Let's Discuss.
Type Matters
The Rhetoricity of Letterforms
(A Book Review by Michelle Widger)
Edited by:
Christopher Scott Wyatt and
Danielle Nicole DeVoss
Parlor Press,​ 2018
www.parlorpress.com
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INTRODUCTION
Type Matters: The Rhetoricity of Letterforms edited by Christopher Scott Wyatt and Dànielle Nicole DeVoss provides in-depth history, research, and cultural reactions to the matters of type and the explorations of why type matters. Type Matters is a collaboration of various histories and research projects that investigate the visual, rhetorical and cultural meaning of type. From historical characteristics and layers of typography to the technological advancements that incorporate print and various type forms, co-editors Wyatt and DeVoss demonstrate in this pioneering collection how understanding typography and its visual impact creates and conveys meaning.
Wyatt and DeVoss gathered and explained this collection to focus on type and type matters illustrating that typography symbolizes cultural significance, possesses personality traits, generates rhetorical responses, and can produce change. From Googles newest serif logo to comic books on up to evaluating typography and technology via video games – Wyatt and Devoss combine and evaluate the research of letterforms, type as content, the development of various fonts and logos to discover the significant cultural motivations and reactions that took place to and through typography throughout history. Through the use of rhetoric, Type Matters connects the study of type and the field of design to overcome the historical theory of “transparent text” to expand designers, students and scholars’ knowledge of the rhetoricity of typography, the command of letters and shapes, and its far-reaching cultural influence.
The thesis of the book: The co-editors Wyatt and DeVoss are trying to prove -- that contrary to traditional, widespread belief that type in design is invisible or even one-dimensional -- type and type selection matters. It matters in the message, to society, to cultures, and to the meaning of the printed or digital work to convey specific rhetorical meaning. As I have worked in the design industry for almost 30 years and have taught in the design field at a university-level, I have always known this to be true. What I have found fascinating are all the stories that have illustrated the rich history and conveyed the importance of the meaning of type and the process of selecting the type. This book is an in-depth study of the meaning of typography and what it has meant to society both rhetorically and culturally.
The co-editors of Christopher Scott Wyatt and Dànielle Nicole Devoss do an excellent job of gathering an in-depth collection of rhetorical research articles on type and the matters of type. Some of the themes that resonate throughout the book are: Type matters, type is cultural, type conveys persona, people have specific perceptions regarding type, type has evolved, type has merged into the message, type provides choices, type links to our past and engages our future, type portrays ethics and ideologies, type can unify us, type can illustrate our histories, type provides community and social action, technologies of standardized type has changed the rhetorical message, and kinetic type can convey specific rhetorical messages. These collections of fourteen different chapters, stories, histories, research, theories, and solutions fit together nicely within the concept to convey the unified message that type matters.
Book’s Contents:
Gathering multiple varied stories of typography from the disappearance of Dove Type in 1916 to the Simon Garfield published “Just My Type” in 2011 achieving bestselling non-fiction list status to the invention of technologies that changed font usage -- Wyatt and DeVoss explore the matters of type to argue their discovery through fourteen chapters that type matters. The journey completed for more than 550 years from the histories through the present toward the future of typography DeVoss and Wyatt illustrate how “Every typeface itself carries memories, moments, and ideological underpinnings … to make academic, scientific, and policy arguments more accessible.” (Wyatt and DeVoss, Introduction) Although typography and its selection have always been a part of the design process, most view typography as though it were ideally invisible taking the forms and shapes of letters for granted. Emphasizing the rhetorical act of selecting a font family or the decision to use hand-lettering, Wyatt and DeVoss explain and illustrate how we “attribute meaning to the design choices made by lettering artists, typographers, and the designers … to make-meaning happen iconographically, photographically, and via other visual means,” (Wyatt and DeVoss, 2017, Introduction).
Chapter 1. On Type and Typographic Anatomy, Christopher Scott Wyatt
TYPE MATTERS: While initially there were only three typefaces, typography has grown to encompass thousands of typographical choices resulting in the same amount of cultural meanings. From shapes of letters to classifications of types, Christopher Scott Wyatt explores type’s rhetorical nature which is regularly overlooked by writers and readers who consider typography as invisible. Wyatt reflects on how typographical standards are presented as norms even with scholarly papers. From letterforms to how typographical names establish meaning through representations, this collection looks into expectations of typography conveying that type means something and, ultimately, type matters.
