BS: Obit - Cursive Writing.

Subject: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: GUEST
Date: 30 Jun 13 - 10:45 AM

It seems that some states and provinces are no longer teaching cursive writing which also means some students cannot read it either. It likely doesn't rank up there with global warming, the shenanigans connected with oil or the latest doings of Monsanto. However, I find it a bit disconcerting.

Articles from CBS:

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-201_162-57591586/is-cursive-writing-dead/

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: Bill D
Date: 30 Jun 13 - 11:01 AM

How are they expecting people to sign their name in the future?

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: Greg F.
Date: 30 Jun 13 - 11:19 AM

By computer.

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: Midchuck
Date: 30 Jun 13 - 11:37 AM

I gave up on cursive writing decades ago, except for signing my name, which is expected to be illegible - that's a status symbol. Whoever invented cursive writing despised left-handed people more than anyone except the people who design repeating firearms.

I READ cursive very well, however. Even really strange cursive. A working life of searching real estate titles in old land records will instill that skill.

Peter

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: Greg F.
Date: 30 Jun 13 - 11:42 AM

Or perhaps there will be an "ap" for signing your name.

Also be interesing watching students- and others- trying to take notes quickly enough laboriously printing them out.

And as Midchuck points out, they will not be able to READ cursive writing, either - making anything written by their parents or older illegible.

This trend represents pure genius in action.

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: Ebbie
Date: 30 Jun 13 - 12:19 PM

Hard to believe they're serious. Just another faddish idea, methinks.

However, somewhere along the way people did lose the ability to carve hieroglyphics- and it takes specially trained persons to even read them now - so maybe...

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: GUEST,Eliza
Date: 30 Jun 13 - 12:36 PM

Children's handwriting is appalling nowadays. I visited our little village school last year on an open day, and the standard of written work was terrible. They seem to be printing letters in a variety of sizes, with capital letters in the middle of words, scribbles and crossings-out all over the place and virtually no connecting cursive lines at all. If a class of mine twenty years ago had turned in work like that it would have been ripped out and re-written during break! I suppose the explanation is that the older ones use laptops for nearly all their work, and seldom need to write with a pen. I reckon a fingerprint will serve as a signature in the future. Writing may become completely redundant.

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 30 Jun 13 - 12:38 PM

Greg F- what is this "taking notes"? Don't they all have pocket recorders now?

Cursive writing- a skill for antiquaries.

I wonder- are there any composers who still do their musical scores by hand?

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: Rumncoke
Date: 30 Jun 13 - 12:43 PM

Blast - I'm just finishing copying my first songbook - changing it from A6 to A5 for the benefit of these ageing eyes, and now I find that both could be illegible in another generation?

I had planned to copy my second songbook, which is A4, into the new A5 version - now I am wondering if I ought to just type it all into the PC.

I have been told that my left handed cursive script is the neatest handwriting one person had ever seen - it just looks ordinary to me - but then I am no Spring chicken at 62 years old.

And I can read some hieroglyphics, some runes and that backwards script with no vowels.

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: Charmion
Date: 30 Jun 13 - 12:48 PM

In fact, it takes experience and skill to read the handwriting of our more recent ancestors. Most people can't read 19th-century manuscripts written with quill pens or even steel-nibbed pens unless the originator if the document was a clerk trained to write a Palmer or Chancery hand; the conventions (such as punctuation and common abbreviations) have changed too much. And that's assuming that the paper and ink have not deteriorated beyond legibility.

I used to work at the National Archives of Canada, and I can read just about anything written by hand in English since about 1700. Eighteenth-century handwriting is generally easier to read, as literacy was less common and even infrequent penmen (and pen-women) were typically fairly well-educated. They also used paper and ink of higher quality than was typically available 100 years later.

The least-legible documents I have ever seen were "cross-written" letters composed during the North West Rebellion of 1885. The writer, Colonel William Otter of Toronto, was short of paper so, when he got to the bottom of the page, he turned it 90 degrees and kept going. Col Otter wrote a fine clerkly hand -- he worked for more than 20 years in the head office of the Canada Land Company -- but cross-writing made his letters to his wife a complete secret to everyone but her!

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: Greg F.
Date: 30 Jun 13 - 12:59 PM

You bet, Q - technology will save 'em all- untill the batteries go dead.

