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The aim of the course is to introduce students to two interconnected fields: typography design and multilingualism. It will raise awareness of how, in today’s globalized world, various writing systems interact and coexist within different typographic compositions, shaping visual communication across cultures. Poslední úprava: Bělehrádková Kateřina, Mgr. Bc. (02.06.2025)
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This course explores typography as the visual form of language, particularly in public spaces. Although typography plays a crucial role in visual communication, it has been underexplored in sociolinguistics. The course examines the visual features of different writing systems, with a special focus on both alphabetical and non-alphabetical scripts, comparing their typographic characteristics. It also explores how multiple languages coexist within the same sign or frame through typography and how typographic methods are used to achieve specific communicative goals and shape socio-cultural interactions. The course will be highly visual and interactive, appealing to students interested in the intersection of graphic design and language. Students will be encouraged to collect and analyze real-world typographic examples and discuss them in each session. Poslední úprava: Bělehrádková Kateřina, Mgr. Bc. (02.06.2025)
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1. No more than 3 absences out of the 13 total weekly sessions.
2. Submit a final essay on one of the given topics, using the analytical methods discussed in the lectures. Poslední úprava: Bělehrádková Kateřina, Mgr. Bc. (02.06.2025)
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Basic literature:
Typography
AMBROSE, G., HARRIS, P., & THEODOSIOU, S. (2020). The Fundamentals of Typography. London: Bloomsbury Publishing.
HARTMANN, T., THOMA, S., & WITTNER, B. (Eds.). (2018). Bi-Scriptual - Typography and Graphic Design with Multiple Script Systems. Salenstein: niggli Verlag.
BRINGHURST, R. (2004). The elements of typographic style. Point Roberts, WA: Hartley & Marks, Publishers.
BAUR, R., & FELSING, U. (Eds.). (2020). Visual Coexistence: Information Design and Typography in the Intercultural Field. Zürich: Lars Müller Publishers.
FRASCARA, J. (2006). Typography and the visual design of warnings. Handbook of Warnings. 385-405.
KIM, S. 1993. “Typecast: Meaning, Culture, and Identity in the Alphabetic Omelet.” In Lift and Separate: Graphic Design and the Quote Unquote Vernacular, edited by Barbara Glauber, 30-37. New York: The Herb Lubalin Study Center of Design and Typography.
LUPTON, E. (2024). Thinking with Type: A Critical Guide for Designers, Writers, Editors, and Students (Revised and Expanded). Chronicle Books.
MELETIS, D. (2023). “Is your font racist?” Metapragmatic online discourses on the use of typographic mimicry and its appropriateness. Social Semiotics, 33(5), 1046-1068.
MELETIS, D., & DÜRSCHEID, C. (2022). Writing Systems and Their Use: An Overview of Grapholinguistics. Berlin, Boston: De Gruyter Mouton. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110757835
MURPHY, Keith M. 2017. “Fontroversy! Or, How to Care about the Shape of Language.” In Language and Materiality. Ethnographic and Theoretical Explorations, edited by Jillian R. Cavanaugh, and Shalini Shankbar, 63-86. Cambridge: CUP.
STÖCKL, H. 2005. “Typography: Body and Dress of a Text - A Signing Mode Between Language and Image.” Visual Communication 4 (2): 204-214. doi:10.1177/1470357205053403.
WALKER, S. (2014). Typography & language in everyday life: Prescriptions and practices. New York, London: Routledge.
Website page on typogrpahy
Lily. 2012. “Stereotype(face): Origins of the Chop Suey Font.” 8Asians. An Asian American Collaborative Blog. https://www.8asians.com/2012/02/21/stereotypeface-the-chop-suey-font/.
Shaw, Paul. 2009. “Stereo Types.” Print Magazine. https://www.printmag.com/post/stereo_types.
Linguistic landscape
KALLEN, J. - NÍ DHONNACHA, E. (2010) ‘Language and Inter-language in Urban Irish and Japanese Linguistic Landscapes’. In Shohamy, E., Ben-Rafael, E. and Barni, M. (eds.), Linguistic Landscape in the City, 19-36. Bristol: Multilingual Matters.
Li, Y. (2023). The chop suey letterform in historical Los Angeles Chinatowns. Social Semiotics, 1-45. https://doi.org/10.1080/10350330.2023.2286443
LOU, J. (2010) ‘Chinese on the Side: The Marginalization of Chinese in the Linguistic and Social Landscapes of Chinatown in Washington, DC’. In Shohamy, E., Ben-Rafael, E. and Barni, M. (eds.), Linguistic Landscape in the City, pp. 96-114. Bristol: Multilingual Matters.