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CHAPTERS
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Chapter 2. Type Reveals Culture: A Defense of “Bad” Type, Garrett W. Nichols
TYPE IS CULTURAL: During this chapter displayed in Comic Sans typography, Garrett W. Nichols discusses the relationship between type and culture. Looking at it from three angles, Nichols discusses the criticisms of design and usages of “bad” typography, what those criticisms say about us as a culture, and the strategic usages of “bad” typography. Type surrounds us and yet, is invisible. Garrett discovers how typography reflects and expresses culture; even revealing it. Meaning the limits, we place on type reflects the limits we place on our culture. Garrett argues that the negative reactions to “bad” type reveal more about our cultural biases and character rather than the worth of the type itself. Garrett urges us to view type choices as purposeful acknowledging what it says about the people who use it and read it. The use of “bad” type may also mean a rhetorical or tactical form of resistance to power.
Chapter 3. “Give Us Back Our Serifs”: The Cultural Rhetoric of Rage Against the [New] Google Logo, Philip Rice
TYPE PERCEPTIONS (SERIF VS. SAN SERIF): During this chapter, Philip Rice concentrates on September 1, 2015, when Google changed the typography of its logo from a serif to a sans serif typeface which sparked a movement toward corporate logo simplicity. Google’s change invoked many various reactions both in favor of and against proving that the look of a logo matters and people do care about design. This collection explores the reactions, how serifs verses san serifs are perceived, and what the reaction reveals in regards to the underlying value systems in society. Citing a study from 2012 where Errol Morris found that serif typefaces conveyed the highest believability rate in typography theorizing that because they look and, in fact, are older they are more official somehow. In reality, the reaction was not necessarily just to the change in logo, but in the perception of change in trustworthiness due to the change in the logo.
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Chapter 4. The Development of Typeface Personas and the Consequences of Perceived Identities, Heather Noel Turner
TYPEFACE PERSONA: In this chapter, Heather Noel Turner reviews research on typeface persona that is found to be culturally produced with socially positioned personalities. Turner’s goal is to illustrate that letterforms and typefaces possess and convey cultural meaning. Again, the hatred for the use of Comic Sans demonstrates that it is a font that portrays characteristics associated with lack of privilege, design knowledge, and taste. Turner finds that designers are urged to select typefaces based on research rather than intuition. The movement toward mechanical looking typefaces away from handwritten seems to create a type of “typographic erasure,” (Heather Noel Turner, 2017, page 94). Turner suggests that since typeface’s western personas are deeply dependent on cultural knowledge, experience, and context – studying them would illustrate that design and typography are culturally embedded matters. Study of cultural work that used to be done verbally is now realized through color, layout, and typography. Turner suggests that “Considering type personas illustrates subtle ways in which design contributes to issues of power and oppression through embedded and attributed meaning,” (Heather Noel Turner, 2017, page 96). Turner recommends that we need to be cognoscente to intentionally recognize visual aspects, their rhetoric, and their relationships with one another. Turner assesses that further research needs to be completed to evaluate the results of raced, gendered and classed typography in addition to questioning how these personas and cultural identities are established and disseminated. Turner raises the question how can design be taught without acknowledging students’ typographical learned experiences or their typographical cultural identities. Turner emphasizes that it would be wise to no longer teach with the assumptions that typefaces convey identical meanings to all students and cultures.
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Chapter 5. Nostalgia for Handwriting: The Rhetoric of Comics Lettering, Aaron Kashtan
TYPE EVOLUTION: Throughout this section, Aaron Kashtan uses comic books as an illustration of the evolution of type. Sharing his nostalgia for handwritten type, Kashtan uses comic books as an illustrative tool because it is one of the last bastions to still utilize hand created lettering over mechanical lettering. Kashtan points out that most scholars neglect the lettering in comics because it is principally designed to be ignored as it is created with visual homogeneity cohesively placing both artwork and lettering on the same visual plane as one. Kashtan denotes that handwriting can be a “gateway to the soul, a physical expression of what is personal or idiosyncratic about the writer,” (page 118). Kashtan notes that while comics use digital lettering, they try to appear handwritten, but in reality, the digital lettering violates the illusion of handwrittenness. Using digital technology to create comics severs the visual connection of artwork and lettering. The chapter ends with a diatribe regarding the comeback or use of handwritten lettering over the “cold, sleek, digital environment.” (Aaron Kashtan, 2017, page 131). Many have tried to digitally emulate handwritten type while few have been able to do so.
