For a Labor History of Typography

For a Labor History of Typography with J. Dakota Brown Co-presented by Book Arts & Special Collections, San Francisco Public Library In recent years, graphic designers have presented challenges to dominant narratives within institutions of their discipline. Amid a range of intensifying social crises, long-neglected questions about working conditions and the nature of capitalism have become unavoidable. This lecture, drawing on J. Dakota Brown’s recently completed dissertation research, argues for a new history of typographical labor. Shifting attention from the professional canon to the tools and techniques of everyday practice, Brown surveys a repressed saga of labor militancy, profit-driven automation, and anti-capitalist critique. Our concluding discussion explores the present-day echoes of this complex and contradictory legacy: What would it mean for graphic designers to locate themselves in a labor history of typography? This and all Letterform Lectures are a public