The Perfect Renaissance Man
Kerning Cultures
Kerning Cultures Network
4.9 • 529 Ratings
🗓️ 2 March 2019
⏱️ 23 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
In the 1930s, the architect Nasri Khattar tried to completely overhaul the Arabic script – singlehandedly. For the next 47 years, he worked day and night to implement his writing system, Unified Arabic. Ultimately, he failed. This is his story.
Special Thanks to Camille Khattar, Yara Khoury, Kristyan Sarkis, and Samar Mikati at the AUB archives.
Produced by Jahd Khalil. With editorial support by Alex Atack, Hebah Fisher, Dana Ballout, and Bella Ibrahim. Sound design by Alex Atack and Mohamad Khreizat. Fact-checking by Zeina Dowidar. Kerning Cultures is a Kerning Cultures Network production.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | You might know that our name Kearning Cultures comes from a phrase in type design. |
| 0:07.0 | Kearning, by definition, is adjusting the space between letters to make a word easier to read. |
| 0:14.0 | Our name is a metaphorical thing. We like to think of our stories as the spaces in between cultures. But today, we have a story that is literally about Kearning, about type design. |
| 0:28.6 | And it's the kind of story that we hope will change the way you think about the words you type, |
| 0:35.6 | when you're texting, when you're emailing, |
| 0:38.3 | or when you're trying to find that perfect caption for a social post. |
| 0:42.6 | I'm Hibba Fisher, and you're listening to Curning Cultures, Radio Documentaries from the Middle East. |
| 0:51.2 | And one story that always kind of captures my imagination. |
| 0:56.0 | It's fair. |
| 0:57.0 | The street's lost culture. |
| 1:01.0 | And you're listening to Kearning cultures. |
| 1:06.5 | Okay. I'm going to start for this one from the top here. |
| 1:09.3 | Today's story comes to us from a new contributor, Jadz Khalil. |
| 1:13.4 | You know that thing when somebody tells you not to think about an elephant? |
| 1:16.7 | So you think about an elephant? |
| 1:18.3 | It's kind of the same thing with reading a word. |
| 1:21.1 | It's pretty much impossible to look at a word you know and not read it. |
| 1:25.0 | We read thousands of words every day, much of it without actually trying to read them. |
| 1:29.3 | There are the billboards and storefronts we read when we drive by without thinking. |
| 1:33.3 | We read novels and books with purpose. |
| 1:36.3 | And then there's the words on screens that hold our attention for hours a day. |
| 1:40.3 | Get ready for another wild news cycle. |
... |
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