Notational iconicity

Abstract In alphabet-oriented reflections on writing, writing is defined as “written down oral language.” This chapter develops an alternative concept: writings are hybrids of image and language. The materiality, perceptibility, and manipulability form the external texture of writings based on the connection between graphism and spatiality. The chapter aims to develop a broadened concept of writing that includes not only fixed spoken language but also numerical scripts, formulas, musical scores, choreographies, and programming languages. Its perspective is to look at inscriptions through the lenses of “notational iconicity.” This inclusive perspective on writing reveals an operative potential for which there is no model in oral language. Like pictures, diagrams, and maps, all tactile and visible scripts use the creative possibilities of artificial flatness. Two-dimensionality opens up a kind of artificially produced space, enabling overview, manipulability, distributivity, and control of what is inscribed on the surface. Last but not least, the inclusive notational iconicity approach avoids an alphabet-centered, Eurocentric conception of writing.