Grapholinguistics

in the 21st Century

G21C (Grapholinguistics in the 21st Century,

also called /gʁafematik/) is a biennial
conference bringing together disciplines
concerned with grapholinguistics and, more
generally, the study of writing systems and
their representation in written communication.
The conference aims to reflect on the current
state of research in the area and on the role Invited Keynote Speakers
that writing and writing systems play in Annick Payne, Venice
neighboring disciplines like computer science Camille Circlude, Bruxelles
and information technology, communication, Donald E. Knuth, San Francisco
typography, psychology, and pedagogy. In
particular it aims to study the effect of the International conference
growing importance of Unicode with regard to
the future of reading and writing in human Organization Grapholinguistics
societies. Reflecting the richness of Yannis Haralambous, Brest
perspectives on writing systems, G21C is Sveva Elti di Rodeano, Venice in the 21st Century
actively interdisciplinary. It welcomes
proposals from researchers from the fields of
computer science and information technology, October 23-25, 2024
linguistics, communication, pedagogy, Funded by the European Union (ERC-2022-COG, CAncAn, G.A. 101088363).
Ca’ Foscari University of Venice
Views and opinions expressed are however those of the author(s) only and do not
psychology, history, and the social sciences. necessarily reflect those of the European Union or the European Research Council Aula Geymonat
Executive Agency. Neither the European Union nor the granting authority can be
held responsible for them. CAncAn - Communication in Ancient Anatolia - ERC-
Palazzo Malcanton-Marcorà
2022-Consolidator Grant - 101088363, P.I. Annick Payne. Dorsoduro 3484/D, Venice
 WEDNESDAY 23 OCTOBER THURSDAY 24 OCTOBER FRIDAY 25 OCTOBER

8:30 Welcome greetings 9-10 Keynote lecture: Camille Circlude 9:00-10:40

James Myers: Synchronic and diachronic or- dering in Chinese
9-10 Keynote lecture: Annick Payne 10:00-10:40 character form patterns
Janet Davey: Beyond the alphabet, beyond the binary, maybe beyond Keisuke Honda: Rōmaji for romanisation and beyond: A non-
10:00-10:40 “Chinese”? Exploring the emergence of gender-inclusive Chinese phonemic adaptation of the Latin script
Bennett Bacon, Dan Harbour, Sara Hockett, Andrew Nevins: Earliest pronouns Noah Hermalin: The Efficiency of Spelling- Sound and Spelling-
traces of protowriting: A bipartite, compositional sign in the Magdalenian Amalia E. Gnanadesikan: Mind the Gap: Spaces and Boundaries in Meaning Mappings in Two Logographic Writing Systems
Upper Palaeolithic
Spoken and Written Language Helen Magowan: Towards reading in four dimensions
Kaveh Ashourinia: Typographical revival of Proto-Elamite script
Arvind Iyengar: Braille as writing: Evidence and lessons for
10:40-11:10 Coffee Break 10:40-11:10 Coffee Break grapholinguistic theory

