Title

Typography Behind the Arabetic Calligraphy Veil

Author

Saad D. Abulhab

A brief

In the change from scriptural writing systems to textual mechanical systems and most recently to digital, computer generated text, some languages and their typographic representations have suffered. One such language, along with its visible language representation, that has not made a smooth transition is Arabic. The author argues that misinterpreting language tradition prevents what he calls Arabetic typography from embracing an appropriate technological adaptation. Putting forth an evolutionary argument, he critiques the notion that calligraphic styles must prevail and that legibility and readability of Arabic characters is objective. He further states that the resulting typefaces when abandoning the so called “Arabic script rules” he challenges are similar in visual impact to the ‘free calligraphy’ typefaces already widely used in the marketplace. Finally he challenges the notion that technological maturity has been reached in digital character input and generation. Following these critiques, he demonstrates the awkward input system for Arabetic text and proposes a Natural Arabetic Input Method. A political and economic subtext runs throughout the essay.

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Title

The Mutamathil Type Style: Towards Free, Technology-Friendly, Arabetic Types

Author

Saad D. Abulhab

A brief

Efforts to adapt various Arabetic scripts to the machine are as old as the field of typography. But most of these efforts had concentrated primarily on forcing the machine to duplicate the Arabetic handwritten forms. Others practically advocated divorce rather than enrichment and reform. One reason why the few modern attempts to typographically solve the technology-induced Arabetic scripts’ problems had failed is that they have presented their new types (or many a time just theoretical calligraphy styles) as replacements of the traditional ones rather than as optional working styles. The author believes that the art of typography, like all other art fields, is also about choice and option. New “controversial” types should be made widely available for users to judge rather than being dismissed based on an advance, unsupported, claims or verdicts by few in influential circles. Through the design of the Mutamathil type style the author/designer adds to the efforts to correct the progress path of the past restrictive, calligraphy-based, Arabetic typography. His new style can produce Unicode compliant, technology-oriented, fonts to work side by side the traditional ones. Such fonts would not only work with current Arabetic applications but can also facilitate future creative ones.

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