Facing New Technologies (FNT): Written Artefacts Multiplied

The FNT Working Group explored why some manuscript cultures transfer the functions of manuscripts to print, tape, online chat, or other digital media and why others, in turn, resist new technologies.

FNT had a broad understanding of techniques and technologies. Since writing involves a variety of techniques, the group’s research was not limited to innovations of the 19th and 20th centuries. One focus of FNT was the interaction between the visual organisation and materiality of manuscripts and technological innovations such as typographical printing. This was paradigmatically analysed, for example, in an essay on Arabic manuscripts by Cornelius Berthold based on a large corpus and focusing on the period when Islamic-Arabic manuscript culture was rapidly shrinking.

A second extensive paper by the same author discussed why some texts continued to be handwritten despite the dominance of printing. Using the example of a group of Chinese medical manuscripts from the 19th and early 20th centuries, Thies Staack has investigated the same question: in a detailed article, he shows that these manuscripts serve didactic and epistemic functions that corresponding prints could not fulfil. Marco Heiles addressed the phenomenon of media change for Early Modern German Books for Divination and Scott Reese discussed the complicated relationship between Manuscript and Print in the Islamic Tradition in an edited volume and in his paper ‘The Ink of Excellence’ in the same volume. In their analysis of hybrid Buddhist manuscripts from Luang Prabang, Silpsupa Jaengsawang and Volker Grabowsky discussed written artefacts that combined handwriting, typewriting, and print and in which typewriting was also used to inscribe traditional palm leaves. The interplay of printing and traditional manuscript culture was also examined in Silpsupa Jaengsawang’s monograph on Anisong Manuscripts Facing New Technologies.

These and other topics, such as typewriting in general, woodblock printing, lithography, new writing supports/tools, and digitisation of manuscripts, were discussed at the monthly meetings of the Working Group and in a workshop in 2022, which tackled the question of why manuscript cultures do persist in modern times. Because of its focus on writing materials, FNT maintained close links to ‘Selecting Materials’ (Research Field K), visible not least in the 2024 workshop organised by FNT and RFK.

The activities of FNT demonstrated that further research into the techniques and technologies used to multiply manuscripts appears to be particularly fruitful. A UWA workshop on woodblock printing, held in April 2024, was aimed in precisely this direction. The approach can also be applied to written artefacts in general, as inscriptions, for example, were multiplied by squeezing or rubbing. In April 2024, the Working Group decided to focus on these means of multiplying written artefacts and added ‘Written Artefacts Multiplied’ to its title.

Consequently, the group’s work in 2024 and 2025 focused on digital, lithographic, and other technologies used to reproduce the content of written artefacts. It became apparent that these topics hold significant untapped potential and are still underappreciated in current research.

Building on this insight, UWA II,  will establish two Concept and Method Units dedicated to ‘Imprinted Handwriting’ and ‘Digital Twins’, respectively. These units draw upon the ideas and initiatives of FNT members Ondřej Škrabal and Hanna Wimmer, among others. This way, FNT has been able to provide important impulses for the continued development and advancement of the cluster and its goal of ‘Understanding Written Artefacts’.

Spokesperson: Tilman Seidensticker