Talk:Writing

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Writing systems Top‑importance

	Writing portal This article falls within the scope of WikiProject Writing systems, a WikiProject interested in improving the encyclopaedic coverage and content of articles relating to writing systems on Wikipedia. If you would like to help out, you are welcome to drop by the project page and/or leave a query at the project’s talk page.Writing systemsWikipedia:WikiProject Writing systemsTemplate:WikiProject Writing systemsWriting system
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Typography Top‑importance

	This article is within the scope of WikiProject Typography, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of articles related to Typography on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.TypographyWikipedia:WikiProject TypographyTemplate:WikiProject TypographyTypography
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Writing Top‑importance

	This article is within the scope of WikiProject Writing, a WikiProject interested in improving Wikipedia's coverage of content related to the fields of rhetoric, composition, technical communication, literacy, and language studies.WritingWikipedia:WikiProject WritingTemplate:WikiProject WritingWriting
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Lead length

I've marked this article's lead section as too long. LarstonMarston (talk) 14:42, 6 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

A potential solution that would also enact some structural updates of interest to WikiProject:Writing could be to stop the lead after the current second paragraph. "Contents" could begin by merging the current section 2 (Tools and Materials) with a consolidated version of the distinction introduced in paragraphs 3 and 4 of the current header (i.e., collective and individual motivations for writing), which could then become sections 3 and 4 in their own right (with 4.1 - 4.5 becoming instructive examples of contemporary collective writing practices and 4.6-4.7 becoming examples of more individualized motivations for writing. Questions of the origins of and differences among different writing systems can be incorporated in the relevant history of collective writing systems, but readers interested in a more substantive account of archeological dimensions of can be referred to existing and already very thorough pages on History of Writing and Writing Systems. This page probably needs to serve readers more interested in the multiplex contemporary uses *of* writing.

Compositionist (talk) 18:02, 6 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Would agree w/ the suggestions above. LarstonMarston (talk) 18:19, 6 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Opening line

I removed the link to "activity" in the opening sentence per MOS:SOB and MOS:OL; is there a "particularly relevant" reason to link it? If so, could the link be moved?

Incidentally, the first sentence's ending contradicts the last sentence of the lead, which defines a text. Whoever checks this could fix the links at the same time. CohenTheBohemian (talk) 15:07, 5 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Wiki Education assignment: Writing 2

This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 3 April 2023 and 16 June 2023. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Roxyrenteria (article contribs). Peer reviewers: Valeriaserrano2, Mari.h1875.

— Assignment last updated by Bryceucsb (talk) 01:22, 13 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]

learning how to write

there is a section Reading#Learning to read.

Shouldn't there bea section Writing#how to write? 178.203.109.225 (talk) 09:16, 17 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Defining adjectives in opening sentence?

@Wolfdog, I'm not sure the additions to Writing is the act of creating a persistent, visual, static representation of language. in the lead are either helpful or supported by definitions and discussions given in sources:

Immediately, visual fails as a necessary property for the definition of writing, as it plainly omits Braille systems. Works including Meletis & Dürscheid (2022) note the typical visual presentation of writing reflects an underlying spatial property that is actually defining.
Conversely, static seems merely superfluous. What technologies or cultural processes are being excluded with this term, which persistent does not already exclude more perspicaciously? It seems to be merely creating more surface area for confusion (e.g. erasable writing).

Remsense 🌈 论 10:40, 1 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Well, alternatively, "a persistent representation of language" is certainly far too broad. That can include the many formats of recorded audio, videos, etc. that have nothing to do with writing. I think at least "usually visual" would be entirely very fair. Wolfdog (talk) 12:14, 1 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

That is the one issue I've struggled with, yes. I've thought of persistent, symbolic as audio recordings are, in theory, facsimiles of the unmediated speech sounds. The issue is I've never quite seen a definition like that in any of the sources I've read that I can recall. Remsense 🌈 论 12:19, 1 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Is there any leeway on the "usually visual" suggestion? It can go wherever you want in the lede. But it's pretty solid if it's true some 90-something percent of the time, right? Wolfdog (talk) 01:20, 2 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry for being absent lately. That's much better to my eye, thank you. Remsense 🌈 论 12:38, 25 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]