# Is cursive dying? **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [October 11, 2014, 11:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-cursive-dying/701072 "2014-10-11T23:10:00Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2015, 7:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-cursive-dying/701072/81 "2015-04-14T07:20:33Z")
I applaud the Ohio legislature. ---
**Author:** ![GrumpyBunny](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/bc8723/32.png) [@GrumpyBunny](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GrumpyBunny)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2015, 11:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-cursive-dying/701072/82 "2015-04-14T11:18:51Z")
Mine’s on life support, that’s for sure. I can write well in cursive, but these days it has to be with a fountain pen and I have to have time to do it. Notes that I take in meetings (that for some reason I don’t have a laptop with me) look like an ink-dipped daddy longlegs having a seizure on the paper. I still write faster in cursive than printing. I’m 45 and learned cursive in 4th grade. I had terrible grades in the subject because my asthma medicine at the time screwed up fine motor control. TOTALLY UNFAIR! :mad: ---
**Author:** ![AHunter3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ahunter3/32/368_2.png) [@AHunter3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AHunter3)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2015, 3:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-cursive-dying/701072/83 "2015-04-14T15:01:48Z")
In elementary school, “Writing”, by which they meant “cursive handwriting”, was a graded subject unto itself, and I always made a C or an occasional C+, and since honor roll required no grades of C or below, it was freaking handwriting that kept me off the honor roll for several years. ---
**Author:** ![purplehearingaid](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/7bcc69/32.png) [@purplehearingaid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/purplehearingaid)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2015, 3:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-cursive-dying/701072/84 "2015-04-14T15:19:26Z")
> **[States fight to keep cursive handwriting in the classroom](https://www.nydailynews.com/life-style/states-fight-cursive-classroom-article-1.1518352)** > > The swirling lines from Linden Bateman’s pen have been conscripted into a national fight to keep cursive writing in American classrooms. Cursive. Penmanship. Handwriting. Yeah I think it dying some schools are longer teaching it , I think kids should at least know how to write their name in cursive . It’s too bad b/c there nothing like getting a letter from a love one that took the time to write it. Now you just send a text and not bother to spell out the whole word . ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2015, 5:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-cursive-dying/701072/85 "2015-04-14T17:05:51Z")
> [@purplehearingaid](#): > > [States fight to keep cursive handwriting in the classroom – New York Daily News](http://www.nydailynews.com/life-style/states-fight-cursive-classroom-article-1.1518352) > Yeah I think it dying some schools are longer teaching it , I think kids should at least know how to write their name in cursive . It’s too bad b/c there nothing like getting a letter from a love one that took the time to write it. Now you just send a text and not bother to spell out the whole word . You can get that same letter printed by hand. It’s just as special. Personally, I write in a mix of cursive and printing. The regular Palmer method cursive we were taught as kids is inefficient and full of needless frippery, in my opinion. The only thing I really see it useful for is possible for teaching fine motor skills. Otherwise, it’s not something I plan to teach my kid(s), except maybe for being familiar with it in reading documents. If the schools teach it, so be it, but it’s not something I find important enough to spend a lot of time on. ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2015, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-cursive-dying/701072/86 "2015-04-14T19:15:44Z")
42 year old man here… I actually have quite nice handwriting. It wasn’t always so- in elementary school, I didn’t get particularly good grades in the subject, but after practicing for so long in school (we were about the last bunch to NOT have computers be ubiquitous in high school), college (how else were you going to take notes?) and grad school (laptops were available, but I didn’t have one), I eventually developed a good looking style. The thing was; if you have to write a lot by hand, cursive is much easier and more importantly, faster to write over the long haul. Trying to take notes by printing is absurd- I never would be able to keep up, or if I did, it would be illegible. But now, with computers, tablets and the like being ubiquitous, there’s not a lot of call for people to write much with pen and paper anymore, so handwriting seems a bit obsolescent. ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2015, 7:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-cursive-dying/701072/87 "2015-04-14T19:35:20Z")
