Ong Reflection

Hello and good afternoon. Of course we already knew that there were differences in oral and written literature before reading Ong’s Orality and Literacy. How impressive is it that this book, written in 1982, takes an interesting subject and dissects it so thoroughly that it becomes painful to read?

I must mention that I do find the subject of orality and literacy quite interesting. It is fascinating to think of cultures and time periods when writing did not exist. And even more enthralling that words are pronounced, emphasized, and even understood differently by people who communicate solely through oral interaction. And while there is no doubt that Ong is well-versed in the subject of written and oral culture, he could take a refresher class on keeping an audience engaged.

Modeled after (i) Additive rather than subordinative (37).

In the beginning Ong created Orality and Literacy. And Orality and Literacy was full of information on writing, and contained many intellectual ideas; and discussed the difference between oral and written culture. And Ong said: ‘Make all the students cry of boredom.’ And all the students cried of boredom. And Ong saw that they were miserable and so he added one hundred and seventy-five more pages of his book. And he called the book Good, and the content Interesting; and there were copies printed all around the world one day.

In the beginning, when Ong created Orality and Literacy, it was full of information on writing, contained many intellectual ideas, and discussed the difference between oral and written culture. Then Ong said, ‘Make all the students cry of boredom’, and all the students cried of boredom. Ong saw they were miserable. Ong then decided to add one hundred and seventy-five more pages of his book. Ong called the book ‘good’ and the content he called ‘interesting’. Thus copies were printed all around the world – the first day.

Basically, instead of saying “and” to connect every singe idea, we use more interesting transitions when writing things down. An example of this is: I use a knife and a plate and peanut butter and jelly and bread to make a sandwich. This sentence turns into: I put two slices of bread on a plate, spread peanut butter and jelly using a knife, then put the two pieces together to make a sandwich. Although, it would be impossible for Ong to use an example as simple and straightforward as this.

In his own words:

“The New American renders it ‘and’, ‘when’, ‘then’, ‘thus’, or ‘while’, to provide a flow of narration with the analytic, reasoned subordination that characterizes writing and that appears more natural in twentieth-century texts” (37).

Even when explaining how something is “natural” in twentieth-century texts, Ong manages to make his sentence-long explanation seem unnatural.

On a side note, thank goodness I read the Oydessey and the Iliad in high school because they were referenced approximately 99 times on each page. Of every name, date, and publication that were referenced, I think those were the only two that I had any idea what Ong was talking about. Although I did also learn about the law of syllogism in geometry freshman year… thank goodness for public education.

To quote one of the various authors that I am not familiar with:

“…James Fernandez (1980) pointed out that a syllogism is self-contained: its conclusions are derived from its premises only. He notes that persons not academically educated are not acquainted with this special ground rule but tend rather in their interpretation of given statements, in a syllogism as elsewhere, to go beyond the statements themselves, as one does normally in real-life situations or in riddles (common in all oral cultures)” (53).

I decided to try my hand at it…

In all classes, where Ong is part of the required material, I feel very sad. Orality and Literature is one of the texts we read in Theories of Writing, and it is part of the required material. How does Ong’s writing make me feel?

Ong discussed that people without oral cultures did not understand the law of syllogism and that their use of language was based more on utility than following patterns. However, I cannot blame any person for not understanding what Ong was trying to convey…

To mention the Odyssey, as I did before, Ong states:

“To assure weight and memorability, heroic figures tend to be type figures: wise Nestor, furious Achilles, clever Odysseus, omnicompetent Mwindo” (69).

This point speaks to the importance of including descriptors, not only to make a piece of writing more interesting, but also to have it fit with the metrical patterns of a long poem that had to be painstakingly memorized and reiterated through voice alone. For the purposes of this post, I think it is fitting to refer to Ong as “long Ong” because nothing in the first four chapters of his book was concise, although he did ironically mention that he would shorten the phrase “primary oral cultures” simply to “oral cultures” for the sake of “brevity” (31).

If Ong’s text is meant to be a stunning example of written language, I wish I lived in a culture of illiteracy.