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Chapter 6. “All Your Font Are Belong to Us”: Gaming in the Late Age of Print Elizabeth Fleitz
TYPOGRAPHICAL CONVERGENCE: During this chapter, Elizabeth Fleitz researches the 2013 iOS game Type:Rider, a video game that takes a player through the history of type from its cuneiform beginnings all the way to the digital era of typography. Throughout the game, players control a colon that jumps and rolls over alphabetical letterforms gathering facts around each typeface design era. As players engage in video games, they need both literacies of text and the game to be successful. Fleitz discusses how typographical letterforms become images that evolve into the physical game space. Fleitz emphasizes how the game deconstructs the letterforms to resist interpretation and deconstruct meanings while converging function, form, and the player throughout the typographical subject. Throughout the chapter, Fleitz researches the meaning behind the written versus the communicated wondering which is more effective in achieving meaning. Focusing on design and content, Fleitz agrees with Marshall McLuhan that “the medium is the message.” (Elizabeth Fleitz, 2017, page 144)
Chapter 7. Why I Hate Times New Roman, and Other Confessions of a Creative-Critical Scholar, Ames Hawkins
TYPE CHOICES: Throughout this chapter, Ames Hawkins devotes this chapter to the loathing of Times New Roman and all for which it stands. Ames was a graduate student when he realized this fact. His hatred stems from the generic Times New Roman selected by Microsoft Word as the original font with which to write. Developed by Stanley Morison in 1929 for the British newspaper, Times of London, it culturally was intended for a more exclusive audience and not for the masses. As Ames puts it, “It was liberating to reject something that had before this moment felt so entirely fixed. The idea that I could make a choice … ” (Ames, 2017, page 160). Around this time, Ames started questioning his gender along with the use of type. Feeling stuck in the social norms, he felt he had no choice. However, realizing he had both a choice of typography and his body became liberating thus proving that letterforms and typefaces can be powerfully visible, beautiful elements of composition and design.
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Chapter 9. Jan Tschichold’s Renunciation of Die Neue Typographie: The Anatomy and Ethics of a Typographical Reversal, David Bedsole
TYPE ETHICS: Throughout this chapter, David Bedsole tries to answer the questions, can type be fascist or unethical? How can we look at typography from an ethical or unethical point of view? The chapter starts with the irony of Jan Tschichold’s 1964 article where he renounces his 1928 typographical ideas as too closely aligned with Third Reich ideology. Through recapturing the background of Bauhaus, modernism, and Tschichold’s theories, Bedsole tries to justify how typography can be ethical, ideological and even rhetorical. Bedsole solves the questions with a reality, “the question is not whether we can praise or blame a typeface, but whether the affordances and constraints of any technology point to ethical or unethical uses.” (David Bedsole, 2017, page 223). Bedsole emphasizes his point by deducing that we do not behave as though type were without ethics and ideology or transparent as argued throughout the book. This collection discusses a variety of instances where researchers argue that a type is left-leaning even using the left-leaning type to engage a specific audience segment unfairly. Most notably, Bedsole argues that we look at typefaces rather than through, ideologies will emerge. While the chapter begins with theorizing Tschichold’s reaction to the internet with its use of Bauhaus to be better, faster more user-friendly – it ends with the optimism of a web-promised democracy where information becomes more widely accessible
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Chapter 10: Typographic Nationalism and the Banal Uniformity of Imagined Communities, Jake Cowan
TYPE AS UNIFICATION: In this chapter, Jake Cowan attempts to uncover how typography and the written word shaped nationalism. While he argues this would work for all nations, Cowan specifically looks at the United States using specific historical and factual instances of the use of exclusivist font and the written word to distinguish the “typographic nationalism” or create “imaginary” feelings of community. Cowan argues that a typeface can enhance cohesion in a diverse population by making the solidarity more readily felt. Through vernacular, road signs, and the printed word – territories are marked and felt as if on a map which produces a sense of unification among strangers even though there is a potential that technology may change this unification. Throughout the chapter, Cowan stresses that public uniformity and “homogenous, empty time” is created by letterforms and the rapid spreading of information that makes typography matter for nationhood.
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Chapter 12: Font of Wisdom: The Vernacular Rhetoric of the Serenity Prayer, William T. FitzGerald
TYPE AS COMMUNITY: Starting with a story of the World War II-era British poster, “Keep Calm and Carry On” discovered in the year 2000 and reproduced on “every conceivable two-dimensional surface,” (William FitzGerald, 2017, page 283). Researcher, William FitzGerald, analyzes the text written by theologian Reinhold Niebuhr (1892-1971) entitled the “Serenity Prayer” as the most reproduced text on the planet, even emphasizing that the text wants to be displayed. FitzGerald poses the question as to why the Serenity Prayer is so re- and mass-produced. The chapter is illustrated with various displays of the “Serenity Prayer” including a tattooed arm. Read rather than heard, FitzGerald discovers that the “Serenity Prayer” is best understood as a phenomenon of linguistic rhetoric and social action that promotes a cohesive community through everyday communications and shared values.