> [@bump](#): > > The thing was; if you have to write a lot by hand, cursive is much easier and more importantly, faster to write over the long haul. Trying to take notes by printing is absurd- I never would be able to keep up, or if I did, it would be illegible. From what I can find, it seems that some combination of print-writing is actually faster, not straight-up cursive. [This is the best I can find](http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2013/04/30/should-schools-require-children-to-learn-cursive/handwriting-matters-cursive-doesnt), but that doesn’t include any scientific study. And I’d suspect it differs from person to person. For me, my printing is faster than “by the books cursive,” but my print-writing style faster than both. But I don’t think they’re significantly faster. To keep up with teachers, I had to incorporate some form of [stenoscript shorthand](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stenoscript) into my note-taking if I really wanted to reasonably keep up. ---
**Author:** ![Octarine](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/22d042/32.png) [@Octarine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Octarine)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2015, 8:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-cursive-dying/701072/88 "2015-04-14T20:06:02Z")
The fact that the government has to step in to preserve it is evidence that cursive is obsolete. Spending the time they’re now wasting teaching bored 8-year-olds an archaic system could be much better spent spending time on learning a second language, teaching them to type, or even outlining the very basic concepts behind computer programming. ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2015, 8:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-cursive-dying/701072/89 "2015-04-14T20:33:19Z")
> [@pulykamell](#): > > From what I can find, it seems that some combination of print-writing is actually faster, not straight-up cursive. [This is the best I can find](http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2013/04/30/should-schools-require-children-to-learn-cursive/handwriting-matters-cursive-doesnt), but that doesn’t include any scientific study. And I’d suspect it differs from person to person. For me, my printing is faster than “by the books cursive,” but my print-writing style faster than both. But I don’t think they’re significantly faster. To keep up with teachers, I had to incorporate some form of [stenoscript shorthand](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stenoscript) into my note-taking if I really wanted to reasonably keep up. Yeah, I’m certainly guilty of doing what the article says; I rarely use the more clunky cursive capitols like “S”, “T” or “Q”, and over time, my writing has drifted a bit from being the strict Zaner-Bloser stuff of my childhood, but it’s still readable and somewhat good looking- if I concentrate, I can do a halfway decent rendition of copperplate with my normal cursive style. I can type faster than either though, which is why I got funny looks in college when I explained that I just typed my papers out from the get-go; back then people wrote them out longhand, then edited as they typed them into Word Perfect or Word, and then finally printed the papers out. ---
**Author:** ![China\_Guy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/779978/32.png) [@China\_Guy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/China_Guy)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2015, 5:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-cursive-dying/701072/90 "2015-04-15T05:08:04Z")
Started school in the late 60’s. Cursive was second grade for when we were grown up. I remember a kid transferred to our school was Washington or Idaho State, and they learned cursive in first grade and he was waaaaaay ahead of us. I was completely gob smacked when I found out my eldest didn’t need to know cursive when we moved to the US and she was in 5th grade. She still doesn’t know how to read or write cursive 4 years later. My eldest twin got cursive in 3rd grade because she is in the gifted class, but cursive is not part of the regular curriculum in Washington State. I guess kids today don’t need to write essays in class by hand, nor in University.I learned how to type 65 wpm as a high school freshman, but I didn’t have access to an Apple II I think until my senior year of University. Cursive, and in my case chicken scratchish, is much faster than printing for something like in class notes or an essay. I’m old enough to think that typing notes in a business meeting is extremely bad form unless you’re the designated note taker. I would NEVER EVER take a laptop into a business meeting and type notes on the fly. Laptop up has a hangover of a “barrier” between you and the customer and eye contact and all that, and the perception that you might be surfing or emails or something non related to the specific meeting. That said I also work in the computer related industry and one simply does not take a competitors product into a meeting (think drinking a pepsi in a Coca Cola Company meeting or wearing Lee’s jeans into a Levi’s meeting). I could carry half dozen devices and use the Air for Apple, the XPS12 for Dell, etc but I find the easiest is to bring in a pad of paper and write cursive notes, and then transcribe what I must. I’ll also note that my handwriting has gone to shit in the computer age. I type faster than most people and rarely handwrite anything except for those meeting notes with customer or partners. And my chinese handwriting has gone completely to shit as I pretty much only write Chinese on computers these days. Gah, my Chinese handwriting wasn’t bad, but now the characters I can still remember looks like something a kindergartner would write. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Strangelove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr.strangelove/32/6613_2.png) [@Dr.Strangelove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Strangelove)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2015, 5:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-cursive-dying/701072/91 "2015-04-15T05:29:31Z")
