Editing Writing (section)

=== Motivations and purposes ===
[[File:Olin-Warner-LoC-tympanum-Highsmith.jpeg|thumb|upright=1.2|A bronze [[tympanum (architecture)|tympanum]] featuring the [[personification]] of Writing, above the main entrance to the [[Thomas Jefferson Building]] in Washington, D.C., sculpted by [[Olin Levi Warner]] in 1896]]
As human societies emerged, collective motivations for the [[development of writing]] were driven by pragmatic exigencies like keeping track of produce and other wealth, recording [[history]], maintaining [[culture]], codifying knowledge through [[curricula]] and lists of texts deemed to contain foundational knowledge (e.g. ''[[The Canon of Medicine]]'') or artistic value (e.g. the [[literary canon]]), organizing and governing societies through texts including [[legal codes]], [[census]] records, [[contract]]s, [[deed]]s of ownership, [[tax]]ation, [[trade agreement]]s, and [[treaties]].{{sfnp|Anderson|2007|pp=177–190}} As [[Charles Bazerman]] explains, the "marking of signs on stones, clay, paper, and now digital memories—each more portable and rapidly traveling than the previous—provided means for increasingly coordinated and extended action as well as memory across larger groups of people over time and space."{{sfnp|Bazerman|2013|p=193}} For example, around the 4th millennium&nbsp;BC, the complexity of trade and administration in [[Mesopotamia]] outgrew human memory, and writing became a more dependable method for creating permanent records of transactions.{{sfnp|Green|1981|pp=345–372}} On the other hand, writing in both [[ancient Egypt]] and [[Mesoamerica]] may have evolved through the political necessity to manage the [[calendar]] for recording historical and environmental events.{{sfnp|Ray|1986|pp=307–316}}{{sfnp|Justeson|1986|pp=437–458}} Further innovations included more uniform, predictable, and widely dispersed legal systems, the distribution of accessible versions of [[sacred texts]], and furthering practices of [[scientific inquiry]] and [[knowledge management]], all of which were largely reliant on portable and easily reproducible forms of inscribed language. The [[history of writing]] is co-extensive with uses of writing and the elaboration of [[Soft systems methodology#Human activity system|activity systems]] that give rise to and circulate writing.

Individual motivations for writing include improvised additional capacity for the limitations of human [[memory]]{{sfnp|Hutchins|1995}} (e.g. [[to-do lists]], [[recipe]]s, reminders, [[logbook]]s, [[map]]s, the proper sequence for a complicated task or important [[ritual]]), dissemination of ideas and coordination (e.g. [[essay]]s, [[monograph]]s, [[Broadside (printing)|broadsides]], [[plan]]s, [[petition]]s, or [[manifesto]]s), creativity and [[storytelling]], maintaining [[kinship]] and other social networks,{{sfnp|Christiansen|2017|pp=135–164}} [[business correspondence]] regarding goods and services, and [[life writing]] (e.g. a [[diary]] or journal).{{sfnp|Lindenman|Driscoll|Efthymiou|Pavesich|2024|pp=70–106}}

The global spread of digital [[communication]] systems such as [[email]] and [[social media]] has made writing an increasingly important feature of daily life, where these systems mix with older technologies like paper, pencils, whiteboards, printers, and copiers.{{sfnp|Sterponi|Zucchermaglio|Alby|Fatigante|2017|pp=359–386}} Substantial amounts of everyday writing characterize most workplaces in [[developed countries]].{{sfnp|Brandt|2015|p=3}} In many occupations (e.g. law, [[accounting]], [[software design]], [[human resources]]), written documentation is not only the main deliverable but also the mode of work itself.{{sfnp|Jakobs|Spinuzzi|2014|p=360}} Even in occupations not typically associated with writing, routine [[records management]] has most employees writing at least some of the time.{{sfnp|Beaufort|2007|pp=221–237}}