# Aesthetics of Typography Research notes toward a paper on the philosophy of typography and graphic design. > [!warning] Methodological Note for Claude > **DO NOT assume the Crystal Goblet thesis is endorsed.** The idea that typography should be "invisible" or "transparent" (Warde 1932) is ONE position in the literature, not established common ground. Nick has NOT endorsed this view. Do not smuggle it in as an assumption when discussing typography. Treat it as a position to be evaluated, not a premise. **Puzzle**: What do we aesthetically appreciate when we appreciate typography? One tradition (Crystal Goblet) claims typography succeeds when it recedes from attention — but this is contested. Other possibilities: typography is appreciated for its formal properties (letterforms, texture), for how it shapes reading experience, for what it expresses, or some combination. The object and mode of typographic appreciation remain open questions. **Gap in literature**: No dedicated analytic aesthetics work on typography exists. Nearby work on design aesthetics ([[Functional Beauty]], [[Jane Forsey|Forsey]]) focuses on physical objects. Typography requires new theorizing. --- ## Immediate Context Potential submission to [[ESA Annual Conference 2026]] (deadline Jan 15, 2026) — but the ideas here stand independently as a paper project. --- ## Philosophical Frameworks ### Goodman's Languages of Art [[Nelson Goodman]]'s *[[Languages of Art]]* (1968) offers several relevant concepts. #### 1. Notational Systems Typography adds "notationally irrelevant" visual properties to notation. The letter "A" in Helvetica and Times New Roman are notationally identical (both tokens of type "A") but visually different. From Goodman's perspective, these visual differences are *notationally irrelevant* — they don't affect character identification. Typography is a system of notationally irrelevant visual properties. The visual form is "surplus" — excess beyond what's needed for the symbol to function. Yet this surplus is precisely what typography as a practice is about. **Possible angle**: Typography occupies a unique position as a practice concerned entirely with the notationally irrelevant features of notational systems. Neither purely notational (like a musical score) nor purely pictorial (like a painting). A practice of aesthetic elaboration *within* a notational system. #### 2. Autographic vs Allographic - **Autographic arts** (painting): History of production matters; forgery possible - **Allographic arts** (music, literature): Notation defines compliance; any correct instance is authentic Typography complicates this: - **Text** is allographic — any correct copy is the work - **Typefaces** are probably allographic — any correct instance of Garamond is Garamond - **Specific typographic compositions** might be more autographic — the specific layout matters - **Hand-lettering/calligraphy** is autographic — the specific marks matter #### 3. Exemplification **Denotation**: Symbol stands for something else (word "red" denotes red things) **Exemplification**: Symbol possesses a property AND refers to that property (paint chip exemplifies its color) Exemplification requires both **possession** and **reference**. A red wall possesses redness but doesn't exemplify it (unless we're invited to attend to its color). Good typography may **possess without exemplifying**. A heavy typeface *has* visual weight but doesn't *refer to* or *highlight* that weight during reading. The weight contributes to the effect (authority, solidity) without the reader noticing. **This could solve the invisibility puzzle**: Typography that exemplifies its properties has become visible and thereby failed as typography. Recessive typography = possession without exemplification. Expressive typography = full exemplification. #### 4. Expression Expression = metaphorical exemplification. A font might "express" authority, playfulness, elegance without literally possessing these properties. It metaphorically possesses them and, in expressive contexts, refers to them. Question: Does all typography express, or only some? Is "neutral" typography possible, or is that ideological? #### 5. Symptoms of the Aesthetic Goodman's criteria for aesthetic attention: - Syntactic density (fine differences matter) - Semantic density (what's symbolized is finely differentiated) - Syntactic repleteness (many features matter, not just a few) - Exemplificationality (symbol exemplifies as well as denotes) **When reading** (attending to meaning): Low syntactic density, low repleteness, no attention to exemplification → NOT aesthetic attention in Goodman's sense **When looking at typography** (noticing design): High syntactic density (every curve matters), high repleteness (weight, spacing, contrast all matter), attending to exemplification → IS aesthetic attention **Possible angle**: The invisible/visible distinction might just BE the difference between non-aesthetic and aesthetic attention in Goodman's sense. Typography is designed to not trigger aesthetic attention during