Secrets of Handwriting: A Philosophical and Anthropological Narrative
Authors:   St. Petersburg State University of Aerospace Instrumentation, Sankt-Peterburg, Russian Federation, Kravchenko V.I. 
Published: February 2025

Introduction. Graphology, as an interdisciplinary science, includes not only psychology, but also philosophical anthropology, allowing you to “see” the features of your personality in a person by signature and handwriting. People differ from each other not in individual character traits, but in ways of combining them. When a person puts his signature on any document, he leaves personal data about himself, allowing us to judge his mental and social qualities. The author, based on a number of previous studies and on the materials of his own developments, reveals the philosophical, anthropological and cultural aspects of graphology as an interdisciplinary science. Content. In modern graphology, much attention is paid to the slant of handwriting, the shape of letters, the presence of punctuation marks and a number of other elements of writing that make up the shape of handwriting. The writer is likened to a screenwriter and director who creates a virtual world in various forms, focusing on the perception of reality around him. At the same time, graphology is closely related to other social disciplines (philosophy, psychology, sociology) and, regardless of the level of its recognition, it is a certain cultural reality. Graphology can be described as a science because of its vital relevance. In the history of society, writing often passed into the hands of hired scribes who wrote quite freely. Individuality thus gained more freedom to express itself in handwritten graphics. In Russia, researchers associate the emergence of the possibilities of individual (personal) handwriting with the appearance of cursive writing and refer to the XVII century. It became known about Russian graphologists-researchers since the end of the nineteenth century. It should be noted that handwriting is one of the forms of the anthropological existence of a personality, therefore, some systematic interest in it is possible in developed handwritten cultures, when there are grounds to talk about the personality as a special semantic and cultural unit. In order to understand some essential features of graphology as an intellectual behavior, it is important to remember that it is historically an earlier form of attention to a person than scientific psychology. The modern age of digital technologies has naturally combined scientific psychology and graphology, which has determined the possibility of a new approach to the study of man as a generic being - from the point of view of psychography.

Conclusions. Modern graphology studies the laws of dependence between handwriting (signature) and personal qualities of a person. Handwriting, as a person “mirror of the soul”, cannot but contain all that latent, which lies in the mental development of mankind in general and of an individual in particular. Any type of letters, drawings, shapes, etc. can be graphologically analyzed, regardless of which part of the body (foot, hand, or teeth a person left his mark on paper). In modern conditions, the graphological method is one of the tools of philosophical and anthropological knowledge of man.