User:Andre castro/Annotation/Language
Florian Cramer - Laguage
In his essay entitled Language Florian Cramer begins by attempting to define what computer languages are and how they differentiate and relate to common human languages. Cramer concludes that "computer control languages are a formal (and as such rather primitive) subset of common human languages"(p.168). Like the association of phonemes to concepts in a natural language, the association of signs to machine operation instructions is simply a convention, therefore computer control languages are "a cultural compromise between the constrains of the machine design [...] and the equally subjective user preferences"(p.169)
Cramer goes on mentioning that computer control languages, when executed, allow words to perform actions, such as in magic practices, but these actions are only formal and restricted to the computer. Unlike a performative speech act, such as judge pronouncing a verdict, computer control languages "become performative only through the social impact of the processes they trigger"(p.170).
Cramer also note that for a computer all information is syntactical language, since digitalizing means to transform an analog event into sequences of numbers.
Cramer concludes his paper by stating that software is not simply code, but the cultural practices of its employment and appropriation. Never-the-less, as code is the constitutive fabric of software, in order to think critically about computers one cannot avoid understand the control languages that make them up.
Cramer, Florian (2008). Language. In: Fuller, M. Software Studies: a lexicon. London: The MIT Press. 168-174.
important quotes
- code and performativity
"The execution of a computer control language is purely formal; it is the manipulation of the machine, not a social performance based on human convetions such as accepting a verdict. Computer laguages become performative only through the social impact of the processes they trigger, specially when their outputs aren't critically checked. [...]as in the 1987 New York Stock Exchange crash that involved a chain traction of "sell" recommendations by day trading software" (pp. 170-171)
- code as control/power - to understand software on need to understand code
"Software as whole is not only "code" but a symbolic form involving cultural practices of its employment and appropriation. But since writing in a computer control language is what materailly makes up software, critical thinking about computer is not possible without an informed understanding of the structural formalism of its control languages."(p.173)