The pro-cursive contingent continues to state–without evidence–that cursive is faster than print. [The data says otherwise](http://www.researchgate.net/publication/240538622_The_Relationship_Between_Handwriting_Style_and_Speed_and_Legibility). Between manuscript, mostly-manuscript, mostly-cursive, and cursive, cursive was the _slowest_. Mostly-manuscript was the fastest. Differences in legibility were minimal. ---
**Author:** ![jz78817](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jz78817/32/1028_2.png) [@jz78817](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jz78817)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2015, 9:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-cursive-dying/701072/92 "2015-04-15T09:14:58Z")
> [@Dr.Strangelove](#): > > The pro-cursive contingent continues to state–without evidence–that cursive is faster than print. > > [The data says otherwise](http://www.researchgate.net/publication/240538622_The_Relationship_Between_Handwriting_Style_and_Speed_and_Legibility). Between manuscript, mostly-manuscript, mostly-cursive, and cursive, cursive was the _slowest_. Mostly-manuscript was the fastest. Differences in legibility were minimal. None of that matters. The only reason we’re talking about this now is because a bunch of old fucks believe that the way things were when they were kids was perfect and should never change. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Strangelove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr.strangelove/32/6613_2.png) [@Dr.Strangelove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Strangelove)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2015, 10:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-cursive-dying/701072/93 "2015-04-15T10:46:32Z")
> [@jz78817](#): > > None of that matters. The only reason we’re talking about this now is because a bunch of old fucks believe that the way things were when they were kids was perfect and should never change. I was forced to learn cursive and have no wish to inflict it on others. I had the random thought that the real value in cursive was with quill pens, which are fragile and tend to leave a blob every time you touch it to the paper. Perhaps I’m insane, and we aren’t actually teaching kids how to write with a technique developed for avian writing technology. And yet Wikipedia backs up my speculation: _The origin of the cursive method is associated with practical advantages of writing speed and infrequent pen lifting to accommodate the limitations of the quill. Quills are fragile, easily broken, and will spatter unless used properly. Steel dip pens followed quills; they were sturdier, but still had some limitations. The individuality of the provenance of a document was a factor also, as opposed to machine font.[2]_ I will accept that cursive is perhaps superior when used with writing instruments in use 1500 years ago. PS: I collect spores, molds, and fungus. ---
**Author:** ![Ms\_Boods](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/5e9695/32.png) [@Ms\_Boods](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ms_Boods)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2015, 2:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-cursive-dying/701072/94 "2015-04-15T14:14:23Z")
When I taught at university in America (up through 2012): 99% of the kids only printed (and almost exclusively in pencil). The ones who wrote in cursive all came from private or Catholic school backgrounds. The printer-students couldn’t write as fast or as much when it came to taking notes or writing out exams as their 1980s-90s counterparts, and would frequently alert me to their agonies by clutching and wringing out their writing hands. Students complained that they couldn’t read my comments if I wrote in cursive – not that I have bad handwriting, but because most of them simply couldn’t puzzle out cursive letters. No, I didn’t switch to print because when you’re marking 100 essays 3x a semester, you stick to the faster method of writing. I also worked for the ESL programme at my university, and those students were taught to write in English only with printing, and were fascinated with joined-up letters. Lecturing at university the past three years in the UK: about an even mix of print and cursive, more cursive than printing (and rarely in pencil). No complaints about me writing comments in cursive (although they did complain mightily about colleagues who had horrendous handwriting). We’re starting the switchover to typed commentary on assessments anyway, although exams are still hand marked.) ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2015, 5:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-cursive-dying/701072/95 "2015-04-16T17:22:25Z")