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 30 Jun 13 - 01:12 PM

I took down the lyrics of a song that I wanted to post in mudcat.
My cursive is so bad I will have to go back to the source to find out what I so laboriously BICed.

One of those sites that won't print. I have used my digital camera on those sites, and that works.

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: Greg F.
Date: 30 Jun 13 - 01:56 PM

Hey, that's not the fault of cursive writing- own up, eh? ;>)

By the by, taking notes isn't the same as taking a lecture; the former engages the brain to take down what's important, the latter takes down everything which is parrotted back without comprehension.

And folks wonder why education is circling the drain.....

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: Greg F.
Date: 30 Jun 13 - 02:01 PM

Ooops. Read "taking" as "TAPING". Having a bad day here, it seems.

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: GUEST
Date: 30 Jun 13 - 02:14 PM

"One of those sites that won't print. I have used my digital camera on those sites, and that works."

Just a do a Printscreen (notice the key on your keyboard for just such a purpose) and then bring up Paint and paste it in there. Then use the cropping tool to grab just the words you want and paste that into a Word doc. Done. A lot easier than scribbling or using a digital camera.

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: Don Firth
Date: 30 Jun 13 - 02:31 PM

I was taught cursive writing when I was six years old and just starting in school (of course, this was back in the days when we carved letters into clay tablets—mid to late 1930s).

A couple of years later, a fan of the "Tom Mix" radio show (for those who've never heard of him, he was a cowboy by trade) and I sent my cereal box-top in and received by return mail my "Tom Mix pen and pencil set." It was a mechanical pencil and genuine fountain pen. Cheap, but fully functional.

From about the age of eight, I was doing a lot of my writing (a halfway decent looking cursive style—and readable by adults and others, with the fountain pen.

Later, I wrote a great deal with a fountain pen. By now, I had a Sheafer pen. Among other things, I wrote an entire 5,000 word short story for a high school creative writing class in cursive script, which my teacher liked so well, she submitted it (my hand-written copy) to the Atlantic Monthly high school short story contest, where it received an honorable mention.

My handwriting was quite distinctive—and quite readable.

When I worked for Boeing as a Production Illustrator (draftsman), they required all writing to be in "Boeing standard lettering"—block letters one-eighth of an inch high.

Within recent years, I've done so much writing either on typewriters or on the computer, that I'm way out of practice with cursive, and my handwriting has really deteriorated—which I deeply regret.

When I watch kids these days on those rare occasions when they are writing something with a pen (ball point) or pencil, I wonder who in blazes taught them how to hold the implement!?? I was taught to hold a pen or pencil this way, where I could control the point (CLICKY). I did a lot of drawing and sketching when I was a kid (still do), and holding a pencil correctly is essential for line control.

These days, I see kids—and not just kids anymore—holding a pen or pencil this way:   CLICKY.

Maybe okay for stabbing something, but hardly for anything that requires any kind of precision.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 30 Jun 13 - 02:42 PM

It's all just the progress in technical/mechanical aids to the illiterate.

Pittman shorthand was universally accepted as being faster and more legible than the Gregg that replaced it, but Pittman relied on line width differences, applied by pressing down to spread the point on a quill or steel nib.

The invasion of decent pencils, and ultimately the "ball point pen" made it impossible to write legible Pittman, so Gregg became dominant.

Development of the typewriter (and the "stenotype") made much manual shorthand a dying art, although it did persist at least into the 60s in some places.

I took lots of engineering notes in Gregg (somewhat crude, since I only spent one weekend learning it) when some nosy person tried to read what I was writing over my shoulder in meetings. It always worked.

As late as the mid '70s, I "accidentally" found some "interesting comments" about the boss in one secretary's Gregg book (apologies for the accident, and agreements on confidentiality properly executed), but by that time several of the better "assistants" could type faster than anyone could talk, so they just made the originals on the spot.

I do persist in using cursive when I write checks, as I refuse to use a debit card. Those I know personally who use debit cards spend a whole lot more time and effort trying to balance their books (if they bother at all) than I do writing the checks and keeping the books, and often spend longer in the checkout line trying to "swipe it" so the reader can figure out who they are than it takes me to do a paper check.

As to the earlier comment: Whoever invented cursive writing despised left-handed people more than anyone except the people who design repeating firearms. one can always do it like DaVinci and just write mirror image cursive right to left. If you only use one side, the prof can flip it over and read it through the paper.

