Indigenous North American Type

Indigenous languages in North America aren’t just linguistically diverse—they also feature unique writing scripts and distinct typographies not found anywhere else in the world. Despite the high number of living Indigenous languages and their graphic richness, Indigenous communities continue to face widespread challenges with typographic expression, as well as accessing and using their languages on essential digital platforms. The fonts which do support rendering requirements for a given language are few in number and only offer limited styles. 

In honor of Designed to Be Red: Native American & Indigenous Poster Works, join Poster House for a virtual lecture with designer Kevin King, who will discuss how the type design company Typotheque conducts research on both the technical barriers and typographic preferences for individual Indigenous communities. Typotheque engages in community-based partnerships to research technical roadblocks and to identify typographic preferences with local readers, exploring new possibilities for typographic expression.

King will discuss the research process, technical considerations, and design methodologies behind this work. He will also explain how this research informs the development and expansion of typefaces for Indigenous language communities in North America.

Kevin King is a typeface designer, typographer, calligrapher, and type researcher based in Canada. His work focuses on font support and research for minority languages, working directly with Indigenous communities in North America to support their language revitalization and preservation efforts. Through his work collaborating with Typotheque, he has contributed to reforming the text standardization for the Unified Canadian Syllabics in the Unicode Standard through character additions and representative glyph revisions. In conjunction with his type design work, he maintains a calligraphy practice, teaching workshops and lecturing on both subjects in Canada and Europe.

Typotheque is a Netherlands-based type design company, recognized as an international expert in multilingual typography and the creation of innovative font solutions for both global and local audiences.

Accessibility Note: This online event will be hosted on Zoom with attendees’ cameras off. A recording of this event will be made available to all registered attendees. Automated closed captioning will be provided. ASL (American Sign Language) interpretation or a CART (Communication Access Realtime Translation) is available upon request. Please contact access@posterhouse.org or (914) 295-2387 to request interpretation services and to address any other accessibility needs. For other event-related questions, please contact events@posterhouse.org.