读麦·讲演·在光速下生活（1974）·009

One of the strange implications of the phonetic alphabet is private identity. Before phonetic literacy, there had been no private identity. There had only been the tribal group. Homer know nothing about private identity; Homer’s world is that of the acoustic epic, the tribal encyclopedia of memorized wisdom, which Eric Havelock has reported so ably in his Preface to Plato. The Homeric epics were part of this acoustic wisdom that preceded literacy and which were phased out by literacy. Homer was wiped out by literacy. Homer had been the educational establishment of the Greeks for centuries. An educated Greek was one who had memorized Homer, who could sing it to his guitar or harp, and perform it in public. He was a gentleman and a free man. Along came the phonetic alphabet, and Plato seized upon it, and said,“Let us abandon Homer and go for rational education.”Plato’s war on the poets was not a war on poetry, but a was on the oral tradition of education.

语音字母不可思议的蕴涵之一是个人身分。在表音读写之前，不存在任何个人身分，只有部落团体。荷马对个人身分一无所知；荷马的世界是听觉史诗——关于记忆智慧的部落百科全书——的世界，对此埃里克·哈弗洛克在他的《柏拉图导论》中作了如此巧妙的叙述。荷马史诗是听觉智慧的一部分，这种智慧先于读写、后来被读写逐步淘汰。荷马被读写能力一笔勾销了。几个世纪以来，荷马一直是希腊教育的权威。一个受过教育的希腊人是一个熟记荷马的人，一个用他的六弦琴或竖琴伴奏着吟唱荷马并在公共场合表演荷马的人。他是一个君子、一个自由人。随之而来的是语音字母，柏拉图抓住了它，说：“让我们抛弃荷马，去接受理性的教育。”柏拉图对诗人的战争，不是对诗歌的战争，而是对口头教育传统的战争。

按：在表音读写之前的口语整体场中，不存在任何个人身份，只有部落团体。电子整体场与此类似。

不同于视觉智慧，听觉智慧采用口头教育传统，人们口口相传史诗、神话这样的部落百科全书，人和史诗神话共同构成这种智慧的媒介，活的媒介。记忆，memorize，备忘，纪念。

古希腊君子，熟记史诗神话，在伴奏中唱诵史诗神话。在公共场合表演史诗神话，就是当时的公开发表，跟印刷时代的公开出版一样。

随着读写能力的增强，人们从字符之外得到了个人身份。

读写兴起，视觉智慧逐渐替代了听觉智慧。柏拉图在读写媒介兴起之初，反对口头教育传统。

巴赫金的观点有助于理解身分与角色：“自我”是抽象与空幻的，只有通过与一个坐标点（即“非我”）的不断对照与互动才能实现自我认知，这个对构建自我不可或缺的坐标点即为“他者”。换言之，自我与他者并非作为单独的实体孤立存在，而是作为“两个坐标之间的关系存在……彼此进行区分。”