Is Handwriting a Dying Art?

I am a huge lover of hand calligraphy, even though most people would say that it, along with paper correspondence, is a dying breed. While that may be sadly true in some respects,I still think handwriting/type is one of the oldest and most beautiful art forms.

Here are a few articles that suggest that it is a dying art.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/7907888.stm

http://www.economist.com/blogs/prospero/2011/10/handwriting

http://www.mamamia.com.au/social/letter-writing-is-a-dying-art-says-baroness-greenfield/

After looking at these articles that suggest that handwriting is replaced by typing as its faster, legible and neater. I decided to go back into the history of writing.

History of Writing

The history of writing records the development of expressing language by letters or other marks.^[1] In the history of how systems of representation of language through graphic means have evolved in different human civilizations, more complete writing systems were preceded by proto-writing, systems of ideographic and/or early mnemonic symbol. True writing, in which the entire content of a linguistic utterance is encoded so that another reader can reconstruct, with a fair degree of accuracy, the exact utterance written down, is a later development, and is distinguished from proto-writing in that the latter typically avoids encoding grammatical words and affixes, making it difficult or impossible to confidently reconstruct the exact meaning intended by the writer unless a great deal of context is already known in advance.

Writing Systems 

Writing systems are distinguished from other possible symbolic communication systems in that one must usually understand something of the associated spoken language to comprehend the text. By contrast, other possible symbolic systems such as information signs, painting, maps, and mathematics often do not require prior knowledge of a spoken language. Every human community possesses language, a feature regarded by many as an innate and defining condition of mankind (see Origin of language). However the development of writing systems, and the process by which they have supplanted traditional oral systems of communication has been sporadic, uneven and slow. Once established, writing systems on the whole change more slowly than their spoken counterparts, and often preserve features and expressions which are no longer current in the spoken language. The great benefit of writing systems is their ability to maintain a persistent record of information expressed in a language, which can be retrieved independently of the initial act of formulation.

The invention of writing was not a one-time event, but a long evolution preceded by the appearance of symbols, possibly first for cultic purposes. Canadian researchers from the University of Victoria suggest that symbolism was used by cave painters of the Neolithic Age. ".

Developmental stages

A conventional "proto-writing to true writing" system follows a general series of developmental stages:^[9]

• Picture writing system: glyphs directly represent objects and ideas or objective and ideational situations. In connection with this the following substages may be distinguished:
  1. The mnemonic: glyphs primarily a reminder;
  2. The pictographic (pictography): glyphs represent directly an object or an objective situation such as (A) chronological, (B) notices, (C) communications, (D) totems, titles, and names, (E) religious, (F) customs, (G) historical, and (H) biographical;
  3. The ideographic (ideography): glyphs represent directly an idea or an ideational situation.
• Transitional system: glyphs refer not only to the object or idea which it represents but to its name as well.
• Phonetic system: glyphs refer to sounds or spoken symbols irrespective of their meanings. This resolves itself into the following substages:
1. The verbal: glyph (logogram) represents a whole word;
2. The syllabic: glyph represent a syllable;
3. The alphabetic: glyph represent an elementary sound.

Modern writing

The nature of writing has been constantly evolving, particularly due to the development of new technologies over the centuries. The pen, the printing press, the computer and the mobile phone are all technological developments which have altered what is written, and the medium through which the written word is produced. Particularly with the advent of digital technologies, namely the computer and the mobile phone, characters can be formed by the press of a button, rather than making the physical motion with the hand.

The nature of the written word had evolved over time to make way for an informal, colloquial written style, where an everyday conversation can occur through writing rather than speaking. Written communication can also be delivered with minimal time delay (e-mail, SMS), and in some cases, with an imperceptible time delay (instant messaging). Writing creates the possibility to break spatial boundaries and travel through time,^{[citation needed]} since a word normally spoken could only exist in the time and space it is spoken in. It creates a certain immortality, that could not be experienced without writing. Socially, writing is seen as an authoritative means of communication, from legal documentation, law and the media all produced through the medium. The growth of multimedia literacy can be seen as the first steps toward a postliterate society.

An info graphic that i found showing that text msgs (SMS) majority are sent by youngsters aged 13 - 17, showing that we rely heavily on technology to communicate as oppose to the basics. 

History of Writing Instruments 

Ancient Writing Instruments - Quills, bamboo, pen sharpeners, fountain pens, pencils, brushes

The history of writing instruments by which humans have recorded and conveyed thought, feelings and grocery lists, is the history of civilisation itself. This is how we know the story of us, by draw ins, signs and words we have recorded. 

The cave man's first inventions were the hunting club (not the auto security device) and the handy sharpened stone, the all purpose skinning and killing tool. The latter was adapted into the first writing instrument. The cave man scratched pictures with the sharpened stone tools onto the walls of his cave dwelling. The cave drawings represented events in daily life such as planting of crops or hunting victories. 

Florian Hardwig has researched the forms of school scripts and various models that are used for teaching children how to write. 

The poster that came with the three books above - "On Air Lines, Flame Bows, Speed Loops" - dialects of handwriting 


Express yourself through Handwriting

Han na Jung's project encourages people to use their handwriting rather than digital typefaces.
Handwriting represents designers’ emotion and themselves. During the digital era, advertising, campaigns,
and branding are increasingly adopting the rough-hewn style of manually created typography. Although
people are welcome to technology and new devices, some of them prefer traditional communications
methods, such as books, face-to-face conversation, and physical mail. An overload of technology might
make people miss the valuable communication ways.

After looking at Han na Jung's Project which portrays different moods and feelings through handwriting, I thought would be quite cool to make my own font - as oppose to having "Bold, Italic, Light, Underline etc" which usually comes with each font you purchase... it would come with "happy, sad, angry etc" which means people could portray their mood and feelings through their writing. 


I need to do a survey to see what people's opinion is, in regards to handwriting being a dying art. 


Possible Questions to ask: 
- How often do you write?
- When was the last time you actually wrote, and what or why were you writing? 
- Do you prefer writing or typing, and why?
- At what age were you taught handwriting?
- If you are writing in print, when was the last time you wrote in cursive?

After looking at handwriting, i started to look at the FOUR ERA's of Penmanship


- The Quill 
- Printing Press 
- Typewriter 
- The computer


Inspiration:

LOVE LOVE LOVE these notebook covers - such a cute idea and concept , i could try doing something similar. 


Here I've just done some drawings to start experimenting with initial ideas