And left handed firearms actualy are fairly easily available in many popular models (for a few bucks more).

John

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 30 Jun 13 - 03:37 PM

Shorthand had disappeared from many companies by the 1950s; the secretaries in the company I was with all had a machine to which we dictated, and had a tube with an earpiece. Forget what the things were called.
It was used for letters; our reports were all set down in our handwriting, and we were lucky that our technically trained stenographers could read our squiggles.

Material for publication went back several times for additions and corrections. Then it was sent to Editing, where two women with degrees in English cleaned it up any mistakes in language.

In grade school, penmanship was taught, but by the time we entered the 7th grade, most of us had forgotten it.

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: Joe Offer
Date: 30 Jun 13 - 04:19 PM

I don't know if it's my left-handedness, but cursive writing has always been very difficult for me. For most things, I print - although my printing isn't as steady as it used to be.
Nowadays, the only things I do in cursive are checks, and I hate doing it. It hurts, and the letters don't come out right.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: Little Hawk
Date: 30 Jun 13 - 04:32 PM

It's inevitable in a society where electronic keyboard and keypad devices have become universally available that most people will lose (or never learn) the skills of cursive writing....just like most people have lost familiarity with horseback riding, shoeing, training, taking care of, and equipping a horse, and maintaining a horseless carriage after about 100 years of the automobile becoming almost universally available.

These things happen when society changes and new inventions take over. Old skills are lost. New skills take their place.

But just as there are still a certain number of people who DO know how to deal with horses, there will probably always be a certain number of people who maintain good cursive writing skills. They'll just be a fairly small minority, that's all.

And the world will keep on turning.

I hardly EVER do any cursive writing anymore, but I'm still capable of it...I'm just not nearly as good at it as I was 30 years ago. This doesn't mean I've gotten stupider. It doesn't mean I'm less literate. It means I've been using keyboards instead. And that's okay.

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: Little Hawk
Date: 30 Jun 13 - 04:34 PM

correction: It should have said "maintaing a horsedrawn carriage" in the above post.

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: Little Hawk
Date: 30 Jun 13 - 04:46 PM

And here's another thing that will presently happen, I'm sure. People will start getting software that they can talk to and which will do the onscreen text for them. It's already out there, and it keeps getting better. It will probably replace most keyboard use eventually. Then people can agonize about young folks not being able to type anymore! ;-)

And the world will keep turning. And some people will always maintain the old skills from the past, while most people will lose them and get new ones in their place.

Here's the thing, though. Our present hi-tech system tends to specialize and greatly limit people's survival skills to a very narrow band that relates just to their job and their education (which prepares them for their job). That means if the overall system itself fails for some reason (war, natural disaster, etc), the public is in deep trouble. And that makes us more vulnerable than a relatively "primitive" culture without a lot of technology, because in those simpler cultures people still have a very broad range of ordinary survival skills. We don't. We expect someone else to do it for us.

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: Dave MacKenzie
Date: 30 Jun 13 - 05:54 PM

I've said elsewhere, but I changed from cursive to italic when I was about 13 when I gave up trying to write legible cursive and changed to a more amenable style.

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 30 Jun 13 - 05:57 PM

Joe -

One of my high school buddies who was afflicted with the sinister curse had a habit of turning the page upside down and writing right to left upside down. This put the hand "off the ink" for at least a line at a time, although the last line could still be smudgeable when you started the next one.

Some of us "righties" found that imitating him and writing upside down (or mirror image right to left) actually produced "prettier" work than when we wrote normally, possibly just from the little extra concentration required - although I suspect that with practice it would all look the same.

A "throwback" in the publishing industry is well known in the case of Earle Buckingham who wrote what many still consider the first "thorough" textbooks on gear design, mostly in the '40s and '50s (IIRC). His original books were all "hand lettered" - drafting style - and to those who've spent "time on the board" they were absolutely GORGEOUS!. Later editions were typeset, but the old ones still evoke warm feelings (not all related to elderly bladder functions).

Judging by the number of books on the shelves at Barnes et. al., Calligraphy is still a fairly popular "craft art," although judging by "her" personal collection a lot more books on the subject are sold than get read. It is still a "marketable" skill, even though the market is somewhat limited. It's hard to view making much of a living "scripting" the graduates' names on diplomas two or three times a year, and not all schools bother with the tradition, although some people seem to have ambitions about getting the job.

