The effects of writing in early America

    I actually hate thinking about the impact language has on our lives because i go so in depth it gives me a headache.
    The effect writing had in history is unbelievable. It's so second nature in our lives, we don't even realize how much we depend on the fact that we're able to communicate and how much has stemmed from the creation of language.
    Even though the United States became an independent nation long after language was introduced, we had the ability to break away and establish a new form of government all because we were literate and could communicate with one another. After our independence was won, our forefathers created the Constitution and Declaration of Independence (http://www.earlyamerica.com/earlyamerica/freedom/constitution/text.html), a document we continue to interpret and use as our foundation of democracy.
    With the creation of language came expressing one's opinions, likes, dislikes, etc. A man like Thomas Paine could publish a book with his beliefs--one which later caused him to flee England with charges of treason. That's sort of the risk you take when expressing something that goes against the grain, though. He stood by his work, The Rights of Man: (http://www.earlyamerica.com/earlyamerica/writings/rights), and even started a revolution among the people of England. That's huge, for someone's opinion to impact so many people...all because of language.
    Another thing that is really interesting to me, is what technology stemmed from all of this. Thomas Paine's book was available all because of the printing press. From that came typewriters (http://www.ideafinder.com/history/inventions/typrwriter.html), computers, cell phones...etc, because people were fascinated with communicating with one another.
    So, I'd have to say hats off to those who created the alphabet and thus invented our lovely language that we use all day everyday, it'd be a strange world fully of hieroglyphics and cave paintings with out it! (and don't even get me started on different languages (i.e. Spanish, English, German...etc.), that's a whole other topic in itself).