home

Recreating the World through Imaginative Language

by Roberto Lavidez

Imagine. Imagine the possibility of changing the world. Imagine having the power to influence worldviews by speaking a poetic language that defies strict rules of grammar and creates new meanings out of combining words, forming never been used phrases like “rapturous nimbus of vernal alcohol” or “rapscallion Rasores rashly versifying nirvana”.

Imagine the creative autonomy of each one speaking a private language as unique as one’s own original thought, giving a whole new meaning to the expression speaking one’s mind.

Imagine words like a variety of flowers you gather and arrange according to your aesthetic taste without being ridiculed for delivering ‘flowery words’.

Imagine words freeing up your thoughts and not being confined to the structures of official grammar constructed by colonials or so called masters of civilization. You and I remain in the periphery of political discourses because the language of domination is eloquently spoken by those who claim authority and property of words. Imagine however if distant voices were heard, respected and accounted for in cultivating diversity as opposed to sterilizing cultures by filtering differences and homogenizing values.

As a colonized subject I could identify with the struggle of conquered voices. The English language subjugates the native consciousness by imposing Western values through the rigors of education. His ethnicity is subordinated by the very universality of English, a language of superiority and hegemony. The voice of the colonized is obliterated by the lingua franca of international political, economic and cultural interactions. Voices that are different are silenced. They lie beyond the linguistic zone of exclusion. Important voices from around the world cannot be heard because they don’t speak in the language of the Western Academy. A critique of the language should foster creativity to dismantle barriers of communication and forge a dialogical proposition of inclusion.

And so I have embarked on this poetry and pictorial composition called webstructionism that reflect a thought process, pushing the boundaries of reason to create a conflictive space within the domain of the ‘universal English’ and show how a linguistic fun game might allow us to rethink and reshape the real but myopic world. Webstructionism aims to decentre the center through the language of the center. I am not advocating that we all should abandon contemporary speech in favor of poetry or webstructionism for that matter. What I am suggesting is that through poetry as a language game we can identify alternative visions. We can draw upon the innovative nature of the aesthetic to rethink deeply entrenched and often narrowly conceived approaches to understanding the world.

So how did this webstructionism come about? Where did it come from?

The experimental concept evolved from tearing pages of an English dictionary and pasting them indiscriminately on a blank canvas. Random words taken from the pasted torn dictionary pages are then collected to form phrases link them to other phrases until a verse is completed. The verse does not necessarily evoke a thought in the literal sense or follow a logical structure. The words that make up the verse are then connected by drawing lines following the sequence of their relative use to expressing a webstruction thought. The lines interconnecting words from the verse now serve as a scaffold or pattern for painting. Swirling lines weaving through selected words are painted to create the visual abstraction.

The concept is in a flux as there is no direct relation to an experience of the outside world or a documentation of a perceived reality. What the artist sees in his mind is the image projected by his understanding of the words and how they play out during the construction of ideas.

Webstructionism in both versification and abstraction follows Wittgenstein’s argument on the grain of truth that the nonsensical possibly carries in contrast to what is deemed sensible only by the strict rules of grammar. The ungrammaticalities and their nonsensicality have a dimension of depth to them and hence are important as opposed to trivial nonsense. The mysterious way words are versified and have taken shape in pictorial sense asserts itself in a conscious effort to make a meaningful collage out of random words and intuitive application of colors. The result is neither static nor crystalline for the meaning is effusive. The initial verse can branch out into various interpretations as far as webstruction can possibly allow.

Same goes with the compositional structure rooted in word connections. The fluidity of its pattern traces the workings of unbridled mind; the force of the line emanates from the sequencing of words without obstruction. To explore the unexplored, that’s the goal. Imaginative webstructionist activity refuses the straitjacketing of thoughts to encounter realities through vocabularies that stretch beyond the borders of rationality. What we should realize is that we have been operating within someone else’s final vocabulary all along. We are deluding ourselves to think that the imagination is sovereign unless the imaginative activity of the mind has the rebellious spirit that severs its ties to reality described by memory.

The webstruction exercise is not an attempt to popularize theories of evolution of language in which case the question of how it evolves remains a mystery. If rationalists and empiricists are still arguing about the origin of language, poetic extrapolations from existing words will just have to go on unimpeded by linguistic theories. There is no point to discuss at this stage how metaphorical language works if studies on man’s ability to use language have scientifically only determined its relative complexity over that used by non humans. The school of thought explaining how we manage to create syntactic sentences assumes that the human brain is ‘hardwired’, that humans possess an innate ability or an access to what has been called a ‘universal grammar’ not to be confused with universal English.

