Whitney Swaim - Ong (Class Reading 5)

Far into Orality and Literacy, Ong discusses how preliterate societies differ in their mnemonic structures in comparison to those of literate societies. Ong shares how oral peoples use narrative to remember stories, traditions, myths, etc. Earlier in the semester we discussed how written narratives are drastically different than oral narratives. For instance, in oral narratives it is acceptable to use repetition, as well as unique sounds and word emphasis. In writing, the tone of the speaker (or author in this case) is much more difficult to pick up on. In fact, no two readers would have the same impression from the same piece of writing. Also, the use of repetition is discouraged in formal writing. Since readers have the ability to refer back to an earlier part of a work, then repetition is silly. Interestingly, though, the memories of oral societies are much more elaborate and functional than literate ones. Then comes the question--is either a well-developed memory or the ability to access and understand vast amounts of data more useful than the other? Is there any way to effectively fuse the abilities of non-literate and literate societies?