able to write down thoughts allows you to look back over whatever you want, whenever you want and these oral cultures did not have this convenience. It’s crazy to think of a culture that has no concept of writing and words, but that they have to remember and be able to recall what they want to repeat. These cultures are not as primitive in their thinking as I once thought and they deserve credit for this because I can't even imagine not having written words, I think life would be much harder.