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Chapter 13: Standardized Typography in Interactive Internet Environments, John R. Gallagher and Rebecca Tarsa
TYPE IN THE DIGITAL ENVIRONMENT: John Gallagher and Rebecca Tarsa explore digital technologies and what the standardized typography (ST) within the realm of the interactive, template-driven internet and what it means to both writers and readers. In this in-depth research, Gallagher and Tarsa explore strengths and weaknesses of standardized text in the digital environment and its effect on the rhetorical message via Facebook and Tumblr. Providing a background to standardized typography in the twentieth century, the authors discuss the concept of flat design in technologies. Identifying miscommunication, misconceptions of identity and reduction of rhetorical options as potential weaknesses in communicating with standardized typography are minor compared to the potential for interactive, digital environments. Gallagher and Tarsa discover that although the internet reduces rhetorical communication options, it is standardized, “shared” typography can enhance communication for both readers and writers while providing a shared sense of purpose.
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Chapter 14: Kinetic Typography: Reinserting Embodies Delivery into Recorded Oral Texts, Christal Seahorn, Diana I. Bowen, Charles Jeffery Darwin, and Dragana Djordjevic
TYPE IN MOTION: Within this final chapter, the authors Christal Seahorn, Diana I. Bowen, Charles Jeffery Darwin, and Dragana Djordjevic explore kinetic (or movable) type and its rhetorical nature. Analyzing various movable-type videos selected from YouTube, the authors' research frequency, function, and the impact of motion behaviors. In the absence of non-verbal cues, the authors argue that kinetic type is visually expressive and provides the condition for representational action required for rhetorical communication. The authors examine global and local kinetic type movement behaviors to propose a four-part theory for rhetorical communication. The input dimensions of oral, motion and typography complement each other to create meaning. Kinetic phrases and words remain after vanishing to extend their visualization. Moving text enhances legibility and readability. The transformation of individual letterforms extends and enhances the text end-coding.
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Chapter 8. Why Bookerly Isn’t (and Why That’s Not Such a Terrible Thing), John Logie
LINKING TYPE PAST AND FUTURE: Throughout this chapter, John Logie examines the typeface Bookerly which was created by the Dalton Maag Foundry in 2014 for the Amazon Kindle e-readers in an attempt to emulate the perfect paragraphs created by typography in printed books. Not only does Logie delve into the makings of Bookerly as a humanistic type form, but he examines the screen-reading experience and how it shapes reader’s perceptions. Logie indicates that while Bookerly is trying to capture the print-reading experience, it is not the fonts, but the modern print-book’s artistry by which it is inspired. Based upon Ellen Lupton’s 2010, Thinking With Type writings, Logie argues that today’s typefaces can be traced back chronologically and culturally as shapers to the European Renaissance as typography points back to the ancient Roman era. Lupton and Logie agree that graphic designers wield typography as an essential rhetorical resource to respond to a situation or specific audience to achieve a direct reaction. While Bookerly was created to superficially resemble humanist type, Logie empirically states, “It is not meant to be used as a print typeface.” (John Logie, 2017, page 205). Just as Gutenberg’s movable type and printing press provided access to information and knowledge not previously granted, Logie acknowledges that Booklery will engage the future of digitally expedited reading spaces.
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Strengths
This book would be an excellent read for an upper-level rhetoric student who wants to know more about typography. Students and faculty alike would learn matters such as the true dimensional aspects of typography and their meaning. Throughout teaching design class, I will never look at Comic Sans in the same way again. It provides a rich historical in-depth look at the evolution of a message and the meaning behind type and type forms. Why there is a hatred for the typeface Comic Sans and the message that conveys to social norms. That type and logotypes can tell a comprehensive history of society and changes within corporations and cultures. It is clear now that communities are not just illustrated via a map but with languages, rhetorical writing, and vernacular synchronicities. From the fun, colorful chapter introduction pages to the color-coded numeration to a whole chapter set in Comic Sans, this book is designed in an entertaining, vibrant way that makes the chapters pop, provides whimsical easy reading and engages the reader to prove the co-editors’ point once again, that type matters.
