unwritten language
No alphabet exists
An unwritten language is one that has no established writing system—it exists only in speech.
Most of the world's languages throughout history have been unwritten, passed down through oral tradition.
Linguists sometimes develop writing systems for unwritten languages to document them before they disappear.
- gestureCommunicative body movement
- faceHead's anterior surface
- speechOral communication ability
- pictogramsImages conveying meaning
- folkloreInherited cultural narratives
oral history · songlines · petroglyphs · storytelling · campfire stories · passing down · tribal elder · tradition · native tongue · ideograms · kinesics · myth · ancestral knowledge · dialogue · ritual chants · sacred songs · facial expression · communal memory