The Story Behind the Story | Christine Alicia Di Pasquale presents ‘Obsolete No More’

“Obsolete No More: Cursive Makes a Comeback” is an animated interactive website about a mature woman coming into her own power as she fights back against the patriarchal systems that rewarded her when she was young but now threaten to derail her carefully curated life.

The story opens after Cursive has been deemed obsolete and laid off from her publishing job, while her male counterpart has been promoted and deemed always relevant. With the help of new young friends and rivals, Cursive turns the tables, leaving everyone around her stunned but not shocked at her ingenuity, adaptability and business acumen.

Cursive inhabits a world of rapidly evolving communication modes, where the mediums that carry messages come to life as characters. She is a once dominant but fading script. Her beau and rival is the ubiquitous Print, and her bosses are the computer codes HTML and UNIX. Her replacements are a Dolphin GIF and the enthusiastic Emoji Chorus, and her mentor in regaining her footing is the largely invisible but still relevant Latin language. As she navigates change, Cursive must choose between returning to the systems that discarded her and forging a new path for herself. She must decide whether to embrace her young rivals or view them as enemies to be vanquished. Ultimately Cursive chooses a combination of old and new—adapting and growing not just wiser but more nimble, creative and free.

Journalist and essayist Christine Alicia Di Pasquale has been producing award-winning nonfiction stories for nearly 20 years. Through the MFA Visual Narrative program, she has elevated her visual communication skills and expanded her storytelling expertise to include animated fiction. Her goal is to pursue a new career as a multimedia story editor.

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