1. three exquisite corpse: form and content

2. Parts of speech Nouns (from latin nomen, “name”) A word for a person, place, thing, or action, or a class of person, place, thing, or action Examples: “examples”, “noun”, “George”, “Evanston”, “running”, “terrorist” Adjectives A word that modifies a noun Examples: “green”, “heavy”, “democratic” Determiners (or “articles”) Distinguish between a general versus a specific use of a noun Examples: “a”, “the”, “some”, “which” Verbs Words that express actions, changes, or states of being Examples: “go”, “went”, “is”, “love”, “has loved”

3. Exquisite corpse “Game of folded paper that consists in having a sentence or a drawing composed by several persons, each ignorant of the proceeding collaboration” 1939 Abridged Dictionary of Surrealism (as copied off the wall at the Art Institute of Chicago) A technique used by the early surrealists for creating unexpected combinations Produces sentences that are grammatically correct But semantically challeng(ing/ed) One of the first uses of chance operations in composition “the exquisite/corpse/will drink/the new/wine”

4. Exquisite corpse drawings Source: http://anexquisitecorpse.net/explanation.shtml

5. a more recent example

6. Class sentences The blue time bends the blue chocolate A pretty cardboard predicates the suicidal sheep The dirty muck becomes an elegant nugget The sonorous Norris University Center laments a collapsed sun

7. Syntax Fancy word for “grammar” Describes how a language is composed of phrases NounPhrase = determiner adjective noun the exquisite corpse a pickled monsoon VerbPhrase = verb NounPhrase eats a pickled monsoon Sentence = NounPhrase VerbPhrase the exquisite corpse eats a pickled monsoon Can have different alternatives for a type of phrase NounPhrase = noun | determiner noun | adjective noun | determiner adjective noun The “|” character here means “or else” an exquisite corpse bought the president

8. Phrase structure of a sentence Linguists notate phrase structure by bracketing: [ sentence [ NounPhrase the exquisite corpse] [ VerbPhrase [ verb will drink] [ NounPhrase the new wine]]] Or more readably … [ sentence [ NounPhrase the exquisite corpse] [ VerbPhrase [ verb will drink] [ NounPhrase the new wine]]]

9. Nested grammar Some verbs are followed by entire sentences VerbPhrase = verb | verb NounPhrase | verb Sentence [ Sentence [ NounPhrase We] [ VerbPhrase proclaim [ Sentence [ NounPhrase the exquisite corpse] [ VerbPhrase [ verb will drink] [ NounPhrase the new wine]]]]] This is called “nesting” or “recursion”

10. Referring expressions in English Phrases that refer to an object or objects “Robin” “James” “The TAs of this class” “the grad students of Ian” “the people in 324” “France” “capitalism” “The sum of 2 and 3” “The mother of the TA of this class” We’ll focus on two kinds Names (“Robin”, “Rob”, “France”, “capitalism”) Functional expressions (the X of Y)

11. A deeply nested referring expression “The mother of the mother of the grandfather of the father of the nation of the mother of the TA of this class” [the mother of [the mother of [the grandfather of [the father of [the nation of [the mother of [the TA of [this class]]]]]]]] Please forgive the sexist expression “father of the nation”

12. Meaning follows form “The mother of the mother of the grandfather of the father of the nation of the mother of the TA of this class” [the mother of [the mother of [the grandfather of [the father of [the nation of [the mother of [the TA of [this class]]]]]]]] Please forgive the sexist expression “father of the nation”

13. Meaning follows form “The mother of the mother of the grandfather of the father of the nation of the mother of the TA of this class” [the mother of [the mother of [the grandfather of [the father of [the nation of [the mother of [the TA of [this class]]]]]]]]CAT 380 Please forgive the sexist expression “father of the nation”

14. Meaning follows form “The mother of the mother of the grandfather of the father of the nation of the mother of the TA of this class” [the mother of [the mother of [the grandfather of [the father of [the nation of [the mother of [the TA ofRobin [this class]]]]]]]]CAT 380 Please forgive the sexist expression “father of the nation”

