Africa Speaks Reasoning Forum

If you do an Internet image search, www.google.com on the following Nigerian names: Haruna, Sambo, Pankan, Kwashi, Imoko, Chika, Azuka, Ezuka, Koma, Zoro, Watanabe, Nene, Osato, Osaru, Okada, Edo, Baba, Emiko, Kano, Nana, Aya, Tami, Tai, Sada, Ikimi, Ume, you will more likely see a Japanese link than a Nigerian link.

http://www.stewartsynopsis.com/links_to_japanese_and_african_la.htm

More about Writing Systems

Writing could also be simply defined as a representation of speech and thoughts through various forms of sound images or graphs. A Writing System then is a conventional and principled way of actualizing activities and thoughts, such as languages, natural science, theology, commerce, and aesthetics.

It is our contention that writing systems are more than a technological tool to languages. Most of our understandings of writing systems are generally confined to linguistics and languages. Close and careful examination of writing systems, from Ethiopic to Vai, from Cretan to Meroitic, from Han'gul to Latin, reveals layers of knowledge beyond language and linguistics. It could be argued that the study of writing systems may provide a new approach to knowledge creations, organizations, and disseminations. Writing Systems are, indeed, rich sources of human intellectual activities, such as history, philosophy, social order, psychology, and aesthetics.

The Quipus knots of the native people in South America, for instance, show parallel features with some of the thought patterns, organizations, and utilizations with the Ancient Egyptian Writing System. Further, the Dravidian Writing System of southern India also appears to share parallelism in shapes or sign structures with the Easter Island Rongo-Rongo Writing System, perhaps suggesting historical continuity between South Asia and the Americas much earlier than the Columbus era.

The Meroitic Writing System of the Kushites in the Sudan uses two or three dots as word separators, just like the extant Ethiopic Writing System, thereby suggesting a link between the two writing systems in the Abbay-Atbara river complex.The Institute for the study of African Writing Systems is established in order to systematically compile, categorize, analyze, and interpret the various forms of writings in Africa. Writing systems are not only facilitators of speech and communication, they are also tools in the creation and utilization of knowledge systems, such as philosophy, astronomy, and numbers.

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Egyptian Writing System

"The Egyptian language"
The language consists of approximately 121 bi-literals, 75 tri-literals, and various determinants and phonetic complements. The bi-literals were individual symbols which expressed two sounds and the tri-literals were individual symbols which express three sounds. Phonetic complements are monoliterals found in front of and/or behind multi-consonantal signs in order to provide clarity and also to complete the meaning of the word. They normally repeat sounds already found in the word, but have no separate sound value.

Special attention was given to the Aesthetics of the language. The sentences were not written with one individual symbol after another. All words took a quadrangular form which some scholar call the square principle; the symbols are placed in an imaginary square and the upper ones take precedence over the lower. The majority of the language was written from right to left except for occasional specific purposes. The determinants were symbols which had no sound value and were used at the end of the word to decipher the meaning between two words with the same symbols. The determinant normally came at the end of the word and demonstrated the meaning of the entire word. Many of the determinants which were added to the words (sometimes more than one per word) did not seem to be relevant to the word's meaning to most European scholars, but I will show that there is a connection with the language to the spiritual beliefs of the people who spoke the language.

These symbols, "Medu Netcher" [Mdw Ntr], cannot be understood without understanding African spirituality and African spirituality cannot be understand without understanding Medu Netcher. The language had to be deciphered in two ways; first it had to be transliterated from symbols to orthographic text and then translated into English.

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Return to Africana Library home page Last Update: April 4, 2003

 Cornell University Logo
Egyptian Writing System

"The Egyptian language"
The language consists of approximately 121 bi-literals, 75 tri-literals, and various determinants and phonetic complements. The bi-literals were individual symbols which expressed two sounds and the tri-literals were individual symbols which express three sounds. Phonetic complements are monoliterals found in front of and/or behind multi-consonantal signs in order to provide clarity and also to complete the meaning of the word. They normally repeat sounds already found in the word, but have no separate sound value.

Special attention was given to the Aesthetics of the language. The sentences were not written with one individual symbol after another. All words took a quadrangular form which some scholar call the square principle; the symbols are placed in an imaginary square and the upper ones take precedence over the lower. The majority of the language was written from right to left except for occasional specific purposes. The determinants were symbols which had no sound value and were used at the end of the word to decipher the meaning between two words with the same symbols. The determinant normally came at the end of the word and demonstrated the meaning of the entire word. Many of the determinants which were added to the words (sometimes more than one per word) did not seem to be relevant to the word's meaning to most European scholars, but I will show that there is a connection with the language to the spiritual beliefs of the people who spoke the language.

These symbols, "Medu Netcher" [Mdw Ntr], cannot be understood without understanding African spirituality and African spirituality cannot be understand without understanding Medu Netcher. The language had to be deciphered in two ways; first it had to be transliterated from symbols to orthographic text and then translated into English.

Back to African Writing Systems

Back to List of Scripts


Return to Africana Library home page Last Update: April 4, 2003