Cursive?

[Rodsie8181]

I just want to know your opinions on cursive. I have been writing in cursive since I was 8 to 9 years old and it has come to my attention that people do not care for cursive as much as they used to.

(Ranting) Also I am sick and tired of when we have an assignment in class and we're suppose to get a classmate to read over our work, because most people in my class can't even read cursive so I have to wait until some comes along that can. 

[Norellia]

I think I was the first generation in my school that did not learn cursive. I remember vaguely in like 5th grade we went over cursive very briefly before stopping. After that my mom tried to teach me how to do cursive at home but it never really stuck. All I can do in cursive is my signature, otherwise I am just writing really fast with a bunch of loops hoping it's correct. I think with use of computers and having to type every document it is natural for cursive to die out, so I don't see it as an issue if people can't read cursive (granted I might be biased). I can vaguely read cursive and usually the letters I can't read  I can guess what it is saying from context. Honestly I don't understand how cursive was effective to begin with. With how badly boys handwriting is in public school I do not understand how assignments done in cursive could have been possibly legible if teachers struggled to read normal writing. Anyway it doesn't bother me if people can't read cursive because almost nothing is written in cursive anymore.

[Epitaph]

They taught me printing first in school then tried to teach me cursive. Didn't go well for them. My brain locked onto one form of writing and all attempts to teach me how to write cursive failed. I can read cursive, but only if it's not butchered(which most people find creative ways to do). I tried teaching myself cursive later on just for the sake of knowing, but my hands are too damaged now either to print in any feasible fashion or learn those smooth loops without butchering them.

 

Cursive definitely is dying. But then again so does everything anyway. It'll either fade to nothing or make a comeback at some point. Either way doesn't much bother me. I know my comment is biased as far as teaching it in schools goes, as all I can remember is the horrible time I had in school trying to learn something that would not stick.

 

Honestly, school sucks dick in general. They could teach cursive as extra curricular stuff, but not mandatory. Or, they could do what they used to. Teach cursive first, as it teaches dexterity, and then teach printing, which requires much less dexterity and would likely be easier for kids to learn as opposed to the other way around.

[Grumpy Alien]

I was taught cursive when I was 8-9 but we were never instructed to actually use it outside of our cursive lessons. I found it more cumbersome to write than printing and harder to read so I never found it useful. My... junior? year of high school, my history teacher said to use cursive when writing our notes because it was faster. Everyone in the class knew how to write in cursive but only the ones forced to use it in Catholic grade school (this was a Catholic high school and I went to public grade school) found it faster. She was really surprised but said if we found printing faster, then use that. Unless someone has immaculate handwriting and takes time when writing, I find cursive much harder to distinguish. It ends up being lots of similar loops. I know my own cursive looks like a complete mess if I write normally and if I try to make it legible, it just looks like a child traced it. 

 

I don't see the point in learning cursive. It is dying and it's dying for a reason. It's not necessary, it's not helpful. It's a less pretty and meaningful version of calligraphy. At best, it's a fancier form of writing. It isn't art like calligraphy and it isn't useful like regular printed letters. I don't think it should continue to be taught because I don't see how it matters.

[Rodsie8181]

3 minutes ago, Norellia said:

Anyway it doesn't bother me if people can't read cursive because almost nothing is written in cursive anymore.

Anymore. But I do believe that people should still be able to at least read cursive since all of our nations older document are in cursive. That includes of of the most important, The Declaration of Independence. 

Also graphic designs often times use cursive font that people need to be able to read.

[kelico]

I'm nearly 30, just as reference, but I loved it when we learned cursive. I wrote in cursive exclusively until college. We had to write in cursive in elementary school in all classes... After that, most kids went back to print. I didn't really develop my own handwriting, which is a combo of cursive and print, until college. I think it's pretty sad that cursive is dying out, but I do believe it is. At the very least, people should learn how to read it, though, because many things are still written in cursive. And it's important to our history and culture, I guess. Maybe it's because I'm an old fuddy-duddy, but I'd be sad if it became a lost art.

[Norellia]

1 minute ago, RodFire8181 said:

Anymore. But I do believe that people should still be able to at least read cursive since all of our nations older document are in cursive. That includes of of the most important, The Declaration of Independence. 

Also graphic designs often times use cursive font that people need to be able to read.

But like I could literally google The Declaration of Independence and read it. No cursive needed. The graphic design this is kinda true but in general cursive isn't like a completely different language I can still assume and vaguely read what is is saying because most letters are similar to what they actually look like...just loopier? So it usually still is legible to read a single word or two. Usually graphic design stuff is just logos, when I see a logo I look at is as an image and description stuff is typed in normal writing. 

