Taking notes in the digital era is simple with the assistance of technology. Meetings, talks, and ideas may all be documented via app-based or traditional recording methods. Nevertheless, things were not always so simple before these useful technologies. Taking down notes in real time was previously made feasible by a kind of writing known as shorthand.
According to Encyclopaedia Britannica, the Greek historian Xenophon invented shorthand. Nonetheless, it wasn’t until the Roman Empire that the writing method was widely employed to swiftly jot down notes while people spoke. Before nearly disappearing during the Middle Ages, the Latin shorthand method was employed for over a thousand years.
Shorthand regained prominence during the Victorian era after a long absence. During the Reformation, it was also employed to hastily notate Bible translations. Modern shorthand evolved as a result of the Industrial Revolution’s demand for stenographers.
Sir Isaac Pitman invented modern shorthand in 1837, and his brother took it to America in 1852. While the Pitman style was popular in the United Kingdom, it was later surpassed in the United States by the style of John Robert Gregg. It was initially named as Light-Line Phonography (1888), but it was eventually shortened to Gregg Shorthand.
Longhand refers to the lengthy strokes required to write words, whereas shorthand was aimed to condense letters to their most basic forms, making it simpler to take notes and document things quickly. Since shorthand has no similarity to the word it symbolizes, it is simple to confuse it with an old text. Some individuals assume it resembles Arabic more than English because of the many dots and loops that reduce our standard manner of writing vowels and consonants.
After acquiring Gregg’s shorthand, participants were able to take down 280 words. The technique is not entirely outdated, since it is still used in the legal, medical, and secretarial areas to take notes.
What are your thoughts about shorthand? Have you used it previously, or do you know anybody who has? Please share your opinions with us and forward this to others so they may learn more about this strange writing as well!
Share this with your friends by clicking below!
