Steven Roger Fischer – författare

It is tempting to take the tremendous rate of contemporary linguistic change for granted. What is required, in fact, is a radical reinterpretation of what language is. Steven Roger Fischer charts the history of language from the times of Homo erectus, Neanderthal humans and Homo sapiens through to the nineteenth century, when the science of linguistics was developed, as he analyses the emergence of language as a science and its development as a written form. He considers the rise of pidgin, creole, jargon and slang, as well as the effects radio and television, propaganda, advertising and the media are having on language today. Originally published in 1999, this new format edition, which includes a new preface by the author, also shows how digital media will continue to reshape and re-invent the ways in which we communicate.

Steven Roger Fischer’s fascinating book, now available in an updated B-format edition, traces the complete story of reading from the time when symbol first became sign through to the electronic texts of the present day. Describing ancient forms of reading, Fischer turns to Asia and the Americas and discusses the forms and developments of completely divergent writing systems and scripts.With the Middle Ages in Europe and the Middle East, innovative re-inventions of reading emerged – silent and liturgical reading; the custom of lectors; reading’s focus in general education – whereupon printing transformed society’s entire attitude to reading. Fischer charts the explosion of the book trade in this era, its increased audience and radically changed subject-matter; describes the emergence of broadsheets, newspapers and public readings; and traces the effect of new font designs on general legibility.Fischer discusses society’s dedication to public literacy in the sweeping educational reforms of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, and notes the appearance of free libraries, gender differences in reading matter, public advertising and the ‘forbidden’ lists of Church, State and the unemancipated. Finally, he assesses the future, in which it is likely that read communication will soon exceed oral communication through the use of the personal computer and the internet, and looks at ‘visual language’ and modern theories of how reading is processed in the human brain. Asking how the New Reader can reshape reading’s future, he suggests a radical new definition of what reading could be.

From the earliest scratches on stone and bone to the languages of computers and the internet, A History of Writing offers an investigation into the origin and development of writing throughout the world. Illustrated with numerous examples, this book offers a global overview in a form that everyone can follow. The author also reveals his own discoveries made since the early 1980s, making it a useful reference for both students and specialists as well as the general reader.

Rongorongo, Easter Island's enigmatic script and Oceania's only known pre-twentieth-century writing system, is here comprehensively documented for the first time. The author tells the full history of rongorongo's exciting discovery and the many attempts at a decipherment. Pre-missionary traditions surrounding rongorongo are described from previously unpublished material. Full transcriptions of all the 25 surviving rongorongo inscriptions are provided, along with detailed photographs of nearly every incised artefact. In over six years of full-time research that took the author from St Petersburg to Easter Island, a wholly new picture of the rongorongo phenomenon has emerged. This book is the definitive study of one of the world's most fascinating and eloquent graphic achievements.

This wide-ranging study of the Pacific Islands provides a dynamic and provocative account of the peopling of the Pacific, and its broad impact on world history. Spanning over 50,000 years of human presence in an area which comprises one-third of our planet – Melanesia, Micronesia and Polynesia – the narrative follows the development of the region, from New Guinea's earliest settlement to the creation of the modern Pacific states.Thoroughly revised and updated in light of the most recent scholarship, the second edition includes:• an overview of the events and developments in the Pacific Islands over the last decade• coverage of the latest archaeological discoveries• several new maps• an updated and expanded bibliographySteven Roger Fischer's unique text provides a highly accessible and invaluable introduction to the history of an area which is currently emerging as pivotal in international affairs.A History of the Pacific Islands traces the human history of nearly one-third of the globe over a fifty-thousand year span. This is history on a grand scale, taking the islands of Melanesia, Micronesia and Polynesia from prehistoric culture to the present day through a skilful interpretation of scholarship in the field. Fischer's familiarity with work in archaeology and anthropology as well as in history enriches the text, making this a book with wide appeal for students and general readers.

This wide-ranging study of the Pacific Islands provides a dynamic and provocative account of the peopling of the Pacific, and its broad impact on world history. Spanning over 50,000 years of human presence in an area which comprises one-third of our planet – Melanesia, Micronesia and Polynesia – the narrative follows the development of the region, from New Guinea's earliest settlement to the creation of the modern Pacific states.Thoroughly revised and updated in light of the most recent scholarship, the second edition includes:• an overview of the events and developments in the Pacific Islands over the last decade• coverage of the latest archaeological discoveries• several new maps• an updated and expanded bibliographySteven Roger Fischer's unique text provides a highly accessible and invaluable introduction to the history of an area which is currently emerging as pivotal in international affairs.A History of the Pacific Islands traces the human history of nearly one-third of the globe over a fifty-thousand year span. This is history on a grand scale, taking the islands of Melanesia, Micronesia and Polynesia from prehistoric culture to the present day through a skilful interpretation of scholarship in the field. Fischer's familiarity with work in archaeology and anthropology as well as in history enriches the text, making this a book with wide appeal for students and general readers.

From the earliest scratches on stone and bone to the languages of computers and the internet, A History of Writing offers an investigation into the origin and development of writing throughout the world. Commencing with the first stages of information storage – knot records, tally sticks, pictographic storytelling – the book then focuses on the emergence of complete writing systems in Mesopotamia in the fourth millennium BC, and their diffusion to Egypt, the Indus Valley and points east, with special attention given to Semitic writing systems and their eventual spread to the Indian subcontinent.Also documented is the rise of Phoenician and its effect on the Greek alphabet, generating the many alphabetic scripts of the West. Chinese, Korean and Japanese writing systems and scripts are dealt with in depth, as is writing in pre-Colombian America. Also explored are Western Europe’s medieval manuscripts and the history of printing, leading to the innovations in technology and spelling rules of the 19th and 20th centuries. Illustrated with numerous examples, this book offers a global overview in a form that everyone can follow. The author also reveals his own discoveries made since the early 1980s, making it a useful reference for both students and specialists as well as the general reader.

Famed for its breathtaking isolation, Easter Island was a verdant South-Sea idyll when a small canoeful of Polynesians arrived in c. AD 700. Centuries later the island's statues were famous throughout the world. This book presents a comprehensive history of Easter Island told by a writer who is intimately familiar with the island, its people and their extraordinary story.When voyaging in the South Pacific became far less widespread around 1500, Easter Islanders became stranded on their desert-like isle, and were forced to adapt to survive. The first European visitors, in 1722, encountered a people thriving in total isolation, surrounded by huge architectural platforms of fitted stones topped by hundreds of monolithic busts. Subsequent intruders brought trade, disease, violence, and the Easter Islanders adapted to this change, too, through cultural re-invention: new leaders, new rituals, new gods. Steven Roger Fischer relates the compelling history of this unique region: how wars, smallpox and the Great Death decimated the island, how Catholic missionaries arrived in 1866 to relieve the suffering of the dying people, and how a despotic Frenchman claimed the island for himself, but who was then killed by the remaining islanders – a population of only 111.The author also examines the modern history of the island, its colonization and annexation by Chile, and its peaceful but insistent civil rights movement in 1964-65. Today, the population has increased, as has tourism of the island – from 2,000 visitors in 1991 to 20,000 in 2001 – and continues to be managed by the indigenous Rapanui people. Foreign interest in Easter Island has never been so keen, and this book is a much-needed history of this little-known but remarkable island.