reading. --- ### Kulvicki's Image Theory [[John Kulvicki]]'s work on images and pictures offers concepts applicable to typography. #### Separable vs Inseparable Syntactic Parts In *[[Modeling the Meanings of Pictures]]* (2020), Chapter 8 "Distinguishing Kinds by Parts," Kulvicki distinguishes: **Separable parts**: Can be independently varied without affecting other parts. Example: the words in a sentence. Changing "cat" to "dog" doesn't change what "sat" looks like. **Inseparable parts**: Form an "amalgamated whole" where varying one part changes the character of other parts. Example: the features of a face in a portrait. Widening the nose changes how the eyes relate to the whole. **Application to typography**: Typography may exemplify inseparable parts. Consider: - Changing letterform weight changes the apparent spacing (heavier letters look closer together) - Changing letter spacing changes the apparent weight (wider spacing makes letters look lighter) - Changing leading changes the apparent word spacing - The whole typographic texture is an amalgamated system where adjusting any parameter shifts others This connects to [[Ellen Lupton]]'s description (in *[[Thinking with Type]]*) of "typography as an elastic system of structural features (weight, stress, stem, crossbars, serifs, angles, curves, ascenders, descenders...)." She notes that "the relationships among letters in a typeface became more important than the identity of individual characters." The Kulvicki-Lupton connection: typography is characterized by inseparable syntactic parts that form a unified whole. This has implications for how we think about the relationship between letterform design (micro) and textural effects (macro) — they may not be independently variable. #### Syntactic Sensitivity and Repleteness From *[[On Images]]* (2006) and *[[Images]]* (2013): **Syntactic sensitivity**: How finely differences in the symbol matter. High sensitivity = small differences make for different symbols. **Repleteness**: How many features of the symbol are syntactically relevant. High repleteness = many features matter (color, texture, size, position), not just a few. Typography has interesting position here: - **As notation**: Low sensitivity (slight wobble in an "a" doesn't change what letter it is), low repleteness (only the basic shape matters) - **As visual form**: High sensitivity (small differences in curve or weight distinguish fonts), high repleteness (weight, contrast, x-height, spacing all matter) This duality mirrors the Domain 1 / Domain 2 distinction: appreciation of typography *as notation* vs appreciation of typography *as visual form* involves different sensitivity and repleteness conditions. --- ### Existing Design Aesthetics #### [[Glenn Parsons]] & [[Allen Carlson]] — Functional Beauty Perception-based account where knowledge of function influences aesthetic appreciation. "Appearance of function" generates pleasure. **Problem for typography**: Typography works by NOT being perceived. Functional Beauty assumes we perceive the object and our knowledge of function shapes that perception. But typography recedes from perception. #### [[Jane Forsey]] — Kantian Dependent Beauty Extends appreciation to include USE, not just perception. The felt quality of using designed objects matters. **Problem for typography**: Forsey's examples involve physical manipulation (handling tools, sitting in chairs). Reading isn't physical use in that sense. Is there "cognitive use"? "Perceptual use"? #### Beauty in Use Paper Our paper argues we appreciate designed objects through aesthetic effortlessness, the proprioceptive feel of use (drawing on [[Barbara Montero]]). **Question for typography**: Does this extend to "cognitive effortlessness"? Is the fluent reading experience a kind of effortlessness that constitutes aesthetic appreciation? This would require extending "use" beyond physical manipulation. --- ### [[Enrico Terrone]]'s Experiential Artifacts Experiential artifacts = artifacts whose function is triggering experiences (vs physical effects like hammers). **Typography's fit**: - Typography might be an "indirect experiential artifact" — shapes experience from background rather than demanding attention - Or: the book is the experiential artifact; typography is part of its structure - Typography might force extension of the concept: experiential artifacts that work *without* attention --- ## The Visibility/Invisibility Question ### Crystal Goblet Thesis ([[Beatrice Warde]]) > [!caution] Status: Position Under Evaluation > The Crystal Goblet thesis is a historically influential view, NOT an established truth. Whether typography should aim for "invisibility" is precisely what's at stake in this research. Do not assume it. "The Crystal Goblet" (1932): Good typography should be transparent like a crystal goblet revealing wine. "The most important thing about printing is that it conveys thought, ideas, images, from one mind to other minds." **Critiques**: - [[Matthew Butterick]]: "Text is already invisible, so typography cannot