> [@percypercy](#): > > If(when) they stop teaching cursive, there’s going to be thousands of documents people won’t be able to read including The Declaration of Independence. So what? The vast majority of Americans can’t read the Bible, either, but that doesn’t seem to stop them. ---
**Author:** ![Kenm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/bc79bd/32.png) [@Kenm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kenm)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2015, 6:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-cursive-dying/701072/96 "2015-04-16T18:04:25Z")
> [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](#): > > Abfolutely. I’ve read the long ƒ rules a few times but can never remember. Only in the middle of a word or in proper nouns or only after a short ƒ or something, and not in a proper noun or in a proper noun or during a full moon on Tueƒdays. I wonder how many 18th-century kids were caned and forced to stand in the rain while cutting quills for fucking it up. ---
**Author:** ![trupa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/aeb1de/32.png) [@trupa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/trupa)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2015, 5:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-cursive-dying/701072/97 "2015-04-28T05:02:02Z")
46 year old dad checking in. I went to a catholic elementary school in French in Montreal. We never even learned printing. Palmer cursive was taught in pencil from grades 1 to 3, and using a cheap cartridge Schaeffer fountain pen from grades 3 to 6. (Yes, the blue end of the eraser does erase ink: fountain pen ink). In fact, I taught myself to print when my son was in grade 1, just for fun, and so I could progress along with him. I use printing now when I write on white-boards or label things by hand. I’m also in the middle of going back to school with a bunch of 20-something class-mates (just finished first year of paramedic school). I take extensive lecture notes as part a learning process that works well for me. I use cursive just for speed. Well, about one third of my class can’t read my notes. The rest think it’s quaint and amusing. Part of the “old guy” shtick. ---
**Author:** ![Kenm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/bc79bd/32.png) [@Kenm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kenm)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2015, 5:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-cursive-dying/701072/98 "2015-04-28T05:07:59Z")
> [@trupa](#): > > I use cursive just for speed. Well, about one third of my class can’t read my notes. The rest think it’s quaint and amusing. Part of the “old guy” shtick. I wonder what they’d think of shorthand. ---
**Author:** ![Whatever4](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/f04885/32.png) [@Whatever4](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whatever4)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2015, 2:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-cursive-dying/701072/99 "2015-04-29T02:47:12Z")
> [@Ambivalid](#): > > I think it’s already dead. [dabs eyes with dainty linen hanky edged in lace] Now no one will want my dip pens and inkwells when I’m gone. Life is too cruel. [seeks solace from glass of elderberry wine] ---
**Author:** ![Miss\_Spaulding](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7ba0ec/32.png) [@Miss\_Spaulding](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miss_Spaulding)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2015, 2:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-cursive-dying/701072/100 "2015-04-29T02:52:17Z")
> [@Mathematics](#): > > OK so I’m pretty young (only 20) but I went to a traditional Catholic school. I was taught cursive as a script. I was not taught printing at all really past age 7 (of course I’ve picked it up from reading books and such though). > > This is really starting to bum me out. I really like my handwriting but a lot of my peers can’t read it. And younger kids especially act like it’s my fault for having bad handwriting. Umm, no, my handwriting is not bad by any means. You just haven’t learned cursive. > > I don’t know what to do because I hate the look of printing and I haven’t developed an attractive handwriting in that style. I really don’t want to change but I feel like in 10 years, I’ll be even more of a relic of the past trying to get people to adapt to my antiquated script. > > I know this is the most trivial post ever but what do you think about this situation? Also, are your kids learning cursive at school? This is by no means a trivial post. And I would seriously advise you to keep up your cursive handwriting regardless of whether or not your generation (and the ones to come) can read it. Why? Because you’re not the problem…the education system is. And it’s utterly failing our kids/teens on a massive scale. Thank God I was homeschooled! Keep up your cursive and encourage anyone you can to learn it. People make excuses now that cursive really doesn’t matter. It should matter! And I pity anyone who cannot wrap their mind around that. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-cursive-dying/701072.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-cursive-dying/701072.md?page=6)