John

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: Greg F.
Date: 30 Jun 13 - 06:29 PM

Say Hawk: Who gives a shit about your fantasy prognostications??

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: Claire M
Date: 01 Jul 13 - 10:52 AM

Hiya,

I love pens, & notebooks. I like those pens that make my writing look good cos they're more comfortable. & I've always loved gel pens. I'm told I've got very good, neat writing "for a disabled person".
I've got a ton of notebooks from when I was little, plain ones to paperblanks – they're all full of thoughts & poetry. I was really pleased to find out people do the same thing on the computer – "art journalling".

There's no need for me to keep my writing up but it took a long time to practise so I don't see the point of giving up.
I would've hand-written my care plan (we have as much say in it as possible) but said document is so long that it wasn't a good idea. Plus I'm a tad too late w/ it. Should've been done ages ago. It looks like a Book of Shadows & I'm really proud of it.

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: Will Fly
Date: 01 Jul 13 - 11:36 AM

I've been cursing in writing for years. Some of my best curses have been in Italic, but I occasionally use Gothic script for old-fashioned German curses like "Verdamnt Englander", etc.

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 01 Jul 13 - 11:53 AM

Claire, did the person who made that patronising comment have good writing for an able-bodied person??

Do you know Fred Small's Talking Wheelchair blues?

In Australia we have a campaign Don't DIS my ABILITY, have you anything like that in your part of the world?

I've had trouble writing for years as the top joint of the middle finger in my right hand is a bit bent & resting a pen there hurts. So I've used pens with padding or separate foam grips (wow, so many amazing products!!) to make writing a bit more comfortable.

I just tried to hold my pen in the wrong way as shown in Don's second clicky & it's not easy to write neatly. Plus my arthritic bits didn't like it.

sandra

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: Little Hawk
Date: 01 Jul 13 - 12:25 PM

Greg - Eh? I don't know the answer to that question. It hadn't even occurred to me to worry about it in the first place till you brought it up. However, I suppose we could do a poll of the entire western world to find out who "gives a shit about (my) fantasy prognostications", but I really doubt the results would justify the effort or the expense. ;-D

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: Jack Campin
Date: 01 Jul 13 - 01:22 PM

are there any composers who still do their musical scores by hand?

Stockhausen used to compose on enormous sheets of paper pinned to an architect's drawing board. Reducing that to something a performer could put on a music stand was Somebody Else's Problem.

Brian Ferneyhough has made deprecating comments about computer notations homogenizing what can be expressed. Good luck trying to computerize this:

Unity Capsule 1
Unity Capsule 2

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: Bill D
Date: 01 Jul 13 - 01:34 PM

It dawned on me how to write cursive these days:

handwriting fonts

My teacher from 62 years ago, Ms. Isgrigg, might happily approve MY use of them, as I could not seem to copy her examples.

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: Rob Naylor
Date: 01 Jul 13 - 05:21 PM

Will Fly: I've been cursing in writing for years. Some of my best curses have been in Italic, but I occasionally use Gothic script for old-fashioned German curses like "Verdamnt Englander", etc.

Damn you Will Fly!!! I opened this thread with the intention of writing something similar but as is often the case you got there first. Buggeration.

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: Bobert
Date: 01 Jul 13 - 05:39 PM

My mama told me that if I kept up with the cursivin' then she was gonna have daddy put a whup on me...

That was it for me...

B~

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 01 Jul 13 - 09:12 PM

I wonder- are there any composers who still do their musical scores by hand?,,I would be absolutely astonished if there weren't. The same way there are a great many novelists who write using a pen and paper. And musicians using the same instruments that have been around for centuries.

And a pocket recorder is great for preserving a lecture or whatever, so you can listen to it again. But it doesn't do anything about picking out the salient bits.

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: PHJim
Date: 01 Jul 13 - 10:53 PM

"I wonder- are there any composers who still do their musical scores by hand?"
I write all of my music, standard notation and tablature, by hand.

On line, words that are spelled correctly like then/than, their/there/they're are often interchanged. I've even seen "use" employed as a plural of "you".

In the sixties, hand written resumes were preferred over typed resumes, especially by school boards. Perhaps it was thought that a typed resume was an attempt to cover up poor penmanship.

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: GUEST,.gargoyle
Date: 02 Jul 13 - 12:54 AM

I write cursive in the style of the Palmer handwriting method...smooth, round, full-blodied letters.