PRESUTTI, S. (2023). Presupposing authenticity through typographic traits in commercial signs. Italiano LinguaDue, 15(2), 64-77. https://doi.org/10.54103/2037-3597/22016
RUBDY, R. (2013) ‘Hybridity in the Linguistic Landscape: Democratizing English in India’. In Rubdy, R. and Alsagoff, L. (eds.), Global-Local Interface and Hybridity: Exploring Language and Identity, pp. 43-65. Bristol: Multilingual Matters.
SCOLLON, R. - SCOLLON, S. W. (2003): Discourses in Place: Language in the Material World. London, New York: Routledge.
Writing system
COULMAS, F. (2003) Writing Systems: An Introduction to their Linguistic Analysis. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
COULMAS, F. (2014) ‘Writing systems and language contact in the Euro- and Sinocentric worlds’. Applied Linguistic Review 5(1), pp. 1-21.
SEBBA, M. (2012) Spelling and Society. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
SUTHERLAND, P. (2015). Writing system mimicry in the linguistic landscape. SOAS Working Papers in Linguistics, 17, 147-167.
STRANDBERG, J. A. (2020). “Nordic Cool” and writing system mimicry in global linguistic landscapes. Lingua, 235, 102783. Poslední úprava: Bělehrádková Kateřina, Mgr. Bc. (02.06.2025)
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Week 1
Latin Script Typography A basic introduction to Latin type and typography, including foundational font families, the distinction between serif and sans-serif typefaces, and key typography terms such as kerning, tracking, and alignment.
Week 2
Non-Latin Script Typography: Chinese An introduction to the typography rules of one of the world's major writing systems - Chinese - covering its history, type classification, and a comparison with Latin scripts.
Week 3
Non-Latin script typography: Arabic
An introduction to the typography rules of one of the world's major writing systems - Arabic - covering its history, type classification, and a comparison with Latin scripts.
Week 4
Non-Latin script typography: Devanagari
An introduction to the typography rules of one of the world's major writing systems - Devanagari - covering its history, type classification, and a comparison with Latin scripts.
Week 5
Multilingual typography: when Latin meet non-Latin script
An introduction to multilingual design, using examples from around the world to demonstrate how languages with different scripts coexist within a single frame, such as in poster design or book editorials. Key concepts include code preference and language hierarchy.
Week 6
Multilingual typography: typography match-making
Building on the previous session, this topic explores a design strategy popular among graphic designers - using typographic methods to harmonize two languages so that they appear visually similar in terms of stroke characteristics and type styles.
Week 7
Typographic landscape: typography in the real world
Building on previous knowledge of type and typography, this session explores typography in the surrounding environment - such as printed materials, shop signs, and billboards. It also introduces the concept of the linguistic landscape and how typography shapes public spaces.
Week 8
Typographic landscape: Chinese restaurant signs
This session examines the typographic composition of Chinese restaurant signage in Prague, applying principles from previous discussions on multilingual typography and linguistic
landscapes. Through case studies, we will analyze how Chinese, Czech, and English texts are arranged, exploring differences in hierarchy, spatial organization, and typographic choices. The session encourages critical reflection on cultural identity, legibility, and visual communication, inviting participants to share their perceptions and interpretations.
Week 9
A Different Kind of Multilingual Typography: Typography Mimicry This session explores the phenomenon of typography mimicry in multilingual typography, where typographic design borrows visual features from one script to stylistically resemble another. We will analyze how cultural elements are integrated through type design, examining its implications for identity, readability, and cross-cultural communication.
Week 10
A Different Kind of Multilingual Typography: Typography Mimicry Continuing our exploration of typography mimicry, this session focuses on students' perceptions of these typographic designs. We will analyze how the borrowing of script features from one culture into another influences the viewer's understanding, cultural context, and aesthetic experience. Students will share their insights and discuss the effectiveness and implications of these design strategies.
Week 11
Discussion of Multilingual Signs Collected by Students In this session, students will present multilingual signs they have collected, and we will analyze how the languages are composed within the given frame. We will examine whether a visual hierarchy is applied or perceived, discussing the impact of typographic choices on legibility, cultural context, and the overall design balance.
Week 12
Multilingual Design: Experiment In this session, we will discuss the results of the students' design experiments. The task was to create a sign using chosen scripts, with the goal of minimizing language hierarchy and displaying the languages simultaneously. We will analyze the design choices made, exploring how well the languages coexist visually and whether the design successfully balances them without prioritizing one over the other.
Week 13
Wrapping up and final discussions; preparation for the final exam paper. Poslední úprava: Bělehrádková Kateřina, Mgr. Bc. (02.06.2025)
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The course will be taught in English. Poslední úprava: Bělehrádková Kateřina, Mgr. Bc. (02.06.2025)
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