be. Rather than wine in a goblet, a more apt parallel might be helium in a balloon." - Deconstructive critique: "Transparent typography" is ideological, not descriptive. Presents a particular style (modernist, institutional) as if it were no style at all. - Readability is culturally relative (German readers found Fraktur perfectly readable) **Better framing**: Not "invisible" but "recessive" or "self-effacing." Typography doesn't demand attention but still shapes experience. Like background music in film — contributes without becoming the focus. ### Two Modes of Appreciation **Mode A (Experiential/Fluent)**: Appreciation through the quality of the reading experience. Processing fluency, cognitive ease. Typography contributes without being attended to. Research by [[Kevin Larson]] shows good typography improves mood and creativity even when readers can't articulate what's different. **Mode B (Formal/Visible)**: Direct appreciation of letterforms, proportions, design. Goodmanian aesthetic attention. How type designers look at specimens. **Question**: Can a typeface be excellent in BOTH modes? Can Helvetica be fluently readable (Mode A excellence) AND formally beautiful when examined (Mode B excellence)? What is the relationship between these modes of excellence? ### Perceptual Psychology Caveat We don't actually know the perceptual psychology of reading typography. Multiple possibilities: - Literal non-perception (typography below threshold) - Background/peripheral awareness - Brief registration then fade - Continuous low-level influence - "Unnoticed noticing" Paper might need to remain neutral on empirical psychology, focus on phenomenological or normative claims, or flag this as an open question. --- ## Asemic Writing ### [[Codex Seraphinianus]] ([[Luigi Serafini]]) Encyclopedia of an imaginary world in undecipherable script (1976-78). Has all visual conventions of typography: - Headers and body text - Captions and illustrations - Visual hierarchy - Page layouts - Apparent cross-references All visually coherent but semantically empty. Serafini: "Writers like [[Umberto Eco]], [[Roland Barthes]], [[Italo Calvino]] were fascinated by something which cannot be read." ### Why Asemic Writing Matters #### 1. Reveals What Typography Adds If asemic writing has aesthetic value despite no notational function, that value is pure visual form — exactly what typography adds to meaningful text. Asemic writing isolates typography's contribution. **Thought experiment**: What would "badly typeset" asemic text look like? Poor spacing, inconsistent rhythm, ugly letterforms. Without semantic content, the only thing to evaluate IS the visual form. #### 2. The Hovering Phenomenology Asemic writing makes readers "hover in a state between reading and looking." Reading fails (nothing to understand) but looking feels like it should be reading (all the visual cues of text). This hovering might be typography's distinctive phenomenological signature — we're always somewhat between reading and looking, and different contexts tip the balance. Asemic writing makes this hovering impossible to escape. #### 3. Empty Goblet Thought Experiment If Crystal Goblet thesis is right (typography reveals content), asemic writing should be aesthetically worthless — a goblet with nothing in it. But the Codex is aesthetically fascinating. **Possible conclusions**: - Transparency thesis is wrong - Typography's value isn't reducible to serving content - The empty goblet IS interesting — we notice the goblet precisely when it's empty #### 4. Spectrum from Notation to Pure Form | Position | Semantic Weight | Visual Weight | |----------|-----------------|---------------| | Pure notation | All semantic | Minimal visual | | Body typography | Heavy semantic | Recessive visual | | Display typography | Semantic + Visual | Visual prominent | | Concrete poetry | Semantic = Visual | Equally weighted | | Asemic writing | No semantic | Pure visual | Typography sits in the middle, never at either extreme. The Codex represents one limiting case that illuminates the whole spectrum. --- ## Dyslexia Fonts as Test Case If asemic writing tests the modes by removing Mode C (fluency), dyslexia fonts test them from the other direction: deliberately prioritizing Mode C at the expense of Modes A and B. ### The Design Approach Fonts like [[OpenDyslexic]] and [[Dyslexie]] were designed to help dyslexic readers by making letterforms easier to distinguish. Design features include: **Weighted bottoms**: Letters have heavier strokes at the bottom, theoretically to "anchor" them and prevent perceived rotation or flipping. **Distinctive shapes**: Letters that dyslexics commonly confuse (b/d, p/q, m/w, n/u) are given asymmetrical or distinctive forms so they're harder to mistake. **Variable letter shapes**: Breaking the consistency of letterforms to make each more individually recognizable. These are **Mode A interventions** — changes to individual letterform design — aimed at improving **Mode C** (reading fluency for dyslexic readers). ### The Empirical Results