{"id":10174,"date":"2021-12-10T13:51:45","date_gmt":"2021-12-10T18:51:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/irreal.org\/blog\/?p=10174"},"modified":"2021-12-10T13:51:45","modified_gmt":"2021-12-10T18:51:45","slug":"red-meat-friday-cursives-last-stand","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/irreal.org\/blog\/?p=10174","title":{"rendered":"Red Meat Friday: Cursive&#8217;s Last Stand"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>It\u2019s been a while since I\u2019ve ventured into the emotional minefield that is cursive handwriting. Here\u2019s a couple of tweets from Paul Graham that make two very good points:<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">They should start by at least not making kids learn the weird copperplate script they call &#8220;cursive.&#8221; I learned it in school but don&#8217;t write in it myself.<\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Paul Graham (@paulg) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/paulg\/status\/1467826027598696449?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">December 6, 2021<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async=\"\" src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>The first is a meta remark about handwriting in general. As Graham says, there are very few places where it\u2019s absolutely required. One of those is taking exams and if your (cursive) handwriting, like mine, is execrable, you can even lose points for illegibility.<\/p>\n<p>The second is that things would be better if we got rid of cursive. Graham\u2019s characterization of it as \u201cthe weird copperplate script they call \u2018cursive\u2019\u201d makes a point that is often missed: cursive really is an atavistic throwback to an earlier time that has no more relevance today than, say, the Gutenberg Press. It\u2019s interesting and important in an historical sense but simply has no place in our day-to-day lives.<\/p>\n<p>Its uselessness in modern life is made clear when you consider the arguments advanced for the continued teaching of it. Its advocates say things like, \u201cIf we don\u2019t teach cursive, students won\u2019t be able to read the Declaration of Independence or The Constitution in the original.\u201d That no one insists we should be teaching ancient Greek so that students can read the Iliad or the Odyssey \u201cin the original\u201d shows how silly that argument is. The other arguments for cursive are likewise special pleading.<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s well past time that we laid this anachronism to rest. Even if you force students to learn it, they, like Graham and I, will abandon it as soon as they can. It\u2019s really just a waste of class time that many students find painful and almost all find pointless.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It\u2019s been a while since I\u2019ve ventured into the emotional minefield that is cursive handwriting. Here\u2019s a couple of tweets from Paul Graham that make two very good points: They should start by at least not making kids learn the &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/irreal.org\/blog\/?p=10174\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[167,208],"class_list":["post-10174","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general","tag-cursive","tag-rmf"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/irreal.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10174","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/irreal.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/irreal.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/irreal.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/irreal.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=10174"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/irreal.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10174\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10175,"href":"https:\/\/irreal.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10174\/revisions\/10175"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/irreal.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=10174"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/irreal.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=10174"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/irreal.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=10174"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}