Calendars:XPUB/XPUB Calendar/15-09-2025 -Event 1

XPUB1: SI #28

Link to the SI #28 program in full here: Writing Machines–Protocols–Feedback

Monday 15 September

10 - 13: Meet at WORM

14-17: Afternoon session (in the Aquarium)

Image: Living Brain, Marvel Comics (1964). See also The Living Brain by cybernetician W. Grey Walters (Second edition, 1963)

14-15:Steve Rushton will introduce the project

+ introduction to the reader WritingMachines Reader
+ introduction to protocols
+ Adjective, Noun, Verb, adverb = making writing machines

15-16:Thematic: The alphabet is software.

Three useful concepts: "uncreative writing"; "cognitive assemblages" and “technotexts”.

In Uncreative Writing, Managing Language in the Digital Age (2011), Kenneth Goldsmith writes: “The world is full of texts, more or less interesting; I do not wish to add any more.” [...] "faced with an unprecedented amount of available text, the problem is not needing to write more of it; instead, we must learn to negotiate the vast quantity that exists.”
In Postprint (2021) – Introducing Postprint, N. Katherine Hayles discusses the concept of "cognitive assemblages", which are "the complex, distributed networks of humans, technology, and environments that collectively perform cognitive functions."
In Writing Machines (2002) – N. Katherine Hayles introduces the concept of “technotext,”, which is: “a literary work that reflects within itself the technological conditions of its composition and production.”
In this session we will draw of historical examples from The Oulipo Group, William Burroughs and Brion Gysin's cut-up works along with examples from Lillian-Yvonne Bertram and Nick Montford's – Output – an Anthology of Computer Generated Text 1953-2023 (2024). We will discuss how these works relate to the idea of humans and machines writing together within "cognitive assemblages" and to what degree these examples represent "technotexts".

16-17: making writing machines