This article presents an in-depth interview with scholar Florian Coulmas on the evolution of writing systems and the transition from print to digital capital-ism. Coulmas offers a historical and critical analysis of how writing and technology have transformed society, from Gutenberg’s printing press to the digital age, while addressing topics such as print capitalism, the relationship between technology and language, and the impact of digitalization on minority languages. Also examined are the social implications of artificial intelligence in writing and the changing role of languages in the digital space. In the final section the interviewers reflect on the dynamic nature of language in the context of digitalization and the challenges for contemporary sociology when language and sociolinguistics come face to face with artificial intelligence.
Alarcón et al. (Wed,) studied this question.