I read an article in
The Atlantic magazine saying that around two-thirds of so-called "Gen Z" students born in the U.S. can neither read nor write cursive. Apparently, cursive writing is no longer taught in U.S. schools.
Paradoxically, this inability corresponds with the recent popularity of script and handwriting typefaces. The article makes me wonder if these faces are the last hoorah of the final generation capable of reading them.
Comments
I don't often use cursive anymore, but I found doing do very useful in university classes when taking notes. My mother, who went to high school in the 1930s, had wonderful handwriting and usually used a fountain pen. She said fountain pens were the norm in her Palmer Method classes @John Butler mentioned. I looked it up — ballpoint pens were too expensive for everyday use until the 1950s when the cost came down and became popular.
The downside is that in ten years all the beautiful OpenType script fonts that have been designed will disappear. But it’s worth the loss if children learn something useful.
And to answer the question you raise: I have never stopped to take notes on paper. This comes even before considering the question of educating children at handwriting.
I wonder if the recent popularity of script fonts is due to nostalgic associations of cursive handwriting with the handmade homeyness of simpler times. Head to the craft-oriented sites that distribute fonts, such as Creative Fabrica, and seemingly most of their fonts are trendy imitations of cursive writing.
I wonder if the popularity of script fonts will bottom out as teenagers turn into adults who have trouble reading them and little personal connection to them.
For cursive forms, models based on chancery cursive as used by Sasson and Williams are the best.
So while historical models specific of a given time, context or writing instrument can come and go, or be prone to use oscillations or fashion, the need to write effectively will always individuate forms that stem from the need.
Surely many historical "learned" cursive models have little to do with the "handmade homeyness of simpler times”. In my opinion Copperplate models or the ones you mention had varied impact on our generation (born between 1960s and 1970s) already. As an italian I learned at school the cursive forms of these "not so ideal" models, but then spontaneosly integrated — by observation — elements of our own chancery cursive. And for the capitals I ended up with the simpler, more effective form, adapting them to the need of writing quickly and effectively that I mentioned.
This does not erase the need to teach models which can aid children to find the best way to write.