Research findings (as of 2024-2025): **Dyslexia fonts don't work**: Multiple studies show that fonts like OpenDyslexic and Dyslexie do not improve reading speed or accuracy for dyslexic readers compared to standard fonts. Some studies show no difference; a few show dyslexia fonts perform *worse*. **What does work**: Increased spacing. Studies consistently show that wider letter spacing and line spacing improve reading for dyslexics. This is a **Mode B intervention** — changing texture without changing letterforms. Key studies: - Wery & Diliberto (2017): OpenDyslexic no better than Arial or Times New Roman - Kuster et al. (2017): Dyslexie font provided no benefit - Zorzi et al. (2012): Extra-large letter spacing significantly improved reading in dyslexic children ### Implications for the Intertwining Thesis This evidence suggests: **Mode C (fluency) is more responsive to Mode B (texture) than to Mode A (letterforms)** — at least for the specific fluency difficulty that dyslexia involves. The spacing intervention works; the letterform intervention doesn't. **Possible interpretation**: Mode A's effect on Mode C may be primarily mediated through Mode B. Changing letterforms doesn't directly improve fluency; but changing texture does. Letterforms affect fluency by affecting texture. **Caution**: This doesn't mean letterforms never matter for fluency. There may be extreme cases where letterform design directly causes reading problems (very unusual forms, inadequate stroke contrast for size). But for the parameter range of normal typefaces, texture may be the more important variable. **Contrast with asemic writing**: - Asemic writing: Modes A + B present, Mode C absent → uncanny hovering effect - Dyslexia intervention: Modes A + B degraded to improve Mode C → Mode A intervention fails, Mode B intervention succeeds Together, these test cases illuminate the structure of relations among the modes. --- ## Micro vs Macro Aesthetics ### Micro (Letterform Level) - Individual curves, proportions, terminals - Stroke contrast (thick/thin) - Apertures, serifs, x-height - What type designers focus on when drawing glyphs - Requires close examination to appreciate ### Macro (Texture/Color Level) - How a block of text looks as a visual field - Overall "color" (darkness/lightness of the page) - Rhythm and texture of the text mass - Emergent properties only visible in paragraphs - "Rivers" = bad white space flowing through text ### Why This Matters - **Partially independent**: Beautiful letterforms can produce ugly texture (or vice versa) - **Different attention modes**: Micro requires close looking; macro requires stepping back - **Invisibility operates at macro**: When typography is "invisible," we mean macro texture doesn't disrupt - **Processing fluency is macro**: Larson's research is probably about overall texture, not individual letterforms ### Bringhurst on "Color" and Interdependence [[Robert Bringhurst]]'s *[[The Elements of Typographic Style]]* (1992/2004) provides the practitioner's account of micro-macro relationships. #### The Four Factors of Typographic "Color" "Color" in typography = the density of texture on the page — how dark or light a block of text appears when viewed as a whole. Bringhurst: "Color depends on four things: the design of the type, the spacing between the letters, the spacing between the words, and the spacing between the lines. **None is independent of the others.**" Breaking this down: 1. **Type design** (Mode 1): The inherent weight, width, and contrast of the letterforms 2. **Letterspacing**: Space between individual characters within words 3. **Word spacing**: Space between words 4. **Leading** (line spacing): Vertical space between lines The interdependence claim: You cannot optimize one factor in isolation. Examples: - A heavier typeface requires more leading to achieve the same apparent color - Wider letterspacing requires narrower word spacing to maintain word-group clarity - Condensed typefaces need more word spacing to compensate for horizontal compression - A high-contrast typeface (thick/thin strokes) creates different color than a monoweight face at the same size This supports thinking of typography as an "amalgamated whole" (cf. Kulvicki): the variables form a system where tweaking any one changes the effect of the others. #### Statuesque Transparency Bringhurst offers "statuesque transparency" as an alternative to the Crystal Goblet's "invisibility": Typography can be **present but not obstructive** — like a good waiter, a well-designed room, or indeed a statue that is there but doesn't interrupt what happens around it. This acknowledges that typography has positive aesthetic presence while still functioning as a vehicle for content. This framing avoids the problems with "invisibility": - Invisibility implies non-perception; statuesque transparency implies perception without disruption - Invisibility makes typographic excellence paradoxical; statuesque transparency makes it intelligible - Invisibility suggests typography should have no character; statuesque