News: Mandarin Audio tour of the OI Museum

Museum in Chicago to attract more Chinese visitors with Mandarin audio tour
English.news.cn   2010-10-29 13:24:29

CHICAGO, Oct. 29 (Xinhua) -- The Oriental Institute Museum of the University of Chicago now offers a Mandarin audio tour to attract more Chinese visitors.

The tour features highlights of the museum to help visitors understand the remarkable artifacts on display from the ancient Middle East.

"It is a great opportunity to show Chicago as such a global city," Joleen Haran, assistant director of tourism at the Chicago Convention and Tourism Bureau, told Xinhua. Haran said that China has been a fast-growing market of international travelers to the United States since both countries signed a Memorandum of Understanding in 2007...

Oriental Institute Museum Self-guided Audio Tours

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News: Three Articles About “Visible Language: Inventions of Writing in the Ancient Middle East and Beyond”

Hunting for the Dawn of Writing, When Prehistory Became History
New York Times, Art & Design
By GERALDINE FABRIKANT
Published: October 19, 2010

 CHICAGO — One of the stars of the Oriental Institute’s new show, “Visible Language: Inventions of Writing in the Ancient Middle East and Beyond,” is a clay tablet that dates from around 3200 B.C. On it, written in cuneiform, the script language of ancient Sumer in Mesopotamia, is a list of professions, described in small, repetitive impressed characters that look more like wedge-shape footprints than what we recognize as writing... [read the rest...]

Olaf Tessmer, Vorderasiatisches Museum, Berlin

A clay tag from around 3200 B.C. has signs that scholars call proto-cuneiform.

Invention of Writing Exhibition
Fine Books Magazine Blog
By Nate Pedersen on October 15, 2010 9:54 AM

Early writing developed independently at four spots around the ancient world: Mesopotamia, China, Egypt, and Mesoamerica.  For the first time in 25 years, examples of writing from all four civilizations are on display together at the Oriental Institute's new exhibition Visible Language, viewable now through March, 2011 at the University of Chicago.  

The highlights of the exhibition are the earliest known cuneiform tablets from Mesopotamia, dated to 3200 B.C., which have never before been shown in America.  The Oriental Institute has the tablets on loan from the Vorderasiatisches Museum in Berlin.  Other items on display include ancient labels from the tombs of the first Egyptian kings, inscribed oracle bones from China, and a miniature altar with Mayan hieroglyphics... [read the rest...]

Oriental Institute exhibit draws on history of writing
“Visible Language: Inventions of Writing in the Ancient Middle East” features artifacts ranging from cuneiform tablets to papyrus manuscripts. 
The Chicago Maroon
By Sara Hupp
Published: October 15th, 2010

If Indiana Jones were still at the U of C, he’d probably consider the Oriental Institute's latest exhibition the holy grail — of linguistics, at least.

While you won’t find any crystal skulls or lost arks, a new exhibit at the Oriental Institute displays some of the oldest examples of writing; “Visible Language: Inventions of Writing in the Ancient Middle East” features artifacts ranging from cuneiform tablets to papyrus manuscripts.

“The invention of writing was the first information revolution,” said Chief Curator Geoff Emberling, an archaeologist specializing in Mesopotamia. “Today, we are living through a revolution in the storage and processing of information, so it is very timely that we look back.”... [Read the rest...]

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Oriental Institute Enterprises, Limited

Several copies of this document, a blank shares certificate in

Oriental Institute Enterprises, Limited

turned up in a desk drawer in the Oriental Institute some time in the 1980's.  Oral tradition current at the time suggested that it was a membership premium issued some time earlier.  I've never seen reference to it in published OI Annual Reports or anywhere else for that matter.

The Human Adventure is Online

The Human Adventure is now online at The Oriental Institute's Youtube Channel.

This 1935 film, produced by the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago under the supervision of Dr. James Henry Breasted was written and told by his son, Charles Breasted. Though we no longer think about archaeology in the same way, this film gives us insight into the early days of the field.

Data (minimal) on the Human adventure at IMDb, and at Turner Classic Movies.
And see a Review of a Review of The Human Adventure.