Looking through the historical lense, writing has just now become a new form of communication. Thus being said, it is not readily available to all peoples in all countries, cultures, and languages, depending on learning disabilities, socio-economic status, education level, gender and race. Historically and systematically writing has been used to oppress people by their differences.
Through the history of this nation, the inability to adjudicate an equal opportunity for all has allowed writing in the form of communication to perpetuate the systematic inequalities. History in many ways continually repeats itself, written communication is no outlier. America's history with racist court statues of “separate but equal” and history of black voter suppression, does not surpass this “great” nation. This denial of equal education has allowed the American society to systematically keep black people oppressed in this country. This notion continues today, it is not a secret that lower socio-economic neighborhoods, which are predominantly made up of people of color, have lower literacy rates. It is no secret that America has a racist and oppressive history of slavery. As stated in Fredrick Douglass's autobiography “ narrative of fredrick douglass” knowledge is power, once slaves taught themselves how to read they were granted access to this knowledge. Denying slaves the right to read, was denying slaves the right to an education, in fear that they will learn how to escape (Douglass). Jumping to today's, and more recent history around the world, writing is a main way for people to receive information, this leads to the use of propaganda especially in China with Mao, or Hitler in World War II, or America currently with propaganda disguised as “fake news.” The main problem here is that writing can be politicized and therefore show bias. If people let this bias influence their opinions there no longer is clarity in what is fact and opinion.
Universally looking at the prospect of writing being universally accepted we must acknowledge obvious barriers of language and literacy rate. The questions I propose is how can writing be universally accepted if there are 6,909 distinct languages around the world (Anderson)? If not all people are able to read, how can writing be universally accepted? If we look around the world you may notice that poorer, developing/ 3rd world countries have the lowest literacy rates. While developed nations as a whole have a literacy rate of 99.2% other countries, such as Niger have a literacy rate of 19% (Brinkhoff). Countries with lower literacy rates are usually at an economic disadvantage in the world, have lower rates of education, and higher mortality rates (Brinkhoff). Taking this idea and applying it to American literacy, we can conclude that lower socioeconomic status neighborhoods, which are predominantly racially ethnic, and immigrant families, have lower literacy rates and therefore a lower quality of education. It is hard enough to try and get over these barriers of class differences, and race differences, but to see that class barriers also affect literacy rates, proves the point that writing has, or can be used as a tool to oppress people.
Writing not only disadvantages the illiterate, or those who do not speak your language, but people who have learning disabilities as well. A study done at the University College of London proved that up to ten percent of people are affected by learning disabilities such as dyslexia, dyscalculia and autism. Translating to an average classroom size of thirty people, this affects three students in every class. Thus being said, I am sure we can deduce that because every language is different, and has their own alphabets, you can be more dyslexic in one language than another. Not every nation can afford for kids with special needs to get the help that they deserve. If these kids do not get the help they need to cope with their disabilities, they will most likely not be able to read. Again this proves my point further, if everyone can not read how can writing be the end all be all form of communication.
Looking at writing from a different light, if writing can be used to oppress people, it can be used to boost the oppress, and help them out of their situation. As learned from Fredrick Douglass, once you learn how to read you have the accessibility to knowledge, knowledge is power. If we stick with this narrative and pour the necessary resources into helping all kids, from all backgrounds, we would have successfully created an educated population. Reading not only leads to knowledge, but reading allows deaf people to communicate, and visual learners the ability to receive information in the way which is best for them. When writing as opposed to speaking, writing allows you to formally think before you speak, by allowing people to formally collect their thoughts, this will allow for a more prepared, and educated society, because you are not spewing everything that comes out of your brain. Writing in general has much to do with cultural expression, from the language we write in. Bad writers are normally paired with the notion that they are uneducated, while good writers are deemed as the opposite. Writing is systematically intertwined in our society, from road signs, to store signs, to texting. These forms of communication are not and should not be deemed as bad, especially when they have been perceived as helpful for so long, but it needs to be recognized by society that not everyone is literate in a country's specific language.
With writing being a relatively new form of communication in the grand scheme of things, written communication should not be a universally accepted approach to expression, until it has stopped being used as a tool to oppress people.
Work Cited
Anderson, Stephen R. “How Many Languages Are There in the World?” Linguistic Society of America, www.linguisticsociety.org/content/how-many-languages-are-there-world.
Brinkhoff, Thomas. “Literacy Rates - World Statistics and Charts as Map, Diagram and Table.” Literacy Rates / Countries of the World, www.citypopulation.de/en/world/bymap/LiteracyRates.html.
Douglass , Fredrick. Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass. 1845.
University College London. "Learning disabilities affect up to 10 percent of children." ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 18 April 2013. <www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/04/130418142309.htm>.