On Christmas day when I was six, I eagerly ran downstairs to open my presents. I’d been told that I was going to get something (I think it was my first bicycle — we were living in Florida at the time, so Christmas weather wouldn’t pose a problem to immediate enjoyment). I got to the end of my presents without finding it. I was terribly disappointed, but then my parents pointed out a piece of paper taped to the inside of the front door. It was a note, and I excitedly tore it down.
It was written in cursive.
My mother read it to me. She said it was from Santa, something like he was going to bring it to me, but the elves hadn’t finished making it yet. But I was suspicious, because she said it with the tone of voice that she always uses when she’s teasing me, and of course I didn’t know the obvious reason she’d be teasing me at that point. I was in the first grade, and cursive wasn’t taught until at least the third grade, so I had no way to verify that she wasn’t making it all up. They could’ve taped any paper on the door and I wouldn’t have been able to tell the difference. Wouldn’t Santa have known that I couldn’t read cursive yet?
That’s what I was reminded of when I read this.
I’m of two minds on it. On one hand, future generations will have trouble reading the writing of the past. On the other, this is the twenty-first century — there isn’t a lot of need to hand-write anything, and there will be even less in time. Typing is even faster than cursive, and speaking (once voice recognition reaches true maturity) faster still.
In fact, as noted in the article, the only place where handwriting is still important is in signatures. There’s some concern about the security of handwritten signatures being compromised by the lack of handwriting skill, but security guru Bruce Schneier disagrees. I guess we’ll see who’s right, though I suspect Schneier has a more valid point.