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For the purposes of research, and because I’m attempting to be more than a wallflower on Facebook, I asked my friends some questions about their handwriting.  I found the responses interesting, varied, and thoughtful.  My first post read, “I’m curious:  How frequently do you write by hand versus typing?  When you do write by hand, do you use cursive, print, or a combination of both?  Is your signature the only thing you consistently write in cursive?”  Here’s what they said:

CC – I only write by hand in my journal or for short notes anymore.  My handwriting is a stylized combo of print and cursive with big vertical swooshes and a deep imprinting with the pen.

LU – I only write my signature in cursive.  I have been printing since in Jr. High.  My cursive looks like a 2^nd graders because I never practiced beyond grade school.

EB – don’t really use cursive anymore, too slow, too easily a scribble.  I write a lot cuz I’m into lists and sometimes I journal.  It’s easier for me to chicken scratch my thoughts and then type them out.  A Luddite at heart I am really into my clipboards.

TB – Touch screens, printish notes, Dr. Scribble siggy

AL – I write almost as much as I type, and I write in cursive most of the time!  Great question, though… I had never stopped to consider this

EH – I handwrite often: lists, notes, and lots at work and it’s pretty much all upper case letters (my dad and my dad’s dad also are full upper case users)…

NN – I was an all caps girl for years and years, then went mostly to print with the typewriter a’s and crossed q’s, and now write in a mix of cursive and print.  My a’s are still typewriter a’s, and the words are often broken up mid word, half cursive and half print.  Not nearly as pretty and ledgible funny to think how much it’s changed.

NN – Legible, I meant!  And it’s definitely not as neat as it once was… I love to write, though.  I love the tactile feel of it.  Being so connected to the words.  But I must say, I’ve noticed I write much better, in general, on the computer.  Don’t know for sure why…  I enjoyed thinking about this one…

I posted this the next day, “I’m finishing a research paper on handwriting.  Thanks for your input.  Anyone else want to put in their two cents about writing by hand or typing?  Cursive or print?”

AA – Mostly cursive, it’s faster.  If I really need another person to be able to read what I wrote, I will generally print.  I write by hand a lot more than I type and print.

AE – I type everything!  It is sad how horrible my handwriting has gotten!  Schools are barely teaching cursive to kids anymore…it seems crazy to think how much it all has changed.

MV – I think schools need to scrap teaching cursive and start teaching kids how to write code.

CM – I believe in handwriting… it hopefully will not be a lost art one day.  I love to write cursive and just recently began subbing in a 3^rd grade classroom.  I had to reteach myself a few 🙂

TH – Cool topic… With the exceptions of my signature (which is a complete bastardization of cursive writing and line art) applications, forms, love letters, sticky notes, grocery lists, greeting cards and journal entries, I type everything.  When I do write, it’s small and in all caps (same with my Dad), and never in cursive.  I find that when there is a necessity for immediacy or emotion, it’s almost always hand-written.

CG – I’ve always loved cursive as an art form and personally prefer using it when not typing… though I sign all of my metal artworks with big bold blocky capital letters welded onto the surface.  It’s very difficult to get clean cursive lines out of a welding gun!

EP – I like handwriting and tend to write in a combination of printing & cursive (specifically, I don’t like cursive b’s, z’s, and q’s) 😉

KD –I hand write personal letters, script/cursive… jotting down notes is definitely a combination… formal papers and such, just go right to typing

DT – cursive for speed and journaling, printing for legibility, and typing is the fastest and least tiring for my hands.  I like a mix of cursive and print ‘cuz a handwriting analyst once told me that shows hemispheric lateralization.  Ouch!

What about you?  Do you prefer typing, cursive or print?

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This week in the History of Publishing class, we had a special guest speaker. Samantha Niemeyer is an SOU alumn from 2011 and is currently working as a copywriter for Fire Mountain Gems.I had never heard much about what copywriting entailed. Samanthat gave a definition.

Copyright: writing with the purpose to sell.

I was surprised when I heard this definition (the one I gave is shortened), and immediately began to consider the different ways that writing and marketing can converge under such parameters.

According to Samantha, the most enjoyable form of copywriting is called Editorial Copy. This kind of copywriting includes: articles, tutorials, blogs, types of writing that teaches potential customers how to do somehting, and usually shows a customer how to use the product and convince them it is worth buying.

Samantha also shared some details about the logistics of her work. Apparently, Samantha and several other writers receive writing assignments (prompts) from their boss, who provides some detail and factual information. From there, the writers are expected to craft an article that will be published under their boss’s name.

At this point in her presentation, I asked Samantha what the differences are between copywriting and ghostwriting. In my mind, they seemed like the same basic thing. Samantha said that the real discerning feature between the two types of writing is their expectations. For example, people expect marketing and copywriting to be deceitful to some degree. Otherwise, how could anyone sell anything? So, people have to assume a degree of dishonesty is somewhere in the recipe when they are chewing on copywritten things. Ghostwriting on the other hand does not have the expectation of dishonesty. People understand that ghostwritten things are not meant to sell something necessarily, but are mostly informative and written by a hired helper.

