Cursive Useless Skill or Not?

[ThatOneComrade 1,091]

 "Page writing, sometimes called body writing, requires the exercise of all the skill we possess in using the pen. Care should be taken in the arrangement of the writing." You have beautiful handwriting! :0 Some of the best I've seen in years!

 

Cursive is hard af when you start out, but when you get into it it's alright. Problem for me is, even though I can write it just fine, I'm far slower in cursive than I am in print. Time is money, and I can't be wasting it on loops and curves. Really, the only reason why I'd need cursive on a daily basis is for my signature. Otherwise, the skill's not that useful. I mean, we live in a time where computers have become major parts of our lives to the point of being addicting. If someone's adamant on writing cursive, there's a font for that.

 

It's sad that cursive's beginning to go "extinct," but at the rate technology is going, I wouldn't be surprised if twenty years from now there's a generation of kids who don't even know what cursive is.

[TheDashingRainbow 134]

I don't see any use for cursive.. although my writing is mistaken for cursive by nearly everyone who sees it.. as I write in print, but all my letters are connected as I never pick up the pencil while writing a word.

[caramba2654 602]

I learned how to write in cursive. It sucked, but I know how to. The think is, for me to be able to write in proper cursive, I need to have something that scratches the paper, otherwise my hand is gonna slip and it's gonna look bad. 

 

After some time, I started altering some of my letters. I stopped doing the full loop on the G and started doing a much fancier thing instead. My T became separated from the rest of the letters and acquired a small stylish curve at the end. My "an" and "en" are still written in cursive. And I write both the cursive and the print versions. Cursive in stuff like "er" and print in stuff like ""rr".

 

It's basically a weird stylish mix of a really crazy cursive and print alternating type of font... thing.

 

 

But I don't think it's useless. It looks pretty if done right and can look quite fancy when used in certain situations. 

[Moonlight 7,286]

Cursive has no use anymore, it's not a bad skill to have but it's not exactly important either. When you're signing for something odds are a simple scribble of your name works fine than some perfect form of writing. I have trouble reading it personally and I've never found cursive to be all that pretty either unless it looks literally perfect.

[Kapitan zur See Hans (Daz) 883]

I guess you could say it is useless, but really all I write is cursive, I actually have trouble writing in print, not that I forget the letters, but it is very sloppy looking and takes me a lot longer to write. I enjoy cursive, it looks neat, the letters flow into each other making it very easy to write, and you can make it your own, though cursive can look the same at times, there is still a bit of personal flair to it. Most of this is frivolous, but I wouldn't give up writing in cursive as that is what I know and I see nothing wrong with it.

[Christmasy Britty 2,553]

I think cursive is important for things like making signatures on important documents but other than that its not very useful

[DubWolf 17,251]

I lack a good signature. I can't write in cursive too well.

 

I recall having to write some honor code in the SAT (in cursive). It was not so easy .

 

To answer that question, I suppose some people may have value of it, so either you learn that skill, or hope that person who values it isn't your future employer.

Edited January 9, 2015 by SparkWolf

[Orablanco Account 3,707]

I still can't write in cursive to save my life, so I never found much use for it outside of signatures. I appreciate the art of calligraphy and all that jazz, but my regular hand-writing is god awful enough without trying to make it all fancy-like.

Edited January 9, 2015 by CITRUS KING46

[deerkittens 102]

To be honest, I don't think cursive writing is really necessary. What's wrong with your regular style of handwriting?

And signatures don't have to be in cursive right?

[Fleur-De-Lis 350]

Cursive is very important for your signature, I really don't think that has changed yet. (as where I live, print is not a suitable form of a signature). Not all cursive is that ... swirly but it is indeed easy enough to read.

 

"Page writing is sometimes called lady writing. requires in increase in the thrill we possess in using the pen. Care should be taken in the arrangement of writing." I had no struggles reading that cursive in post #1, aside from a few of the r's which were too small and easily missed. It may be a "fancier" version of some one's cursive but it sure isnt as legible!.

 

As for its use, it actually does have one, as believe it or not it does in fact make longer writing assignments easier to deal with (provided your familier with cursive). You generally have less hand fatigue than you would from writing in print (and if proficient enough, you can write faster than you ever could with print; still slower than typing though of course). As for how much use you would get out of that I dont know, because computers are becoming a bigger and bigger thing for assingments and classrooms. But still you shouldn't neglect handwriting because when you do have to use it, you could find yourself in quite the pickle! (especially if you can't read your own writing!)

 

Some professors in college pretty much make cursive a requirement ... or at least i heard that about an upper level english course (so take that with a grain of salt; as its may just be a rumor).

[Invincible 2,091]

There's a certain aesthetic quality to cursive, which adds more of the writer's personality to the written piece, you know? You can learn things about someone from their handwriting (you can tell i'm a huge slob from mine   ).

 

Wish i could master it, really. I'm not a native English speaker of some sort, and Cursive writing isn't taught in schools along with English language.  

