What you will learn at CalRBS History of Type in August 2022—no. 33

I will be teaching the history of type at California Rare Book School (CalRBS) August 8–12, 2022. The 5-day intensive class will be based at the Letterform Archive in San Francisco. Along with lectures, discussions, and hands-on examination of typographic artifacts and materials at the Archive there will be field trips to other Bay Area institutions to look at books, broadsides, and more. The class will be small (7 to 12 people).

Here are 10 things you will learn in the class:
1. why the Latin alphabet has capitals and small letters
2. why there are uppercase and lowercase letters
3. why Herbert Bayer’s notion of a Universal Alphabet makes sense
4. why Herbert Bayer’s notion of a Universal Alphabet is wrongheaded
5. why Jan Tschichold designed a better unicase alphabet than Herbert Bayer
6. why sans serif type is an odd concept
7. why serifs matter
8. why serifs don’t matter
9. why a serif-less roman is not a sans serif
10. why a serif-less roman is a blinkered concept