Etc Portal to Contamination

etc filter as an entry point to look into rejected space which can be a starting point

An etc filter as an entry point/door to address/look into negative space/rejected space which can be a starting point, yet to be defined.

overview

In the beginning, Gersande's(G) interest in the rejection list was 'rejection as a starting point', and Chae(C)'s was: 'rejection as a turning point-a trigger for an action/a change/a different direction'.
C was stuck with the word, 'et cetera' because:
1) MICHEL FOUCAULT Order of Things (Preface)
2) she was curious to look into what goes under this ambiguous et cetera(and others) boundary.
G's interest started from the work of an AI researcher, Sennay Gebhreab.
As C and G were learning how to analyze/process txt. files and categorize/structurize using NLTK functions for several weeks, C and G thought what if we shine a light on the usage of 'etc.' which is usually neglected in text and dialogues. With an intention to see 'et cetera' as a negative space, C and G invite ppl to negative space where concept/a word/.../ resides, and encourage readers to imagine what concept/a word/.../ is under that space in an attempt to reflect our way of talking, our way of categorizing and our way of writing text.

week 7, 1st of November / Prototyping

During the class, Manetta and Michael introduced us to the concept of corpora and filter. C and G were in a group (cuz we were sitting next to each other(=´∀｀)人(´∀｀=)) and we started a discussion about our interest in regards to the topic of 'rejection'. G mentioned Sennay Gebhreab(will be filled in) who focuses on the racial bias in A.I. and the relation between colonialism and technology.(maybe not correct.. G, plz feel free to edit) C talked about her fascination with the 'other' category and et cetera.

During the class, Manetta helped C and G to write code that goes through the NLTK corpus('mobydick', 'pride and prejudice', etc.)

etc filter

C and G's intention was:
1) make a et cetera & co filter
2) to give readers a context, not only print/return the target sentence(a sentence that contains etc.) but also print/return previous and next to the target sentence
3) ...(to be continued...)

here are some snippets from G and C's Jupyter notebook.

from nltk.corpus import Gutenberg
gutenberg.fileids()
print(body)
counter = 0 etcetera = ['et cetera', ' etc ', ' etc.', '...', '[...]', 'and-so-on', 'and-so-forth', 'and others', 'et al.', 'and all the rest', 'and on and on', 'along with others']

for sentence in body:

   for cet in etcetera:
       sentence_str = " ".join(sentence)
       sentence_punc = sentence_str.replace(" ,", ",").replace(" .", ".").replace(" ;", ";")
       
       if cet in sentence_punc:
           prev_sentence = body[counter - 1]
           target_sentence = sentence_punc
           nex_sentence = body[counter + 1]
           print(prev_sentence, target_sentence, nex_sentence)
           print('______')

Our first result was this: ...(to be continued...)

week 8, 8th of November / Prototyping

Before class

before the prototyping class, G and C had a meeting about what they thought about et cetera. This meeting was a brainstorming session for both of us.

During class

G and C learned how to make input-etc etherpad and output-etc etherpad using API!! C IS SUPER EXCITED ABOUT THIS METHOD.

Input Etc
Output Etc

week 8, 9th of November / Class with Cristina

After having a check-in moment and group discussion with Cristina from 10:00 - 17:30(!!), G and C agreed on the following things:

1) filter etc & co
→ synonyms
→ gate to the negative space
in notebook/logbook (Jupyter-like layout),

2) Run the filter etc & co
→ use the filter to find negative space in content online(things that we wrote in etherpads, NLTK corpora, references gathered by XPUB1 and Cristina, Steve, Manetta, and Michael)

3) yet-to-be-named-publication
→ physical publication
→ annotations/updates can go back to the notebook
→ logbook as intro
→ the instructions
→ negative space waiting to be filled

4) And others(Mainly documentation)
→ track and tracing nomadic publication
→ C and G delivery service, pick-up
→ hand-to-hand
→ last reader/author chooses the next one

...back to number 1), full circle ⥀