[Grumpy Alien]

Just now, RodFire8181 said:

Anymore. But I do believe that people should still be able to at least read cursive since all of our nations older document are in cursive. That includes of of the most important, The Declaration of Independence. 

Also graphic designs often times use cursive font that people need to be able to read.

Honestly, I don't see how old documents need to be read in their original handwritten format. The Declaration of Independence, for example, is also printed and most people have never seen the original document. We know what it says and can find it online. Not many Americans could tell you word for word what it says because that's not important to most people. They know what it is and what it means but they don't have any reason to actually read it, let alone as it was originally written. That's largely irrelevant. And most graphic design fonts that use cursive aren't real cursive and can be read by someone who doesn't know real cursive. They're usually more of a hybrid between print and cursive that many people use naturally when writing.

[Rodsie8181]

4 minutes ago, kelico said:

I think it's pretty sad that cursive is dying out, but I do believe it is. At the very least, people should learn how to read it, though, because many things are still written in cursive. And it's important to our history and culture, I guess. Maybe just because I'm an old fuddy-duddy, but I'd be sad if it became a lost art.

That's also what I believe. Even if it is not needed for practical use, I still think it should be kept around as an art form, because essentially it is. But what I find sadder is that hand writing in general is going down because of typing.

[Ldlelee]

I was taught cursive when I was in elementary school. I was told incessantly that it would be required in high school—and then I wrote all of my papers electronically. I kind of forgot about it, to be honest. Then one day, somebody must have told me something along the lines of "Kids don't know how to write in cursive these days," or "Cursive is dying," because I took that as a challenge. I re-taught myself how to write in cursive in a couple of days and have been using it every day since.

[Norellia]

I do like cursive as an art form. I think it is a very pretty and elegant form of writing, but I just don't see it having an practical use in our society anymore that we would need every day.  

[Rodsie8181]

8 minutes ago, okir fokir said:

Honestly, I don't see how old documents need to be read in their original handwritten format. The Declaration of Independence, for example, is also printed and most people have never seen the original document. We know what it says and can find it online. Not many Americans could tell you word for word what it says because that's not important to most people. They know what it is and what it means but they don't have any reason to actually read it, let alone as it was originally written. That's largely irrelevant. And most graphic design fonts that use cursive aren't real cursive and can be read by someone who doesn't know real cursive. They're usually more of a hybrid between print and cursive that many people use naturally when writing.

I think it has at least some relevants because it is part of our nations culture and history. 

[Rodsie8181]

4 minutes ago, Norellia said:

I do like cursive as an art form. I think it is a very pretty and elegant form of writing, but I just don't see it having an practical use in our society anymore that we would need every day.  

I agree with you. I also don't see an everyday practical use of it, but I still believe that people should at least know how to read it and appreciate it as an art form. 

[RoseGoesToYale]

I think cursive is very important and should still be taught in school, if for no other reason than to reduce the amount of chicken scratch on holiday cards. I swear once I got one that I thought said "Muffy Chrusticus!" I sometimes have trouble reading what my peers write on the board, it's so bad. Outside the US, cursive is still very important (my Russian teacher was adamant about the students using cursive), so if I travel abroad, I want my writing to be legible.

[Grumpy Alien]

18 minutes ago, RodFire8181 said:

I think it has at least some relevants because it is part of our nations culture and history. 

And if a person has interest in that, it can very easily be self taught either from the internet or books. But I don’t think that’s vital for education.

[Rodsie8181]

2 minutes ago, okir fokir said:

And if a person has interest in that, it can very easily be self taught either from the internet or books. But I don’t think that’s vital for education.

I don't think it's vital either. I see cursive as more of a art form that should be forgotten. If no longer taught in English I think it should at least be gone over in art just a little.

[iff]

I checked a sample of my hand writing in an a4 pad I have.

 

I seen to switch between print and cursive with cursive being in flourishes and particular words will always be in cursive. There seems to be very little logic in my writing style.

 

Sometimes can be difficult to read cursive. 

[Tintinfan]

I can only write in curves. When i write in print it is slow and in block capitals.

As for legibility.... ha ha ha. most people cannot read my handwriting. Depressingly that group of people sometimes includes me.

[Anthracite_Impreza]

We were taught to write in cursive but as time went on no one bothered to 'correct' it. My writing went towards a print form with some joined up-ness and loops. I don't see why anyone should have to write in a particular way and I couldn't care less if it naturally died out, such is the way of fashion. People should be able to write however they prefer as long as it's legible (and even that only matters if they're expecting others to read it).

