Cursive

For the Chinese cursive handwriting in calligraphy, see Cursive script (East Asia). For the style of typeface, see Italic type. For the rock band, see Cursive (band).

Example of classic American business cursive handwriting known as Spencerian script, from 1884

Cursive (also known as joined-up writing[1][2]) is any style of penmanship in which characters are written joined in a flowing manner, generally for the purpose of making writing faster, in contrast to block letters. It varies in functionality and modern-day usage across languages and regions; being used both publicly in artistic and formal documents as well as in private communication. Formal cursive is generally joined, but casual cursive is a combination of joins and pen lifts. The writing style can be further divided as "looped", "italic", or "connected".

The cursive method is used with many alphabets due to infrequent pen lifting and beliefs that it increases writing speed. Despite this belief, more elaborate or ornamental styles of writing can be slower to reproduce. In some alphabets, many or all letters in a word are connected, sometimes making a word one single complex stroke.

  1. ^ "Do we need to teach children joined-up handwriting?". BBC News. 11 November 2017. Retrieved 28 March 2024.
  2. ^ Russell, Helen (31 July 2015). "Signing off: Finnish schools phase out handwriting classes". The Guardian. Retrieved 28 March 2024.