Orality and Literacy: The Technologizing of the Word

Orality and Literacy was written in 1982. Discuss how technological changes associated with the digital revolution of the 1990s and 21st century (the internet, mobile phone communications, social media etc.) have impacted human communication and thought processes, paying particular attention to Ong’s notion of “Secondary Orality.”

Analyze the evolution of educational practices related to language and communication, with particular focus on the contrast between a rhetoric-centric educational system and a program of education focusing on the “3 Rs.” How might Ong’s prior research on the educational theories of Ramism have influenced his treatment of literacy in education?

Ong describes language as an essentially oral phenomenon. To what extent is this assertion undermined by the existence of sign language and deaf culture?