Networking Counter Language 1.0
For this piece I was interested in trying to learn more about how our language works and adapts with new forms of communication such as Twitter. In particular, I was entertained by the idea of how swear words might infect our culture of language, and at what point are they really no longer faux pas but common place. Contrary to the common place, the question also posed the question of what the usage of words that might be seen as more vulgar and hurtful. The end result was surprising and is fascinating to watch grow while contemplating how often these words are actually used in spoken language versus the other world of Twitter.
Networked Words
This was my first piece using the Processing language to code such an applet being that this quarter also marked the beginning of my work with Processing. Though it though, I’ve found the possibilities of Processing in combination with OpenGL to be incredibly vast, and am eager to take this version 1.0 and refine it into a more adaptable machine of understanding. It’s ability to breakthrough to active sources of data is really quite incredible, allowing a work of art to maybe even become culturally aware.
The visual image of which this piece represents is constructed of a series of cones whose size is determined by the percentage of an assigned words usage through twitter in comparison to its counterparts. In this way we are able to explore questions of the significance and/or destruction a swear word might have within society. It is interesting to watch the piece develop though, because as the form takes on the different averages of size; the words the one might expect to be used with the greatest frequency are significant but the ones we might like to think are not so prevalent are as well. In a sort of way we are observing a cultural subconscious act in a way it might truly desire but is afraid to actually portray publicly, or maybe it is who our culture really is seen from a layer within.
Structuring the shape
