Text Criticism as a Lens for Understanding the Transmission of Ancient Texts in Their Oral Environments (original) (raw)
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Handbook of Stemmatology, 2020
Introductory remarks by the chapter editor, Elisabet Göransson Textual criticism and the study of the transmission of texts is by and large dependent on writing and written sources. The development of literacy, from the oral transmission of texts to the development of written records, was a long process indeed, and it took place in various parts of the world. The earliest stages of writing were pictograms, used by the Sumerians, Egyptians, and Chinese, from which ideographic or logographic writing, which expressed abstractions, was developed. Phonetic writing, in which symbols, phonograms, represent sounds rather than concepts, was then developed into syllabic and later into alphabetic writing. Early Sumerian literature and Egyptian literature, both extant from the late fourth millennium BC onwards, constitute the oldest literatures we know of. A wide range of literary textsletters, hymns, and poems, but also autobiographical texts-were written in Egyptian hieroglyphs. A narrative Egyptian literature became common from the twentyfirst century BC onwards (during the Middle Kingdom). The cursive shorthand known as the hieratic script gradually became more widely used, both for recordkeeping and for correspondence. Later on, the demotic script was developed from the late Egyptian hieratic script for the same day-today uses, and finally the Egyptians settled on a revised form of the Greek alphabet, the Coptic alphabet, which simplified writing most decidedly. Similarly, cuneiform literature from the ancient Near East, preserved on mostly fragmentary clay tablets, consists of a large corpus of narrative and laudatory poetry, hymns, laments and prayers, fables, didactic and debate poems, proverbs, and songs (T. L. Holm 2005). Even though writing and literature thus existed for a long time before classical Antiquity, for the study of textual criticism and stemmatology-i.e. the relations between the textual witnesses of a textual tradition-approaches to studying the transmission of Greek and Latin texts have been the main points of departure. The basic concepts, methodology, and terminology used by scholars within the field of stemmatology draw exclusively on the literary development and the copying of texts in ancient Greek and Latin. Hence, the perspective in this book and in this introductory chapter is based on the background of the ancient Graeco-Roman world. An overview of other types of literary cultures, specific textual traditions, and editorial approaches used for manuscript traditions in other parts of the world can be found in chapter 7 of the present book (on early Ethiopian, Hebrew, and Chinese literary cultures). For more case studies of oriental manuscript traditions, the reader is referred to the Comparative Oriental Manuscript Studies handbook (Bausi et al. 2015, 363-462). The textual traditions and transmission of the literary texts we study and analyse depend on many different circumstances. The nature of the preserved manuscripts, their material transmission, authorship, genre, the complexity of the textual tradition, and so on constitute specific challenges for the editor when deciding upon Open Access.
APCG, 2024
Date: July 27th-28th, 2024 Location: Trinity College Dublin, University of Dublin, Ireland Submission Deadline: January 31st 2024. The research team of the ERC funded research project Arabic Poetry in the Cairo Genizah (APCG), based at the Department of Near and Middle Eastern Studies, School of Languages, Literatures and Cultural Studies, Trinity College Dublin, invites scholars and researchers to participate in our upcoming international conference exploring the multifaceted dimensions of the Anthropology of Texts. This conference is part of the ongoing APCG project based in TCD in close collaboration with Cambridge University Library. A crucial strand of the project is to conduct an anthropological study of the Jewish people of medieval and Ottoman Egypt through manuscripts of Arabic and Judaeo-Arabic poetry and secondary literature. The focus is on the role that poetry played in cultural life as an expression of Egyptian-Jewish experience in the Middle Ages and the Early Modern period. The Anthropology of Texts conference others a dynamic platform for scholars from diverse fields to come together and explore in depth the notion of textuality. This conference aims to unravel the rich tapestry of history, culture, writing systems, and practices that characterized the Middle Ages and the Early Modern period. By scrutinizing the contexts in which these texts emerged and the networks through which they travelled, we seek to decipher their role in shaping societies and in being shaped by those societies. Some of the engaging questions we seek to explore are: How do texts, whether scripted, spoken, or material artifacts shape their contemporary societies? What insights do they provide into the value systems, ideologies, and everyday lives of various groups? Can texts become conduits for understanding the interplay between local dynamics and global communities at the time? By tracing cultural intersections and geographic links embedded in these texts, can we reveal unexplored connections between seemingly disparate places and people? Additionally, what can the practices of textual production and inscription reveal about the societies they originated from? We invite submissions on a wide array of topics that align with the conference theme including, but not limited to: Text Production and Circulation: Exploring the dynamics of text creation, transmission, and dissemination in various forms—written, oral, and material artifacts. Text Functions and Social Implications: Investigating the roles of texts in societal contexts, their functions, and the social implications they carried. Reception of Texts: Analyzing how texts were received, interpreted, and integrated into diverse cultural landscapes. Socio-historical Relations and Encounters: Uncovering narratives of interaction, conflict, and cooperation reflected in textual materials. Global Connections: Tracing the threads of interconnectedness that spanned regions and cultures through textual channels. Scribal and Material Practices: Exploring the craftsmanship of text creation including scribal techniques and material choices. Rituals, Customs, and Traditions: Examining the role of texts in perpetuating rituals, customs, and traditions within societies. Value Systems and Everyday Life: Decoding the values, beliefs, and quotidian experiences embedded in textual records. People’s Interaction with their Environment: Unveiling how texts mirror human interaction with the physical and cultural environment. Studies on the Genizah Fragments: Exploring the nuanced tapestry of Jewish-Egyptian community through folk and colloquial poems, or other fragments. Uncovering the nuanced expressions of masculinity, femininity, gender dynamics, as well as personal sexuality and public morality through the writings of the Jewish-Egyptian community. We invite submissions for individual papers and panels. Paper proposals should comprise a 250-300-word abstract along with a brief biographical note detailing research interests and relevant publications. Panel proposals should designate a session chair and include a session abstract, title, and concise abstracts for each participant’s paper, along with their respective biographies. A bursary will be provided towards travel and accommodation costs and the selected papers will be published in an open-access volume. Please submit all proposals to Mohamed Ahmed (ahmedm4@tcd.ie) and Sally Abed (abeds@tcd.ie) by January 31st 2024.