Strengths & Weaknesses
Weaknesses
One thing I found challenging in discussing the book is that the authors do not distinguish between type, typography, fonts, and typefaces. However, after reading the text, I wonder if it is just my cultural implication to want to distinguish between that and not necessarily needed. While I understand the implication of the book’s name -- there is another book by the name of Type Matters which poses a challenge when Googling the book. While this book contained a wealth of information regarding typography, I kept wondering would I use this in a design classroom setting. I would argue this book is more for the rhetorical study of conveying a message then the design student. While I learned some insightful information regarding type selection and the conveyance of the message that it sends, I do not know if it offers design solutions as to more of a thought-provoking query into what type means and how does it convey a message. Much was discussed in regards to rhetorical message behind typography selection completely leaving out design elements within font readability, (i.e, paragraph length, contrast on color, etc.,). While the co-editors did an excellent job of conveying their message in typography, I wanted more pictures or examples of how type matters.
Chapter 11: Logotypes in Place: A Visual Rhetorical History of Cigar City, Meredith A. Johnson, Peter Cannon, Roxanna Palmer, Joshua M. Rea, and Tanya Zarlengo
TYPE AS PLACES AND PEOPLE: The authors of this chapter take the cultural Mecca in Florida that is Ybor City analyzing cigar logotypes to illustrate the conveyance of technological, social and material expressions of origin of culture and place that is the National Historic Landmark District. The authors Meredith Johnson, Peter Cannon, Roxanna Palmer, Joshua Rea, and Tanya Zarlengo then explain how the logotype manifestations have the perspective to exercise shared stimulus on the locations and cultures in which they ascended. They demonstrate how deconstructing logotypes can provide insight or typographic artifact into the construction and reflection of the people and places within a situational, historical context. Through analyzing the typographical formation of the cigar logotypes, the authors provide much-needed dimensions into the rich Latin histories, economic conditions, social practices, and political alliances rendering life and dimensions into the logotypes.
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CONCLUSION
In summary, there have been many books written on visual rhetoric and design that focus on design elements such as white space, alignment, proximity and repetition. However, most all of them pertain to graphics that could potentially impact viewers and readers. While some focus on font selection to convey a message, most see typography as invisible or part of the communication. Rarely do typographical design books discuss the impact that typography, font shapes, and logotypes have on the subconscious, cultural, and rhetoricity of the message in our society as do the co-editors of Christopher Scott Wyatt and Dànielle Nicole Devoss do. This collection of fourteen different chapters, stories, histories, research, theories, and solutions fit together nicely to convey the unified message that letterforms make a deep difference impact as ingrained on our society and type truly does matter.
Picture from:
Michelle Widger's Personal Collection
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ABOUT CO-EDITOR: Christopher Scott Wyatt
Christopher Scott Wyatt earned undergraduate degrees in English education and print journalism at the University of Southern California. He later completed a master of arts, with distinction, in English Composition Theory and Rhetoric at California State University in Fresno.
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Wyatt completed his graduate degree at the University of Minnesota and earned a doctorate in Rhetoric, Scientific and Technical Communication, specializing in instructional technology and students with cognitive challenges. Wyatt is currently a writer, editor, and consultant for Tameri Publications in Visalia, California where he supervises fiction and non-fiction editing and consulting; conducts writing and editing seminars; prepares pre-press layouts; designs and writes content for various multimedia presentations; and advises in-house publishing departments. For a full list of Wyatt’s education, teaching experiences, industry knowledge, publications, appearances, honors, and organizations – visit his website at link.
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ABOUT THE CO-EDITOR: Danielle Nicole Devoss
Dànielle Nicole Devoss is a Professor of Professional Writing, Associate Chair and Director of Graduate Programs, and William J. Beal Distinguished Professor for the Department of Writing, Rhetoric, and American Cultures for the College of Arts and Letters at Michigan State University.
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Devoss inexhaustible research includes computer and technological literacies; digital-visual rhetorics; social and cultural entrepreneurship; innovation and creativity; and intellectual property issues in digital space. Devoss productive work appears in College English; Computers and Composition; Kairos: A Journal of Rhetoric, Technology, and Pedagogy; and Pedagogy: Critical Approaches to Teaching Literature, Language, Composition, and Culture.
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Devoss has co-edited several books including Digital Writing Research: Technologies, Methodologies, and Ethical Issues (2007, Hampton Press), which won the 2007 Computers and Composition Distinguished Book Award. She also co-edited Technological Ecologies and Sustainability, the first title to be published by Computers and Composition Digital Press, the first digital press in the U.S. with a university press imprint.
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In addition, Devoss is collaborating on several collections of essay writings and research projects that include: Making Space: Writing Instruction, Infrastructure, and Multiliteracies; Digital Rhetoric Collaborative; Type Matters: The Rhetoricity of Letterforms; and Explanation Points: Publishing in Rhetoric and Composition. She has also authored and co-authored numerous articles and chapters exploring technology, literature, critical theory, science, and cognition. For a full list of publications, digital text resources, full-text articles, and links to her blog and lectures, visit her website.
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