The uppercase version consists of the two slanting sides of a triangle, crossed in the middle by a horizontal bar. The lowercase version is often written in one of two forms: the double-storey |a| and single-storey |ɑ|.
Capital letters were written first; and lower-case letters evolved as writing needed to speed up – some have a completely different character (e.g., A/a, E/e, Q/q, R/r) andare simply a smaller version of the upper-case letter (e.g., P/p, S/s, W/w).
LETTER STONE Inscriptions in stone slabs from Egypt, including this specimen dating to almost 3,500 years ago, contain the world's oldest alphabet, which one researcher now argues was an early form of Hebrew. New translations of these inscriptions contain references to figures from the Bible, including Moses.
“Gen Z often favors lowercase text in both personal communication and branding because it feels more casual, authentic and conversational. It aligns with the way they text and communicate on platforms like TikTok and Instagram, where lowercase has become a visual cue for informality and relatability.”
Schools had limited time, limited resources, and tough choices to make about what skills mattered most. Cursive looked optional compared with “21st-century skills.” So cursive got cut. And when 45 states decided not to teach it individually, a whole generation grew up without it.
The character 'á' (or 'Á') is called A with an acute accent, or simply A-acute, and the mark itself is the acute accent (´). This diacritic is used in many languages like Spanish, Portuguese, Czech, and Irish to show a stressed syllable, a different vowel sound (often longer or higher-pitched), or for other phonetic/grammatical reasons, depending on the language.
“Lowercase feels like an ongoing conversational tone without a start or end,” she says. “It removes the serious tone certain texts can exude, even without trying.” Ruweyda Hilowle, 24, has also turned her back on capitals. “I text in lowercase because it feels more relaxed,” she says.
The letter was originally an A with a lowercase e on top, which was later stylized to two dots. In other languages that do not have the letter as part of the regular alphabet or in limited character sets such as US-ASCII, Ä is frequently replaced with the two-letter combination "Ae".
The most common letter is no surprise to most people: It's E, and it's immediately followed by another vowel, A. And those letters are much, much more popular than the final two letters in the OED's list, which are J and Q.
Because although they might not use spell check as much as us or rely on it as much, they still get the knowledge of how to spell—it isn't any less.” Many of the studies proposing Gen-Z's spelling errors mention social media as an explanation for syntax mistakes.
According to graphology*, ALL-CAPS writers have some personality traits in common. They are typically uncomfortable talking about their personal lives or do not want others to know too much about themselves.
The Seattle Times notes Black as “belonging to people who are part of the African diaspora.” They capitalize Black because it reflects shared cultures and experiences.
People write 'z' as a '3' (or a cursive 'z' looks like a '3') due to shared origins with the Greek letter Zeta (Ζ) in both Latin and Cyrillic alphabets, creating similar fluid, looping shapes in handwriting, and sometimes to distinguish it from other letters like '2' or 'y', with some variations like the ezh (Ʒ) in Slavic languages looking identical to '3'.
The first two symbols in the Phoenician alphabet were ʾālep and bēt, which were translated to alpha and beta in the Greek alphabet… which were combined in the word alphabet! We might think it sounds childish to call them the ABCs, but really the word itself just means A-B.
Gen Z struggles with cursive because the Common Core Standards (2010) removed mandatory cursive instruction, shifting focus to keyboarding and technology, leaving many without foundational skills for reading old documents or even personal notes, making it seem foreign like hieroglyphics to them. While some states reintroduced it, the gap in consistent education left many unable to decipher cursive handwriting, impacting historical research and personal connection to past writings.
The rarest letter in the English alphabet is generally considered to be Q, closely followed by Z, J, and X, though the exact order can vary slightly by text, with 'Q' appearing as low as 0.1% of the time and 'J' being the only letter that doesn't end a native English word.
The spelling for the numbers 1 through 10 are: One, Two, Three, Four, Five, Six, Seven, Eight, Nine, and Ten, which are fundamental number words used in English for counting and basic arithmetic.