A certain organ in the brain can tell the source of linguistic abilities shared by man and chimpanzee but the evolution of ideas cannot be ascertained as to how man accumulated vocabularies or how complicated we think we think compared to how other species communicate. Through natural selection mental faculties have blossomed that enables man to speak and comprehend languages.

Imaginative activity is the least studied in terms of qualitative analysis. To investigate the why and the how ideas are formed in the mind of an abstract painter or a surrealist poet is problematic from the stance of defending universality of language. Measuring craniums and brain matter for comparative analysis is a dead end route for scientists whose antiquated method bears haunting influence of eugenics.

Art asks questions and science is supposed to supply the answers. The problem is when scientists do not acknowledge or are inept to recognize the novelty of questions posed by the more imaginative. If say an artist in tuned with nature suspects that a bird is poetic in its own way the scientist would readily dismiss it as ridiculous assumption. Birds don’t speak, don’t write, and don’t poeticize. The hierarchy of linguistic capabilities remains to be the domain of man and English language being the property of dominators of civilization and precursors of globalization. The irrational assumption that birds are poets ostracizes the artist as possessing a ‘birdbrain’. The testing of intelligence stops at studying the responses to sensory stimuli for which birds rank low amongst non humans. It does not venture into decoding bird songs since words do not apply. It makes the subject difficult for scientific study thereby hampering the study of creativity for humans as well. Unfamiliar syntax is considered nonsensical therefore useless to go through an in-depth study. What cannot be graphed in mathematical terms is thrown out the window of the lab.

Cognition and behaviors measured by Anglo centric science preclude the understanding of phenomena outside the monolithic culture that shapes the language. The many uses of a dominant language are confused with the functions of the brain. Ill equipped scientists whose hubris overshadows imagination mistakenly linked English proficiency to level of intelligence. In the history of I.Q. testing, the lack of knowledge of the English language posed a problem to new immigrants arriving in Canada. The Sexual Sterilization Act of Alberta enacted in 1928 unfairly categorized immigrants with marginal English skills as having impaired intellectual functioning based on their I.Q. test scores. As a result, many of those sterilized under the Sexual Sterilization Act were immigrants. The eugenics inspired Act peaked during the Depression blaming defective breeding to explain for the financial problems of the nation. An immigrant with poor English skills who failed the I.Q. test then categorized as subhuman became the perfect scapegoat. Since the yardstick used for determining intelligence was a language not spoken by immigrants, examiners blinded by their faith in the English language equated it with mental superiority thereby dehumanizing English deficient subjects as having ‘birdbrains’.

Webstructionism underscores the set of rules governing what on face value seems jabberwocky verbiage. The activity of language as a game is played by the inventor of the game. The private meaning becomes accessible by explaining the structural component of the language game. Now imagine if the phrases germinating from webstruction are used in pragmatic communication evoking multiple semantics and nuances. Decoding the language would subject the users of conventional English today to an ordeal not unlike that of the ‘nitwit’ immigrant. Imagine if the self directed evolution were initiated by webstructionists, the coded message embedded in concatenations will not be distinguished by English speakers themselves whose cognition of symbolic language is close to nil. Their interpretation of meaning would bear no resemblance to the intransitive Meaning in the webstruction language. Non webstructionists would fail the test and suffer the consequential damnation of eugenics.

Wiittgenstein gives us some examples of the many different uses language has; giving orders and obeying them; describing to appearance of an object; constructing an object from a description (a drawing); reporting an event; speculating about an event; forming and testing a hypothesis; presenting the results of an experiment in a diagram; making up a story; play-acting; singing catches; guessing riddles; telling a joke, solving a problem in practical arithmetic; translating from one language to another; asking, thanking, cursing, greeting, praying. What do telling jokes and saying prayers or obeying speed limits have in common? It is pointless to insist on a common denominator if what it means and what it signifies have different uses. There is no general theory of language that encompasses language. Wittgenstein found that the varieties of linguistic usage of words in many cases pointed to a ‘family resemblance’ between them rather than one single essential meaning.

Webstructionism transforms words like a chameleon adapting to a world being conceived. Finite materials of ungrammaticalities are fashioned to create a world that opens up to possibilities, chance encounters leading to a pregnancy of possibles. Words are the ground of all things. They are imaginary expressions that synthesize the unseen and what is perceived.

Merleau-Ponty sought to establish the real and the imaginary as two separate but corresponding realms. A central theme in his philosophy is the dialogical nature of imagination. It is by means of the imagination that we are able to free ourselves from ordinary experience and explore a world of possibility. He differed from Sartre in arguing that the fact that the image is an intentionality different from all other modes of consciousness does not mean that it is some sort of negative entity. To Sartre, there is no interior except me, and every other is exteriority. To Merleau-Ponty, imagination is both a presence in absence and an absence in presence. It does not just create an image as a ruse for making the absent present. It elicits vision – much in the same way marrow elicits the growth of a bone. The artwork serves in some sense as a ‘blueprint of the genesis of things’.

