typography · book design · illustration

play

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Work in progress

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Selected process images from current MA research project, which uses the tilde (or swung dash) to  discuss diverse historical, liguistic and social themes. As the speed and volume of global communication gets exponentially faster, so too the speed at which language (and punctuation) evolve is getting faster. Being available on our keyboard but with less fixed meaning than, say, the question mark, the tilde is revealing of this  process.

The project begins by considering just how graphic marks come to carry meaning, and whether or not their shape influences how we feel we might attribute meaning to them. It goes on to explore several of the more widely-used or important historical meanings of the tilde (abbreviation, approximation, destruction, sarcasm/irony), connecting associated themes to discuss wider social communication behaviours.