Human script has gone through a long process and many developments, eventually evolving into two main branches, namely, the ideograph and the phonography. However, the reasons for the separation of ideograph and phonography, as well as the features of the two, have been the subject of much disagreement in the academic community. Taking Chinese characters as an example for ideograph, English, Sumerian cuneiform, and Phoenician as examples for phonography, this article makes a detailed study of the reasons for differences in the origins of ideograph and phonography from the aspects of geography, national concepts of time and space, and phonetic structure.
Cite this paper
Liu, G. , Chen, C. and Ye, T. (2024). A Comparative Study of the Origins of Phonography and Ideograph. Open Access Library Journal, 11, e1340. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.4236/oalib.1111340.
Von Humboldt, W. (1999) On Language: On the Diversity of Human Language Construction and Its Influence on the Mental Development of the Human Species. 2nd Edition, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