The process of webstructionism can be related to dream work reminiscent of the principle of expansion. The meaning that germinates from the original syntax together with the possibility of expanding the text to accommodate further additions of vocabularies signifies the morphing characteristic of language. The transitive nature of every word either completes a meaning or unravels a cache of meanings by its association with other words.

What determines the use of webstruction as poetic device is what constitutes the meaning of an utterance. The intended task is to find meaningful cosmos out of metaphorical chaos during the practice of webstructionism. The incorporeal frame of mind seeks reinvention of subjectivity in the dual exercise of intuitive construction- reflective deconstruction of the text. Words are in a flux and the contemplation of its expression, extricating from one dimensionalities and penetrating into different metabolisms of organic language present themselves as cells of resistance against despotism of socially stratified narratives. Instead of avoiding the disquieting strangeness of generated thoughts from imaginative praxis, a creative imperative to enrich the world by re-composition of generalized matrix becomes the authentic goal of communication.

Metaphor is constitutive of reality. There exists a confluence of speech and reality whereby they constitute each other. It is in the metaphoric mode that we experience life as form. It provides the fabric within which we come to know the world. Wittgenstein stresses language-games as ‘providing the hinges for our interaction with the world.’ The world takes on its reality in relation to human existence, grounding language in general and metaphoric speech in particular within the broader spectrum of human activity.

Webstructionism brings imaginative activity to the fore of salvaging dormant thoughts embedded in wayward words to loosen or tighten the screws of language-games that ‘provide those hinges with the world.’ It is an odd tool for a task of measuring systems of communication that requires precision but the rough-edged ‘imprecise’ language generates fresh insight that makes opening of the door to the world more inviting.

WEBSTRUCTIONISM SERIES

by Roberto Lavidez (Author, Poet, Artist)

The creative dimension of language use presupposes that man can generate and transform word combinations and grammatical structures that have never been heard or spoken before. Sentences and phrases that may have no exact parallels in previous English usage can be created and understood. This rationalist view, in contrast to the empiricist, argues that not all knowledge is derived from and determined by sense experience. It supports the theory of innate ideas whereby some knowledge can result from the inherent structures of the mind. Though external stimulation is necessary to awaken innate capacities, it does not necessarily mean that ideas and concepts result completely from external impressions.

Chomskyan theory is in direct contrast to the Lockean theory of the mind. The generative ability of man is what Chomsky argues is universally present in all human language and thus also in all mankind. He argues that man by being intrinsically creative is capable of understanding and generating different and unique forms of expression. In Chomsky’s words, “the speaker of the language knows a great deal that he has not learned.” On the other hand, the mind, in Locke’s view is tamquam tabula rasa. It is like a clean tablet or slate upon which nothing has been written. All reflection is ultimately dependent upon sense perception. The mind, in this view, has no autonomy or creativity. It is totally impressionable and completely determined by sense impressions.

In recognizing these two contrasting positions elucidating the workings of the mind, webstructionism seeks to underscore the creative mental process of forming never been used phrases derived from random extraction of words. I have embarked on this experimental concept of gathering torn pages of a dictionary, pasting them indiscriminately on canvas to generate a pictorial composition which I call webstructionism. Without a fixed pattern or preconceived idea of how the phrase will turn out I rely on the power of intuition in combining words that normally wouldn’t be selected to express a thought in the real sense. Though Castaneda’s Guise theory also regards things in the imagination as thought similar to thoughts about real things in the world, phrases in Webstructionism fundamentally speaking, preclude any reference to immediate reality.

There is an otherworldly reality inhabiting the canvas space where the arbitrary selections of words provide the framework, syntax as pictorial composition. Symbolic knowledge supersedes the literal in providing the blueprint for the visual imagery. The words that make up the complex phrase are connected by drawn lines following the sequence of their relative use to expressing a thought. The resulting visual abstraction made up of lines connecting words serves as the subject for painting. Enclosed shapes determined by swirling lines weaving through selected words are then painted according to preference which again is directed by intuition. Choosing colors to fill in shapes simulate the process of choosing words to make a phrase. Aesthetics that guide the use of colors however do not necessarily apply the same literary approach of mixing words. The sensory appeal of colors influenced by artistic preference and knowledge of the discipline do not equate to the rational order and ordering of words in a phrase. It is less restrictive to put color red next to brown than to combine words bandage and insincerity.