transparency allows character without obtrusiveness #### Text as Textile Bringhurst frequently uses the textile metaphor: - Individual letterforms = threads - Texture of the page = the weave or cloth - A page of text has "warp and weft" — the horizontal movement along lines and vertical rhythm of line spacing This metaphor captures how micro (thread) and macro (cloth) relate: individual threads have properties (color, thickness, texture) but the cloth has emergent properties (pattern, drape, hand) that depend on how threads interact. Neither level is reducible to the other. The textile metaphor also appears in Lupton: talking about how letterforms combine into texture. --- ## The Hybrid Status Thesis Typography is anomalous because: 1. **Notationally allographic but visually analog/dense** — defined by discrete character-compliance but has continuous aesthetic properties 2. **Functions through possession without exemplification** — in recessive mode 3. **Shapes experience without demanding attention** — unlike artworks 4. **Neither pure artwork nor pure tool** — not meant for contemplation like art; not physically used like tools **Mirror image with asemic writing**: Typography is "notationally discrete but pictorially dense." Asemic writing is "pictorially dense but looks notationally discrete." Comparing them illuminates both. --- ## Possible Paper Framings ### 1. The Goodmanian Thesis Typography is notationally irrelevant visual elaboration of notational systems, which possesses but does not exemplify its aesthetic properties in normal use. The "invisibility" puzzle dissolves: typography isn't invisible, it's just non-exemplifying. ### 2. The Two-Mode Thesis Typography admits two distinct modes of aesthetic appreciation: - Experiential mode (value through reading quality) - Formal mode (value through design properties) Question: What is the relationship between these modes? Can typography excel in both? Existing frameworks tend to capture only one or the other. ### 3. The Hybrid Status Thesis Typography doesn't fit existing categories of artwork or designed object. Requires new theorizing about artifacts that shape experience without demanding attention. ### 4. The Asemic Angle Use Codex Seraphinianus to reveal what typography contributes by showing typography without content. "The Codex reveals what typography is by showing us what it looks like when you remove the content entirely." ### 5. Against Crystal Goblet Use asemic writing as counter-example. If empty goblets are aesthetically fascinating, then the goblet was never just transparent. --- ## Title Ideas - **Font Matters** — double meaning: "matters relating to fonts" AND "font is important" - **Font Unseen** — direct about the theme - **Font Blind** — provocative, suggests something we're missing - **Font Absence** — philosophical, about presence-through-absence --- ## Sources to Cite ### Philosophical - [[Nelson Goodman]], *[[Languages of Art]]* (1968) — notation, exemplification, autographic/allographic - [[John Kulvicki]], *[[Modeling the Meanings of Pictures]]* (2020) — separable vs inseparable syntactic parts - [[John Kulvicki]], *[[On Images]]* (2006) and *[[Images]]* (2013) — syntactic sensitivity, repleteness - [[Glenn Parsons]] & [[Allen Carlson]], *[[Functional Beauty]]* - [[Jane Forsey]], *The Aesthetics of Design* - [[Hannah Kim]], "A New Class of Fictional Truths" (2022) — formal features generate fictional content - [[Enrico Terrone]], on experiential artifacts ### Practitioner/Design - [[Beatrice Warde]], "The Crystal Goblet" (1932) - [[Matthew Butterick]], critique of Crystal Goblet - [[Robert Bringhurst]], *[[The Elements of Typographic Style]]* (1992/2004) — color, four factors, statuesque transparency - [[Ellen Lupton]], *[[Thinking with Type]]* — elastic system of structural features ### Art/Examples - [[Luigi Serafini]], *[[Codex Seraphinianus]]* (1981) — asemic writing test case ### Empirical - [[Kevin Larson]], research on typography and mood/cognition - Zorzi et al. (2012) — spacing improves dyslexic reading - Wery & Diliberto (2017), Kuster et al. (2017) — dyslexia fonts don't help --- ## Two Domains of Typographic Appreciation > [!warning] Methodological Note for Claude > **DO NOT assume this Domain 1/Domain 2 split without explicit discussion.