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Audio books are popular as ever, and they make for great entertainment, but as far as I am concerned, it’s not reading. It drives me crazy when someone says they have read a particular book, when in reality, all they’ve done is listened to it. I mean, society as a whole doesn’t consider watching a movie based on a book as reading, so why should listening be much different?

My main argument is simply this: reading and listening are different skills. In all my teaching classes I’ve been told when making a lesson plan to be sure to address the four different skills; reading, writing, listening and speaking. I’ve found too that this also applies when learning a second language. And while there is certainly some crossover between the aforementioned skills, each one is its own animal. Take learning a foreign language for example. Just because you can look at a word and recognize its meaning (aka read), does not mean that you will understand the word if you only hear it and vice versa.

When it comes to audio books, many argue that it should be considered reading because you still have to apply critical thinking to what you are hearing, as well as understand the spoken words and make meaning from them. However, there are many holes in this logic. For one, by this philosophy, a simple conversation could then be considered “reading”. However, no one would ever even think of conversations as reading.

The dictionary definition of reading is “to look at carefully so as to understand the meaning of something written or printed” (Dictionary.com). By this definition, to read something is to look at the written component of a language and create meaning from the symbols. When you listen to an audio book, there is nothing to look at and infer meaning from…unless you want to count looking at the case cover.

Don’t get me wrong, audio books are great. Just don’t tell me it’s reading.

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Here are the non-words for May and today we begin month six! And thanks to Leroy Fulwiler, Kim D C Harper and Wilkins-O’Riley Zinn for their non-word contributions.

As you know—or maybe don’t—I try to curate the non-words by looking up the possible non-words to see if they are already in use as words. One of the surprising benefits of this has been to learn about some words that I didn’t know existed. Among them are tain, swelt, adject, smatter, inutile, acquittance, cessant, and wakelessness (this last one used by Emily Dickinson).

tridecadedication is a long non-word made up to recognize Steve Larvick and doug Kirby on their 30 years (each) of service at Southern Oregon University. I made an effort this month to add some very short non-words and to include an auxiliary verb. And I used thecal even though it exists as a botantical term; the allusion was too good to resist.

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fetonyms, n. words or meanings joined by folk etymology, such as May Day and mayday (from the French word for “help”). 1 May

shoedoo, n. the sticky film that gets on your shoes when you recycle cans or bottles ( w/ apologies to Andy Williams). 2 May

unpalate, v. to cause something to be distasteful, unsavory or unpleasant (backformation from unpalatable). 3 May

sesquipediment, n. a very long word that you have to stop and look up. 4 May

fiesta résistance, n. the ultimate Cinco de Mayo celebration [from pièce de résistance, w/ thanks to Leroy Fulwiler]. 5 May

ish adj. A separated affix meaning about; also, ishness, indicating a state of uncertainty (from Kim D. C. Harper). 6 May

sult, v. to offer one’s unsolicited, uninformed opinion (a clipping of insult plus consult). 7 May

humong, v. to make something much much bigger, to supersupersize (clipping of humongous). 8 May

malastute, adj. lacking shrewdness or perspicaclty about one’s own concerns. 9 May

intimatum, n. a final statement of demands or conditions made by a partner, spouse or other very close friend. 10 May

enfact, v. to assert something untrue, illogical or dubious amidst a cloud of real facts. 11 May

incurate, v. to allow a project to take a life of its own and proceed without acitve tending (from in + curate). 12 May

matrimatrix, n. the biological substance out of which something is formed and by extension a nurturesome environment. 13 May

verkle, v. to expel something from one’s throat, such as a hairball or piece of stuck food (from verklempt). 14 May

nat, v. to begin to natter but catch yourself after the first natterance. 15 May

fauxobey, v. to pretend to obey a rule or law you disagree with while actually ignoring or subverting it. 16 May

myriaddled, adj. having a thousand things to do and not knowing where to begin. 17 May

bafflefog, n. dense cloud of doublespeak, bureaucratese or other incomprehensible language (from Wilkins-O’Riley Zinn). 18 May

whomligan, n. one who misuses the word “whom” where “who” is required grammatically. 19 May

explosition, n. a bursting forth of words, without regard for the conventions of rhetoric or composition. 20 May

deconcile, v. to mutually chill a once amicable relationship. 21 May

wusta, auxiliary verb [woostuh] should have and would have if I had thought of it (“I wusta offered you a ride”). 22 May

philantrophy n. the recognition one receives for a large donation to a building project. 23 May

thecal, adj. of or relating to a master’s thesis. 24 May

roly, adj. obsessive, proselytizing religiousity (shortening of “rolling holy”). 25 May

happenstand, v. to be minding one’s own business when something happens in the immediate vicinity. 26 May

envoguerate, v. to revive a flagging brand; also re-envougerate, meaning to rerebrand. 27 May

commemory, n. a shared recalling of national or group significance, especially embodying sacrifice. 28 May

lococo, adj referring to any contemporary low-brow art which mimics the look of the late Baroque period. 29 May

tridecadedication, n, enduring comitment and dedication to a thirty-year endeavor or enterprise. 30 May

smot, n. a pattern of mottling or a series of irregular spots on fabric or on one’s skin. May 31