To obfuscate my identity I use draftsman block. (it helped pay the bills)

More than once....it was necessary to imitate (forge) script writing....it was best done upside down.

Sincerely ,
Gargoyle

all performed with white hat benevelolence

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: JennieG
Date: 02 Jul 13 - 02:06 AM

Good.

The scar from when, as a 10YO, I was held up to ridicule in front of the whole class by my teacher, because of my handwriting, has burned deep and never gone away. The humiliation of being sent to a younger grade for that lesson is still with me.

My handwriting is legible, not as much as it used to be before the computer made life so much easier but it's still better than some.

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: Joe Offer
Date: 02 Jul 13 - 02:29 AM

Hey, Bill D, don't you have a font called "Palmer Method"?

Otherwise, I may have to hire Gargoyle as an amanuensis.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: Penny S.
Date: 02 Jul 13 - 02:32 PM

I used to try very hard to teach joined handwriting to children who had not been taught how to hold the pen when younger and could not understand the necessity of using the correct grip so the finger and thumb work like a pantograph. But, with the introduction of the literacy hour and all the rest of the curricular innovations, there wasn't time. I did it with exercises to music (Scott Joplin worked really well) to get a rhythm going (like they used to teach typing) and it worked. But time was driven from the day.

Stupid.

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: Lighter
Date: 02 Jul 13 - 04:52 PM

The nineteen-year-old witness in the Zimmerman trial testified that she could not "read cursive."

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: Bill D
Date: 02 Jul 13 - 06:24 PM

Joe.. I have 622 fonts in the 'handwriting' folder, many of which are more like 'fancy printing'.

Ok...now I have a font that the experts in alt.binaries.fonts say is 'very close' to Palmer. It is called AbcCursive..in 6 styles, including with the sort of lines a teacher would use to define letter height. (They didn't have one either, as of 2010)The commercial version of the genuine Palmer is $49.95.

I can send it to anyone who wants it.

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: Bill D
Date: 02 Jul 13 - 06:26 PM

Or... *wry grin*... you can get it here.

http://www.fontpark.net/en/font/abccursive/#

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: Greg F.
Date: 02 Jul 13 - 06:45 PM

Hmmm.... that abcCursive would rate about a grade of "C" in any handwriting class I ever took...

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: Bill D
Date: 03 Jul 13 - 10:06 AM

C? well, *shrug*... I suppose the point was to be legible for the masses... and that it was.

I once saw a professional calligrapher making his living writing wedding invitations..etc. Fancy pen with nibs that extended to his right... and amazing, lovely script. I wonder if there are any of those left.

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: GUEST,Eliza
Date: 03 Jul 13 - 12:37 PM

Bill, there are. Our hospital has a chapel and a dedication book for deceased patients. The writing is exquisite and there is a tiny, delicate painting in watercolour rather like illuminated script for each entry. So does our crematorium. In fact, they could be the same hand. Also, there are evening classes for calligraphy and one can create cards and wall posters etc. But the pens, ink and special paper are quite expensive.The nuns at All Hallows in Ditchingham also produce beautiful prayer cards etc in calligraphy. So the art is alive and well.

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: Bill D
Date: 04 Jul 13 - 12:01 AM

Ah... that's good to know, Eliza. I suppose I should have realized that 'some' would keep an art alive.

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: GUEST,.gargoyle
Date: 04 Jul 13 - 02:49 AM

What Bill is passing off as PALMER certainly is NOT.

Look at the broken back in his LC f.

Look to the sloppy crook of his LC k.

The most telling is his LC b ... it was described as having "a little begger's cupped hand" in the original instruction. Bill's version begger's the question question of what that thing is sticking out?

Sincerely,
Gargoyle

Scrivener Joe ... a Scribner.

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: GUEST
Date: 04 Jul 13 - 10:06 AM

I had a teacher in high school who could write in the Germanic black lettering. She wrote all our assignments on the chalkboard in that script. She tried to teach us how but it was mixed results at best.

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: Bill D
Date: 04 Jul 13 - 10:16 AM

If you read carefully, garg, I said the folks at alt.binaries.fonts noted that this was as close as they'd found to Palmer among free fonts.

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 09 Jul 13 - 05:07 PM

cursive

Subject: RE: BS: Obit: Cursive Writing.
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 09 Jul 13 - 07:31 PM

brilliant!