[Someone Else]

I've heard that it's dying and not really taught in schools anymore.  

[knittinghistorian]

I went to three different schools for first, second, and third grade.  In the first school, we learned D'Nealian (which I don't think ANYBODY learns anymore!), and in the second we learned print, and in the third we learned cursive.  And SOMEHOW, out of that confusing mishmash, I ended up with the neatest block printing ever.  I can write cursive, but it takes more thought and I don't prefer it.  I can read it, and I'm glad I can; as a historian, if I couldn't read cursive I would not be a happy camper when I went to archives to look at letters and manuscripts and things!  That is why I think people should at least know how to read cursive, for the sake of being able to read our history.

[Gloomy]

I was taught cursive and know how to read it(as long as the person who wrote it actually wrote it legibly instead of writing it like a doctor’s handwriting). It is kind of dying, but whatever, things change.

[Fluffy Femme Guy]

I can read cursive if it's neat, and can sign my name quite nicely.
Other than that it's all print for me.

I think it should be taught in schools, but mainly so people can read it and to sign their names.
Unless somebody is legitimately faster writing with it I don't think they should be forced into it.

[Rodsie8181]

2 minutes ago, Fluffy Femme Guy said:

I can read cursive if it's neat, and can sign my name quite nicely.
Other than that it's all print for me.

I think it should be taught in schools, but mainly so people can read it and to sign their names.
Unless somebody is legitimately faster writing with it I don't think they should be forced into it.

You know out of all the things I've mentioned so far I forgot to mention the most important. SIGNING YOU NAME!! Thank you for mentioning it, because surely I wasn't going to realized I forgot to mention it anytime soon.

[Karst]

I normally use cursive when I write things by hand. It allows me to write faster without getting a hand cramp, which is very useful for taking notes.

[Grumpy Alien]

Does anyone actually write their signature in cursive? My signature only includes two actual letters. The first letter of my first name with squiggles approximating the same length and the first letter of my last name, same thing.

[Rodsie8181]

1 minute ago, okir fokir said:

Does anyone actually write their signature in cursive? My signature only includes two actual letters. The first letter of my first name with squiggles approximating the same length and the first letter of my last name, same thing.

I write my signature in cursive which includes my first name and last initial.

[Guest]

14 minutes ago, okir fokir said:

Does anyone actually write their signature in cursive? My signature only includes two actual letters. The first letter of my first name with squiggles approximating the same length and the first letter of my last name, same thing.

I do, it only includes my first initial and the third letter in my first name (for right now)

[everywhere and nowhere]

Does it have to be taught separately? For me writing in cursive and reading cursive is intuitive. It could be much more important in some languages which use different alphabets - the famous (?) case of lower-case Cyrillic cursive "t" looking the same as lower-case Latin "m".

I was trying to find an alphabeton (a sentence with all letters of the alphabet, such as the English "A small brown fox jumped over the lazy dog" - but it's a very "lazy" example indeed, a true alphabeton should include each letter only once) in Ukrainian, but I have been unsuccessful, so let's try a random short sentence...

Normal type: Пів-Америки шкодує свого вибору...

Cursive: Пів-Америки шкодує свого вибору...

(Approximate pronounciation: "Piv-Ameryky shkoduye svoho vyboru", meaning: "Half America regrets its choice". I wrote this sentence after Trump's election. )

The difference is quite substantial in case of a few letters, much more than in Latin alphabet...

 

Myself, I use cursive. Even though I have a horrible handwriting, essentially illegible to other people, I still write my diary manually. After the first few years I developed a custom I still follow: quotes (including self-quotes from my own older entries) and foreign-language insertions (as opposed to ordinary loanwords) are marked by cursive.

[everywhere and nowhere]

PS. Another example of the disparity in Cyrillic normal type and cursive.

It's a paraphrasis of a line from the Russian revolutionary poet Mayakovski: "I would learn Russian just because Lenin used to speak it". So I have found a following tongue-in-cheek Russian phrase, used in Ukraine:

Normal type: Мы рысский выучим только за то, чтоб громко скандировать: Путин хуйло!

Cursive: Мы рысский выучим только за то, чтоб громко скандировать: Путин хуйло!

Pronounciation: My ruskiy vyuchim tolko za to, shtob gromko skandirovat': Putin khuylo!

Meaning: We will learn Russian just to loudly chant: Putin is a prick!