Discourse Architecture

1
Discourse Architecture Online Public Space and
Public Discourse UCSC/Center for Cultural
Studies/April 2003
Warren Sack Film Digital Media Department UC
Santa Cruz
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Talk Outline

• Discourse Architecture A Definition
• The Communication-As-Bit-Transmission Problem
• Three Questions
• What is software?
• How is the construction and (re)production of
  public space and public discourse imbricated in
  the architectures of software (and hardware)
  design?
• What kind of software can be written to
  critically reflect upon online public space and
  public discussion?
• Demos
• Spin Doctor
• Questioning the News
• Conversation Map
• Open Source Browser
• Street Stories
• Translation Map
• Conclusions Technologies of Discourse Self

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Software Spin Doctor
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Software Questioning the News
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Input Questioning the News
FRENCH EMBASSY IN TOGO TURNS DOWN VISAS FOR 80 OF
MOBUTU ENTOURAGE   LOME, Togo (AP) 05-21
155845 -- More than half of ousted Zairian
dictator Mobutu Sese Seko's entourage were denied
visas to France, a French embassy official said
Wednesday. With Togo's leaders pressing Mobutu to
go, France is the most likely destination for the
autocrat on the run, but French officials have
repeatedly said that he has not yet turned to
them for refuge. Mobutu and members of his
extended family fled from his jungle retreat in
Zaire's north on Sunday, as rebels loyal to the
country's new leader, Laurent Kabila, closed in.
Since then, he has been joined by other members
of his family and close aides, bringing the
number of his entourage in this West African
country to 155. His son, Kongulu, arrived Monday
night from Brazzaville, Republic of Congo, with
84 members of Mobutu's extended family. Of those,
Togolese authorities would only let in five --
including Kongulu -- leaving the other 80 at the
airport. ...
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Output Questioning the News
NOMINALIZATION QUESTION(S) Who leads
what? PRESUPPOSITION QUESTION(S) If leaders
are pressing Mobutu, (2a) Did leaders compact
Mobutu? (2b) Did leaders pack together
Mobutu? (2c) Did leaders wring out Mobutu? (2d)
Did leaders squeeze out Mobutu? (2e) Or, Did
leaders compress Mobutu? IMPLICATION
QUESTION(S) Did officials really say he has not
yet turned to them for refuge?
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Demo Conversation Map

• Conversation Map summarizing and visualizing
  very large-scale conversations (e.g., newsgroups)

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Demo Open Source Browser

• Open Source Project Browser summarizing and
  visualizing email CVS logs
• Nicolas Ducheneaut, Ph.D. student, UCB PARC
  Research Scientist

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Open Source Project

• Open Source Software Development as Learning
  Environment
• Dilan Mahendran and Nicolas Ducheneaut, Ph.D.
  students
• John Canny, CS Division Steven Weber,Political
  Science Department and Bob Cole, Haas Business
  School, UC Berkeley. Also, Dr. Francoise
  Detienne, INRIA, France and related work with
  Paul Pangaro, Elaine Coleman, and Rachel
  Strickland at Sun Microsystems.

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Software/Hardware Street Stories

• Street Stories wireless GPS device for
  archiving and accessing audio-based, community
  stories
• Mahad Ibrahim, Ph.D. student Craig Rixford and
  Mike Kim, masters students, Seema Moorjani,
  undergrad

11
With Sawad Brooks Projects

• Translation Map Sociotechnical protocol and
  visualization for coordinating geographic and
  linguistic translation
• with Sawad Brooks

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Conclusions

• Reinventing conversation The term Dialectic
  originates from the Greek expression for the art
  of conversation.
• Related work in art and philosophy
• Digital Dialectics (MIT Press) Peter Lunenfeld
  (Art Center) et al.
• Digital Compositing Digital compositing
  exemplifies a more general operation of computer
  culture assembling together a number of
  elements to create a single seamless object." Lev
  Manovich (UCSD), The Language of New Media (MIT
  Press)
• Meta-Morphing (UC Press) Vivian Sobchack (UCLA)
  et al.
• Montage ? Suture e.g., Sergei Eisenstein, A
  Dialectical Approach to Film Form
• Changing the self Individuals, groups,
  villages, nations, nation states, social
  movements, VLSC, etc.
• Conversation/dialectics as technology of the self
• Sherry Turkle called the computer the second
  self
• Foucault provides a long genealogy of
  technologies of the self.