** This is ONE possible way to organize the territory, not established framework. Nick has NOT endorsed this split—it emerged from earlier conversation but may be the wrong way to carve things up. Before using this framework in any draft or discussion, question whether it's actually the right structure for the paper's argument. Typography can be aesthetically appreciated in fundamentally different ways, and these divide into two domains: ### Domain 1: Typography as Autonomous Visual/Experiential Object Appreciation that does NOT require knowing what the text says or what context it's used in: **Mode A: Letterforms (Micro)** - Appreciating individual characters: curves, proportions, stroke contrast, serifs, terminals - What's appreciated: the visual design of discrete symbols - How: close examination, comparison with other faces - Analogous to: appreciating a well-drawn figure, an elegant curve **Mode B: Texture (Macro)** - Appreciating the overall visual field of text: "color," rhythm, density, pattern of black and white - What's appreciated: emergent properties of characters in aggregate - How: stepping back, seeing the page as visual composition - Analogous to: appreciating a textile's weave, a field of grass **Mode C: Reading Quality (Experiential)** - Appreciating the felt quality of reading: ease, flow, pleasure, rhythm - What's appreciated: how typography shapes the temporal experience of reading - How: through the experience itself (perhaps only noticed when absent) - Analogous to: appreciating a comfortable chair through sitting, not looking ### Domain 2: Typography as Semantic/Relational Appreciation that REQUIRES grasping meaning, content, or cultural context: **Mode D: Expressive Character** - Appreciating what a typeface "expresses" or "conveys": authority, playfulness, elegance, warmth - What's appreciated: the metaphorical/connotative properties - How: responding to the "feel" or "voice" of the type - Requires: cultural knowledge (knowing that certain forms are associated with certain meanings) **Mode E: Fit/Appropriateness** - Appreciating how well a typeface suits its content or context - What's appreciated: harmony between form and function/meaning - How: considering the relationship between typographic choice and what's being communicated - Requires: textual knowledge (knowing what the content is) ### Why This Distinction Matters Domain 1 appreciation is **free** (in something like Kant's sense) — appreciation of formal or experiential properties without needing to grasp external meanings. Domain 2 appreciation is **dependent** — it depends on grasping a concept, context, or cultural meaning beyond the visual form itself. **Paper scope**: Focus on Domain 1 — typography as autonomous visual/experiential object. This is where the distinctive philosophical puzzles lie (the relationship between visual form and reading experience, micro vs macro appreciation, etc.). Domain 2 connects typography to broader questions about expression and meaning that apply to many art forms. (Need catchier name for Domain 1 — "typographic form"? "typography as such"? "formal typography"?) --- ## The Intertwining Thesis One possibility for the central argument: investigate the degree to which Modes A, B, and C (in Domain 1) are intertwined rather than independent. ### The Question Are Mode A (letterforms/micro), Mode B (texture/macro), and Mode C (reading fluency/experiential) three **independent dimensions** of typographic appreciation that can be separately evaluated and optimized? Or are they **aspects of an inseparable aesthetic structure** — an "amalgamated whole" where they can only be understood in relation to each other? Evidence for intertwining: - Bringhurst's claim that none of the four factors of color is independent of the others - Kulvicki's concept of inseparable syntactic parts - Lupton's "elastic system" where relationships matter more than individual features - The practitioner experience that adjusting one parameter requires compensating adjustments elsewhere ### Possible Dependency Structure One hypothesis: Mode A → Mode B → Mode C, with Mode B as mediator. **Mode A → Mode B**: Letterform properties (weight, width, contrast, shape) contribute to but don't determine textural effects. The same letterforms at different spacings produce different textures. Letterforms are necessary but not sufficient for texture. **Mode B → Mode C**: Textural properties (color, rhythm, evenness) may more directly affect reading fluency than letterform properties do. The felt quality of reading — ease, flow, fatigue — may be a response to macro-level texture rather than micro-level shape. **Mode A → Mode C?**: The interesting question is whether letterforms affect reading fluency directly, or only through their contribution to texture. If a beautiful letterform produces ugly texture, does it harm reading? If an ugly letterform produces good texture, does reading still suffer? This is an empirical question but also a conceptual one: what would count as evidence that Mode A directly affects Mode C vs. only indirectly through Mode B? ### Complications **Against simple hierarchy**: The modes aren't purely sequential. Considerations: - A reader might notice and appreciate letterforms during reading (especially at beginnings of sections, during pauses) - Texture emerges from letterforms + spacing, not from letterforms alone - Reading fluency might sometimes be affected by specific letterform confusions (l/1, rn/m) — a Mode A effect on Mode C that bypasses texture **Attention and switching**: Different modes may be foregrounded at different moments. A reader might: - Read fluently (Mode C dominant) - Notice the page is beautiful (Mode B becomes salient) - Pause at an unusual letter and appreciate its form (Mode A enters) The intertwining might be diachronic (modes alternate in attention) as well as synchronic (modes simultaneously contribute). --- ## Abstract Structure Notes 1. **Opening**: Establish that typography admits aesthetic appreciation (uncontroversial) 2. **Distinction**: Two domains of appreciation — semantic/relational vs autonomous/formal 3. **Scope**: This paper focuses on the autonomous/formal domain 4. **Puzzle or question**: [TBD — what's the central question for this domain?] 