15. Meaning follows form “The mother of the mother of the grandfather of the father of the nation of the mother of the TA of this class” [the mother of [the mother of [the grandfather of [the father of [the nation of [the mother ofRobin’s mom [the TA ofRobin [this class]]]]]]]]CAT 380 Please forgive the sexist expression “father of the nation”

16. Meaning follows form “The mother of the mother of the grandfather of the father of the nation of the mother of the TA of this class” [the mother of [the mother of [the grandfather of [the father of [the nation ofThe United States [the mother ofRobin’s mom [the TA ofRobin [this class]]]]]]]]CAT 380 Please forgive the sexist expression “father of the nation”

17. Meaning follows form “The mother of the mother of the grandfather of the father of the nation of the mother of the TA of this class” [the mother of [the mother of [the grandfather of [the father ofGeorge Washington [the nation ofThe United States [the mother ofRobin’s mom [the TA ofRobin [this class]]]]]]]]CAT 380 Please forgive the sexist expression “father of the nation”

18. Meaning follows form “The mother of the mother of the grandfather of the father of the nation of the mother of the TA of this class” [the mother of [the mother of [the grandfather ofGeorge’s grandpa [the father ofGeorge Washington [the nation ofThe United States [the mother ofRobin’s mom [the TA ofRobin [this class]]]]]]]]CAT 380 Please forgive the sexist expression “father of the nation”

19. Meaning follows form “The mother of the mother of the grandfather of the father of the nation of the mother of the TA of this class” [the mother of [the mother ofGeorge’s great grandma [the grandfather ofGeorge’s grandpa [the father ofGeorge Washington [the nation ofThe United States [the mother ofRobin’s mom [the TA ofRobin [this class]]]]]]]]CAT 380 Please forgive the sexist expression “father of the nation”

20. Meaning follows form “The mother of the mother of the grandfather of the father of the nation of the mother of the TA of this class” [the mother ofGeorge’s great great grandma [the mother ofGeorge’s great grandma [the grandfather ofGeorge’s grandpa [the father ofGeorge Washington [the nation ofThe United States [the mother ofRobin’s mom [the TA ofRobin [this class]]]]]]]]CAT 380

21. Meaning follows form “The mother of the mother of the grandfather of the father of the nation of the mother of the TA of this class” TA mothernationfather grand- father mother CS-380 RobinRobin’s mom USA WashingtonWashington’s gdad W’s GD’s mom W’s GD’s gmom

22. What have we learned? Media have Structure/form/syntax Meaning/content/semantics The two are interdependent, but semi-autonomous Media are generative Their grammars can be filled in in an infinite number of ways People are incredibly good at extracting meaning, even from “meaningless” media Chance operations can produce interesting juxtapositions Specify a structure Fill in positions randomly (There are other ways of doing chance operations too…)

23. Syntax of meta We’ll be using a programming language called meta It has a very simple syntax (we’ll modify this later): Expression = word | number | “[“ Expressions … “]” Phrases are explicitly grouped using brackets Examples [box 10 10] [point 100 100] [line [point 100 100] [point 20 20]] We’ll talk about semantics next …

24. Our example in Meta “The mother of the mother of the grandfather of the father of the nation of the mother of the TA of this class” [mother-of [mother-of [grandfather-of [father-of [nation-of [mother-of [TA-of cs-380]]]]]]] TA mothernationfather grand- father mother CAT-380 Robin’s mom Robin’s gmom USA WashingtonWashington’s gdad W’s GD’s mom W’s GD’s gmom I don’t expect you to understand this yet

25. Or alternatively… “The mother of the mother of the grandfather of the father of the nation of the mother of the TA of this class” [with washington = [father-of [nation-of [mother-of [TA-of cs-380]]]] [mother-of [mother-of [grandfather-of washington]]] TA mothernationfather grand- father mother CAT-380 Robin’s mom Robin’s gmom USA WashingtonWashington’s gdad W’s GD’s mom W’s GD’s gmom