Reply #44: Universal literacy would be very unusual for that time and place. [View All]

[eallen]

Were all peasants taught to read and write? How was this done? Were public schools established in villages? Were slaves taught to read and write? And what was the material basis for doing so? Today, we have cheap paper. Before that, children were taught using slates. I've never heard of a society that had universal literacy prior to modern times. The claim that Mohammad achieved this is remarkable.

Universal literacy is not an easy achievement. It takes a considerable education system wherever it occurs. And it leaves behind considerable evidence, because everyone knowing how to read and write, they proceed to do so. Widespread literacy is the basis for amateur and commercial writing, for entertainment, advice, record keeping, business transactions, etc. Businesses and institutions develop around these, even where only a large portion of the public is literate. Consider Elizabethan England, which did not have universal literacy, yet had handbills distributed advertising everything from plays to legal issues. And graffiti. Even the Romans left graffiti everywhere, and they did not have universal literacy. If this revolution really did occur in medieval Arabia, it should have left behind considerable evidence of itself. Even if only the female half of the poplution was literate. It doesn't seem like much to ask where that evidence is.