Ph. D./MA Seminar: Textual Traditions of the Old Testament
macdiv.ca
M. J. Boda: Ph.D./M.A. Seminar-Textual Traditions of the Old Testament (draft syllabus) McMaster Divinity College, F2009 1 Ph.D./M.A. Seminar: Textual Traditions of the Old Testament CHTH G105 -CO1/ OT 6ZE6 (draft) McMaster Divinity College Fall Semester 2009 Mondays 10:30am-12:20pm *** Mark J. Boda, Ph.D. Professor of Old Testament (905) 525-9140 x24095 mjboda@mcmaster.ca http://divinity2.mcmaster.ca:8111/faculty/faculty.aspx?facid=5
2023
This PhD dissertation develops incongruence as a critical category for the study of multi-text manuscripts. It argues that the makers of manuscripts in French, Occitan, and Franco-Italian between ca. 1250 and 1350 deployed incongruence to create “thought laboratories,” which are spaces for readers to engage in speculative thinking on targeted questions. In line with the habits of dialectical thinking of the time, readers were encouraged to reflect on the tensions that arise from the conflicting assessments, contradicting reasonings, and discrepant values found in the contents of multi-text manuscripts. This dissertation establishes the significant role of incongruence—defined as the dissonance in theme, tone, or logic between two or more co-present texts—in the production and reading of multi-text manuscripts of vernacular literature, which make up two thirds of vernacular books in the period 1250–1350. The introduction sets up the theoretical and historical framework for the dissertation by discussing the key notions of “text,” “book,” and “practice,” which it relates to literary studies, codicology, and anthropology. It defines thought laboratories as spaces of speculative thinking provided by multi-text manuscripts, and it proposes that incongruence was mobilized by the makers of manuscripts to direct readers’ attention to points of contention with which they were invited to engage. Chapter 1 discusses how the inclusion of obscene parodic stanzas in a troubadour songbook from Italy creates a dialectical relationship between lyrics presented as canonical and parodic stanzas that deride them through their obscene imitations. The incongruence of the obscene stanzas within a songbook that presents its contents as cultural capital worth preserving and emulating invites inquiry into the formation of a canon and the role of songbooks in consecrating a cultural heritage. Chapter 2 examines a North-Eastern French manuscript that creates a debate between a cleric and the woman he woos. The debate thematizes clerical learning and the role of gender in claims to knowledge and assertions of sincerity, since the validity of the debaters’ claims and their motivations are constantly questioned. Through the logical setup of the ending of the debate, which is incongruous with the logic of the debate that precedes it, readers face the difficulty of having to take sides in a debate they are supposed to judge impartially. When weighing the arguments, they get to perform the interrelation of gender and knowledge that the debaters expose. Chapter 3 considers the role of irony, discrepant character assessments, the presence of prose, and that of the Roman de Renart within a collection of Arthurian verse romances from North-Eastern France. By bending the expectations strongly associated with a very codified genre, these elements cast into relief the motivations that lie behind the glorification of chivalric heroes and the presentation of an ideal political order. Because several texts in this manuscript are interrupted or end ambivalently, it allows readers to think about alternative endings to the romances it contains. Chapter 4 examines a Northern Italian compilation of prose and verse historiographical material interspersed with didactic and sapiential texts. The incongruences of fact and of assessment, the incongruous co-presence of prose and verse, and the uneasy chronological ordering of texts draw attention to misfits in this collection. Readers, who are faced with a history in pieces, can reassemble texts into a history they deem more suitable, which leads to an interrogation of what constitutes suitable history. Through attention to the strategies of compilation, textual intervention, and illumination deployed by the makers of medieval manuscripts to direct the attention of readers, this dissertation argues for an intellectually engaged and creative way of reading vernacular literature in manuscripts between 1250 and 1350.
Constructing texts/understanding texts: Lessons from antiquity and the middle ages
Computers and Composition, 1997
During the present shift from print to computer-mediated communication (CMC) literacy, much scholarship has taken a short view, looking at the history of the Internet, for example, rather than at other eras of maior change in communication technology, such as the development of the alphabet or the shifts from the scroll to the codex to the printed book. This era of CMC resembles other ages-particularly manuscript eras-when changes in communication media restructured human thought, how communicators and teachers conceived of and constructed texts, and the processes by which they mode sense of texts and imparted them with authority. By studying the oreas of similarity between the rabbinic and medieval manuscript eras and our own time, technical communicators may come to an understanding of how changes in technology sparked shifts in the social and intellectual dynamics of text construction. And by looking ot these earlier traditions and the environments in which texts were studied, we may develop a deeper understanding of some of the intellectual, ethical, and educational implications of texts in this CMC era. authority authorship computer-mediated communication memory technical communication Human history has entered what Sherry Turkle called a liminal era, when "old structures have broken down and new ones have not yet been created" (as cited in McCorduck, 1996, p. 157). This moment, like others in the past, has been brought about by a change in communication technology, and like earlier liminal periods, this is a time of great tension and opportunity. Digitalization of information, which computers made possible, is responsible for the transformation we face just as the invention of the alphabet, the development of writing, and the advent of printing brought about earlier changes.