Joe Mackiewicz article What Technical Writing Students Should Know About Typeface Personality describes the importance of typeface in a document as a form of visual rhetoric.  Typeface choices such as broadway, garamond, verdana, or calibri can affect the tone and an artefacts ability to persuade its audience.  Mackiewicz comments that students need more guidance when it comes to typeface choices, as it is rarely taught and highly accessible with the use of computers, but only offers that technical writing should occur in fonts that are neutral and professional.  While this is appropriate ideal for technical writing, I can think of many typefaces that would fit into that catergory (calibri, cambria, times new roman, etc.) and Mackiewicz does little to guide a student into which of these typefaces may be more appropriate than the next.

Mackiwicz also mentions that certain fonts hold historical meanings that a writer should consider when choosing an appropriate typeface.  He mentions that the typeface helvetica "dredge[s] up the emotions and memories connected to the Helvetican IRS" as it is used on many government documents (9).  Many conventions of font exist from times before access to typeface was easy, which makes choosing fonts difficult when thinking historically.  Many fonts, as depicted below, are associated with certain brands.  One can easily distinguish the letter "G" representing Google and the "P" associated with the Playstation brand. 


 There are conventions dictated by the past that we still cling to in the age of computers.  Newspaper headlines are still created in an ornate manner, as was the convention of newspapers dating back to 1906 (depicted below on the left).  The New York Times still uses the same typeface for its headline, even though the paper now is able to integrate more use of visual rhetoric, with graphic and multiple typeface choices.  While it is not necessary for the New York Times to "cling" to its typeface, I think it lends to its ethos and the convention allows the reader to see the document as a newspaper without having to actually read any of the present text.  

                     
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  1. Very nice Shannon! I think that fonts are a little complicated. You are correct, Mackiewicz doesn't give us much information about the various fonts. I like how you displayed "broadway" as it takes me immediately to a place in my mind where I connect with a broadway production. The New York Times are exceptional pieces to put on display here. No one does a newspaper that says, New York, quite like the New York Times.

    I once worked with a couple of graphic artists and they knew their fonts very well. I sat close to them and would listen to "font conversation" from time to time. With the technology revolution we are living with, we take fonts for granted. They are on the drop-down menu for us to choose from. Sometimes we are frustrated with things like an email program that only gives us one or two choices of font. It just makes me want to know more about these fonts and who they are historically, and who chooses to use them while the rest of us use an email standard.

    Rosanne

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