This book investigates the history of writing as a cultural practice in a variety of contexts and periods. It analyses the rituals and practices determining intimate or 'ordinary' writing as well as bureaucratic and religious writing.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

A World Inscribed : Introduction / Martyn Lyons and Rita Marquilhas -- The Babylonian Scribes and Their Libraries / Francis Joannès -- Writings in the Korean Han'gŭl Script by and for the Women of Chosŏn Korea (1392-1910) / SeoKyung Han -- Paper World : The Materiality of Loss in the Pre-Modern Age / John Gagné -- Writings on the Streets : Ephemeral Texts and Public Space in the Early Modern Hispanic World / Antonio Castillo Gómez -- Writing One's Life : The French School of the Anthropology of Writing / Nicolas Adell--Calendar, Chronicle and Songs of Sorrows : Generic Sources of Life Writing in Nineteenth-Century Finland / Anna Kuismin -- Reading the 'Cheyenne Letter' : Towards a Typology of Inscription beyond the Alphabet / Germaine Warkentin -- The Scribal Culture of Children : A Fragmentary History / Verónica Sierra Blas -- Policing Writing in the City, 1852-1945 : The Invention of Scriptural Delinquency / Philippe Artières -- QWERTYUIOP : How the Typewriter Influenced Writing Practices / Martyn Lyons -- The Future of the History of Writing / Martyn Lyons.