5. **Contribution**: [TBD — what does the paper argue?] --- ## Working Formulations *Quick notes from conversation — not endorsed, just worth considering later.* - "Typography IS the systematic attention to what notation officially doesn't care about." - "Typography is the set of variations that notation tolerates but pictures distinguish." - "What typography shows: the pictorial is inside the notational. It's not that there are two different systems applied to the same object. It's that within any notational token, there's a pictorial dimension that notation itself doesn't care about." - "Every note in a musical score must be played at SOME tempo, with SOME dynamics, with SOME timbre — even though the score doesn't specify these. Performance interpretation is the art of making these choices. Typography is the visual equivalent for text." *(Yes, this is Bringhurst: "Typography is to literature as musical performance is to composition: an essential act of interpretation" and "The typographer is to the text as the theatrical director to the script, or the musician to the score." — Elements of Typographic Style, pp. 19-20)* - "Perhaps the philosophical importance isn't about what typography IS, but about what typography SHOWS US about the notation/picture distinction itself. Goodman's framework treats notation and picture as fundamentally different kinds of systems. But typography shows that you can't fully separate them. Every notational token has pictorial properties. The pictorial is always already there, inside the notational." *(But doesn't Kulvicki already say something like this?)* - **Historical/Productive Properties**: Typography might exemplify properties related to its mode of production: 'Hand-lettered-ness' (even when actually digital), 'Industrial-ness', 'Mechanical-ness', 'Calligraphic-ness'. These are traces of production methods. A script font exemplifies the quality of having been written with a flexible pen — even though it was actually made digitally. This is a KIND OF FICTION: the font metaphorically possesses these productive properties. **Open questions:** - If typography is pictorial, what is it a picture OF? - Can we have a stylised picture of text in a particular typeface? - Are typefaces equivalent to pictorial styles (cartoon, 16th century, etc.)? --- ## Cool Quotes > "Shape, for example, is an SRP of most alphabets. One can change the shape of a letter without altering its syntactic identity, but if one wants to change a letter's syntactic identity, one must change its shape." > — [[John Kulvicki]], *[[On Images]]* (2006), p. 30 > "The easiest way to see this is to follow Goodman (1976) and imagine an inscription alongside a picture thereof. These representations may have the same properties—the same shape, color, and what have you—but removing the serifs from the inscription leaves its identity intact while removing them from the picture makes it a picture of a different inscription." > — [[John Kulvicki]], *[[On Images]]* (2006), p. 34 > "While relative repleteness says something about the number of properties of token representations—viz. relatively speaking, how many of those properties are relevant to the syntactic identity of the object—sensitivity says something about how those properties relate to the syntactic types of which they are tokens." > — [[John Kulvicki]], *[[On Images]]* (2006), p. 37 > "Imagistic representations only have inseparable syntactic parts, while linguistic representations only have separable syntactic parts." > — [[John Kulvicki]], *[[Modeling the Meanings of Pictures]]* (2020), p. 136 > "The difference is syntactic: the constitutive aspects of the diagrammatic as compared with the pictorial character are expressly and narrowly restricted. The only relevant features of the diagram are the ordinate and abscissa of each of the points the center of the line passes through. The thickness of the line, its color and intensity, the absolute size of the diagram, etc., do not matter... For the sketch, this is not true. Any thickening or thinning of the line, its color, its contrast with the background, its size, even the qualities of the paper—none of these is ruled out, none can be ignored... the symbols in the pictorial scheme are relatively replete." > — [[Nelson Goodman]], *[[Languages of Art]]* (1968), pp. 228-229 --- ## Next Steps 1. Decide on main framing 2. Draft extended abstract / paper outline 3. Read relevant chapters of [[Languages of Art]] to confirm Goodman interpretation **If submitting to ESA**: Deadline January 15, 2026 (see [[ESA Annual Conference 2026]])