Language

===Writing, literacy and technology===
{{main|Writing|Literacy}}
[[File:Winnipeg Forks - Plains Cree Inscription.jpg|thumb|upright=1.35|An inscription of [[Swampy Cree language|Swampy Cree]] using [[Canadian Aboriginal syllabics]], an [[abugida]] developed by Christian missionaries for Indigenous Canadian languages]]
Throughout history a number of different ways of representing language in graphic media have been invented. These are called [[writing systems]].

The use of [[writing]] has made language even more useful to humans. It makes it possible to store large amounts of information outside of the human body and retrieve it again, and it allows communication across physical distances and timespans that would otherwise be impossible. Many languages conventionally employ different genres, styles, and registers in written and spoken language, and in some communities, writing traditionally takes place in an entirely different language than the one spoken. There is some evidence that the use of writing also has effects on the cognitive development of humans, perhaps because acquiring literacy generally requires explicit and [[formal education]].<ref>{{harvcoltxt|Olson|1996}}</ref>

The invention of the first writing systems is roughly contemporary with the beginning of the [[Bronze Age]] in the late [[4th millennium BC]]. The [[Sumerian language|Sumerian]] archaic [[cuneiform (script)|cuneiform script]] and the [[Egyptian hieroglyphs]] are generally considered to be the earliest writing systems, both emerging out of their ancestral proto-literate symbol systems from 3400 to 3200 BC with the earliest coherent texts from about 2600 BC. It is generally agreed that Sumerian writing was an independent invention; however, it is debated whether Egyptian writing was developed completely independently of Sumerian, or was a case of [[cultural diffusion]]. A similar debate exists for the [[Chinese script]], which developed around 1200 BC. The [[pre-Columbian]] [[Mesoamerican writing systems]] (including among others [[Olmec]] and [[Maya script]]s) are generally believed to have had independent origins.<ref name="Coulmas"/>