ABSTRACT
In order to construct a history of the role of mental imagery and its relationship to verbal processes in literacy, we must interweave threads from such diverse disciplines as philosophy, rhetoric, literary study, psychology, and education. Our tapestry will still be incomplete, however, because our history in these areas is incomplete and because the concepts of imagery and literacy have been treated differently at different times. Imagery has been a controversial topic, sometimes seen as the divine human faculty, sometimes as mystical and occult-it might be called “the concept from heaven and hell.” In particular, the imagistic and the concrete have been in a continuing tension with the verbal and the abstract, reflecting intellectual movements across the ages.