[Haruhi-chan 486]

Sadly, I can't write in cursive. So, it is pretty useless for me. Yeah, I should have learned it in school but... the teacher didn't pace herself on teaching me. Plus, I was a very slow learner at the same time as well. :/

[SparklingSquirrels 21,332]

I don't really use it for anything besides my signature, but I can still write in cursive fairly well.

[Ricebug 555]

Nothing besides my signature, and still being in school so some teachers wont take anything except cursive.

 

Plus your writing looks so fancy

[Mutemutt 773]

Honestly, I'd say it's only two uses is in signatures and in making things more difficult to read. That's pretty much it. Yeah, it makes writing an essay or some such, faster but every professor I've had want's the work typed: it's much easier to read. Pretty much every document you ever have to sign also requires you to write your name in print as well. Yeah, some people just have messy handwriting but cursive certainly won't help there.

 

Yeah, I learned how to write cursive; I had to use nothing but cursive for a year or two in school. It's permanently affected my print, some letters being connected by thin lines from not lifting the pen all the way or my "g"s looking like they're in cursive and all the letters having that sort of cursive flow to it. Even with that, I find writing in cursive to be pretty uncomfortable and kind of a nuisance to read really.  

[Tameless 979]

I hardly ever use cursive, but when I do it's nice to know it. Overall it is pretty useless.

[ARagY 1,152]

In Russian you ALWAYS write in cursive Cyrillic. If you don't, well, you're a scrub. #gitrikt #2015toinfinity

 

In Latin script, I write in half-cursive. I don't bother usually with the i's or t's because they take me more time. Also I have one of the rarest writing styles for A. When I'm writing formulas I use the A like on a computer, but when I'm writing stories or something I use the italic-like a. Writing æ is still fun though.

 

So no, I don't think it's a useless skill. I'm unsure of what other countries/languages regulate the use of cursive, but for me it's pretty much been the standard for writing since..forever. Print does have its advantages, though. For one; you don't have to spend so long trying to read someone's sloppy cursive (which I've seen a lot more slop of than print). On the flipside, cursive lets you write faster, is more formal, and to me at least, sooo much less handache than blockier characters.

[Ziltoid the Omniscient 286]

The only reason to use cursive is for signatures. Otherwise print is perfectly fine and probably more appropriate because it's more legible. Nowadays the most important writing aspect is likely your wpm since nearly everything is trying to be 'paperless' these days

[Ashen Pathfinder 16,161]

Copied from the other thread:

 

IIRC, here in West Virgina, cursive isn't really taught much anymore, outside of signatures.

 

I was taught it back in my schooling days (consider this, I'm 28 now XD) and we were taught on how important it was and how colleges would require you to write papers with it.

 

Absolute nonsense.

 

As it stands, it's pretty much lost amongst todays youth. Heck, I don't even remember how to write cursive outside of signatures. >_<

[ARagY 1,152]

 

The reason of signatures of how you write is to prove whatever you do or want is proven by you. It doesn't even need to be perfect, you just write it how you're comfortable with, even if the signature is messy. The hard reading of signatures is the point for people to have difficulty of trying to read your penmanship and copy it from the dot.

If you sign with print, there could be an identity theif who can print your same very name. Copying the penmanship of print is easier than copying the penmanship of signatures.

I feel the the only use of cursive writing should be signatures and signatures only. As I said above, signatures are MEANT to be hard to read, so that an identity thief will have trouble copying it. On other uses, however, may not be as easily recommended, as they tend to be more confusing to read in letter cards than it is to the words in print.

Forensic analysis of signatures is much easier than of print, as I was told.

[Astral Blitzen 469]

I'm always writing in cursive and my cursive is neater than my print and people say I have beautiful writing c:.

[Derplight Sperkle 1,013]

I was taught how to write in cursive back in 4th grade. It was useful to learn how to sign my name, but otherwise was not used at all. My teachers afterwards when always asked said write it in print. So I lost my knowledge of how to write in it except for my signature.

 

In my opinion, cursive is starting to lose its steam. Computers are coming out on top as the go to way to write assignments. I haven't written a paper with my own hands since middle school, which for me has been 8 years (3rd year in college currently). Even if old documents are needed to read, most if not all have already been retyped so reading cursive is also losing its luster.

 

Cursive has its uses, but I find beyond writing your signature, it doesn't have to be a required part of modern curriculum.

[Wyzecat 350]

After having cursive writing crammed down my throat for six years and changing schools, I can say that cursive is totally impractical and nearly useless outside of signatures, which just look like scribbles anyway, and the statement that you have to write before you take the PSAT. I've never been required to write in cursive outside of that school and the PSAT.

[Astral Blitzen 469]

I'm always writing in cursive and my cursive is neater than my print and people say I have beautiful writing c:.

Ill try to get a pic of it sometime

[Noei 718]

In that sense, art is "useless", too. 

 

Shall we only pay attention to "useful things" ? If then, this world would be boring as heck.

 

Maybe cursive is useless, still, it doesn't change the fact that it's beautiful.

Edited January 10, 2015 by Mademoiselle Noel