11:10-12:30 11:10-12:30 10:40-11:10 Coffee Break

Perri Antonio: Rethinking Unicode: how to digitally encode non-linear Dimitrios Meletis: Types of iconicity in phonographic writing systems
written artefacts? A tentative encoding of Codex Mendoza, folio 2r Philippa M. Steele: Thoughts on the visual-cultural fit of writing 11:10-12:30
Sina Fakour: Reviving Linear Elamite (2300–1880 BCE), the oldest known systems, and its intersections with linguistic fit Dennis Reisloh, Tatjana Scheffler: On the linguistic status of emojis
phonetic writing system David L. Share: Blueprint for a Universal Theory of Learning to Read: Lieke Verheijen: Orthographic and Visual Alignment in On- line
Alexandre Solcà: Clusters and syllabo-logographical classification models in Insights from Psycholinguistics and Grapholinguistics Writing: Language Style Accommodation with Textisms, Emoji, and
Linear A/B tablets: lexical and visual analogies for a more comprehensive Terry Joyce: Some tentative musings on the nature of morphography Emoticons
study of their properties and advanced Bronze Age trading-diplomatical Michael Filhol: AZVD as a Sign Language writing system proxy, and
correspondences 12:30-14:00 Lunch the potential evolution
Duoduo Xu: Glyph Families in Dongba Script Claudia S. Bianchini, Ludovic Saint-Bauzel: Transcribing the body as
14:00-15:40 we transcribe the voice: towards an automatic transcription of sign
12:30-14:00 Lunch Santhosh Thottingal: Parametric type design in the era of variable and language and co-speech gestures
color fonts
14:00-15:40
Jonas Romstadt: Looking for the crucial point(s) – Forms and 12:30-14:00 Lunch
Vasanta Duggirala, Raju Surampudi Bapi, Soham G Korade: Graphic
Complexity and Orthographic Neighbors: Observations based on Telugu functions of punctuation units in handwritten German school exams
Writing System Fabian Strobel, Isabella Maurizio: From Graphemes to Phonemes to 14:00-15:40
Saiya L. Karamali: The Developing Orthographic Conventions of Roman Graphemes: Using Hexapla Secunda for Reconstruction Florian Coulmas: The Linguistic Landscape: What we can learn from
Hindi-Urdu Yannis Haralambous: Masoretic Graphemics and Graphetics: it
Jan Kučera: Tamil Orthography Reforms Challenges and Solutions Titus Nemeth, Martin Tiefenthaler: Prima — An innovative type,
David A. Roberts: Linear featurality in Roman script African orthographies Avelino Corral Esteban: The process of graphization of the Scottish designed for learning to read and write
Dan Harbour: Allo-, allo-, ALLO: Allography/allomorphy parallels and Gaelic language and the accuracy and effectiveness of the spelling Hector Mangas Afonso, Peter Bil̆ ak: Enhancing Distance Reading for
writing systems as Autonomous Language-Like Objects: An Ethiopic case reforms for its preservation and revitalization Low Vision: A Reading Acuity Experiment on Letter Width
study Mary C. Dyson, David Br̆ ezina: Do we process characters as shapes,
15:40-16:10 Coffee Break nothing special?
15:40-16:10 Coffee Break
16:10-16:50 Poster session 15:40-16:10 Coffee Break
16:10-18:10 Tilly Guthrie: Haptolinguistics? The multiscriptal requirements of
Behnoosh Namdarzadeh, Nicolas Ballier: Audio LLM subtokens as blindness before the standardisation of Braille in Britain, c.1820-1905 16:10-18:10
encapsulated knowledge: the case of Persian subtoken graphemic
Claire Danet, Léa Chevrefils, Claudia S. Bianchini, Morgane Joseph Dichy: Written languages and the Mental Lexicon: a crucial
representations in Whisper
Rébulard, Adrien Contesse, Chloé Thomas, Patrick Doan: Describing aspect of grapholinguistics, exemplified by agglutinative word-form
Ariq Syauqi: Southern Sumatran Scripts: The Transformation from 14th
Century to Present movement in Sign Language: from body multilinearity to transcription recognition in Arabic and Biblical Hebrew
Paul D. Ueda: Characters, Romanization, and Anti-Colonialism: Historical linearity Spyros Armostis, Marilena Karyolemou: Creating a writing system for
Development of Taigi and Vietnamese an endangered language: the graphisation of Cypriot Arabic
Tomi S. Melka, Robert Schoch: The Persistence of the Grapholinguistic 16:50-17:50 Keynote lecture: Donald Knuth Guy Boursier: Writing Egyptian Arabic: the case of a ‘dialectal’
rongorongo Tradition on Rapa Nui during the Late Nineteenth and Early Wikipedia
Twentieth Centuries 19:30 Social Dinner Adeli V. Block: Inscribing Multilingualism: Lifemaps and “Trans-
Gordon G. Berthin, Robert Schoch: The Antiquity and Timeframe of the scripting” Among Moroccan Amazigh Youth
Rongorongo Script on Rapa Nui
Tomi S. Melka, Robert Schoch: Towards a Comprehensive Grapholinguistic 18:30 Closing remarks
Analysis of the Rongorongo Phenomenon of Rapa Nui: Suggestions
Regarding a Reorganization of the Core and Extended Rongorongo Corpus

19:00 Aperitivo