Hala Alani 
Riem Ibrahim In the 1960s, Iraqi designer, calligrapher, poet, and editor Muhammad Sa‘id Al Saggar introduced the Simplified Arabic Alphabet, a radical typographic system intended to resolve the structural incompatibilities between Arabic script and modern typesetting machines. By proposing a streamlined script architecture, Al Saggar envisioned a future in which Arabic could fully participate in contemporary publishing technologies without forfeiting its legibility or cultural depth.
Yet what began as a functional design intervention quickly became politically charged. Al Saggar’s Simplified Arabic Alphabet was condemned by conservative circles as a betrayal of cultural heritage, while nationalist factions viewed it as an innovation to be instrumentalized. In 1973, the system was adopted by Al-Thawra, the official newspaper of the ruling Ba‘ath Party, which sought to align itself with progressive, forward-looking projects to reinforce its modernist image. Despite this, Al Saggar firmly resisted affiliation with the regime, whose ideological agenda clashed with his personal beliefs. His refusal, however, was met with mounting pressure. Under threat and coercion, he was forced to implement and oversee the use of his script for nearly five years during the early Saddam era, an experience that would ultimately contribute to his exile in Paris. There, removed from the apparatus of state control, he continued to develop experimental scripts and refine his vision for Arabic typography. Al Saggar continued to write, design, and develop experimental scripts such as Al Basri and Al Nabati, yet his contributions remain largely absent from canonical design histories.
This presentation — part of a broader research initiative and forthcoming bilingual monograph (Khatt Foundation, Arabic Design Library) — draws on newly recovered archival materials and oral histories to reconstruct Al Saggar’s journey: one marked by innovation, controversy, and displacement. Positioned within the Blank Screen subtheme, it confronts the mechanisms of prosecution of Arab designers and eliminating their contributions from global design discourse.
By revisiting Al Saggar’s Simplified Arabic Alphabet not only as a technical achievement, but as a politically consequential act of reform, the talk highlights the profound stakes of typographic experimentation in contested cultural terrains. It makes the case for historiographic reclamation as a form of resistance, illuminating how scripts can function as both instruments of emancipation and targets of suppression.