Webstructionist grammar is autonomous in the rationalist sense that syntax is not solely derived experientially nor does it wholly represent reality. Sentence construction is rooted in imagination, descriptive of an idea generated from the selection and sequencing of words. It follows a thought process which chooses and decides which words from the randomly torn pages pasted on canvas are used to form an idea. The discarded words remain in the periphery of the design of interconnected lines forming the webstruction. The chosen words are highlighted while the discarded ones are either painted over or left as they are printed words on a page. A deliberation takes place in sequencing words to generate a phrase. Worn out phrases are avoided to explore possibilities of creating a syntax out of unique word combinations. It is a negation of conventional usage of the English language, a freedom from the subjugation of official grammar. Despite the wide variety of descriptive words available to depict reality, language is forged in its method of representation. The very limitation of vocabulary available to webstruction on the other hand propels the imagination to forge a reality embedded in the never been used phrase.

In Wittgenstein’s philosophy of language, he rejected the assumption that the meaning of the word is the thing it stands for. Wittgenstein argued that meaning is what is given by explanations of meaning, which are rules for the use of words. It is what is understood when one understands what an utterance means based on several criteria of understanding. “Concepts are not correct or incorrect, only more or less useful. Rules for the use of words are not true or false. They are not answerable to reality, nor to antecedently given meanings. Rather they determine the meanings of words, are constitutive of their meanings.”

The intentionality of thought and language of webstructionism conveys the subjective proposition of a metaphorical world laden with symbols. The object is not perceived or seen in the spatio-temporal world in which the artist finds himself but is imagined from the relations of words as defined in the dictionary. The personal imaging of thought formed by the play of words is divulged through the content of what is written and highlighted on canvas. Though the puzzle of retrieving usable words to create a thought shares a similar thread of arbitrary use of language to represent external reality, webstructionist thought gravitates towards the unknown like stumbling upon an intriguing object or mysterious code that needs to be examined or deciphered to reveal its meaning. The meaning is in the process of construction and deconstruction of imaginings. It does not pretentiously encapsulate the essence of a higher reality but can only give a mirage of the metaphysical. The final end has neither finality nor ending. It can only retrace the formation of words which when looking at the amorphous image conceals the origin of thought instigated by the artist. The inductive deductive roundabout exegesis behind the pictorial and verse compositions is the operative principle of webstructionist thought and language. It is picture making ‘worth a thousand words’ generating potential variants of invented realities.

The resulting art made up of connecting words, intersecting lines and complementing colors becomes the perceivable object contained in the two dimensional canvas. The experience of looking at the image should stimulate a response. The viewer is invited to engage in the artist’s reflection with similar intention evoked in other works of art. The distinctive element of webstructionism is its allusion with words, existing or extinct as building materials for its non representational form. Obsolete words are activated to play alongside surviving terminologies in the canvas space. Because of its printed presence in the old page used as material pasted on canvas, the transposition into verse breathes in new life to the archaic. The specialized usage of words characterize webstructionism as bridging the imagined with the historical and cultural which also leads to an enquiry about the artist’s familiarity with concepts. The word ‘nincompoop’ has survived more than 300 years since it was first coined by a British playwright which until now remains to be a favorite among Brits. It was picked up for a webstruction piece like a long lost cousin to the word ‘stupid’. In certain English speaking societies, ‘nincompoop’ is either obsolete or totally fresh sounding. The word ‘stupid’ is more universally used. Bringing it to the mix adds flavor to webstruction verse. Coming from the same ‘stupid’ clan, the word functions like a perfect guest to a ‘non compos mentis’ party, tagging along its older sibling ‘ninny’ and ‘nitwit’ buddy.

Through definition of the word and its synonyms the artist digs into his experience of the human behavior and applies the coinage to describe other words standing as subjects which similarly have been ensnared in the game of chance. Words are appraised according to their usage and it is to the discretion of the artist whether they get selected or discarded. To demonstrate the process, a webstructionist piece tracks down a ‘nincompoop’ partaking in the concept being imagined by the artist. The concept is in a flux as there is no direct relation to an experience of the outside world or a documentation of a perceived reality. What the artist sees in his mind is the image projected by his understanding of the words and how they play out during the construction of ideas.

Rapine of Vernal Alcohol

the albino alchemist

alerted the vestry

about the rapine

of Alcalde’s

rapturous nimbus

of vernal alcohol

by ninny albatross

and nitwit alewife

albeit the rapport

with veteran

rapscallion Rasores

and nine

Alexandrian nincompoops

who were

rashly versifying

nirvana

to the vestured

with a rapier

Nizam

As epitomized in the abstraction verse above, words were short listed to adapt to the concept being processed by the artist at the time he was scanning the torn pages. The unused terminologies however have the potential of being transported to a blank slate of webstructionism for a second look. Although the pages have already been pasted on the first version, the following words can still serve as left over materials going through the webstructionist stage of constructing a new verse:

rapparee, rapper, rapt, raptorial, rare, rarely, rascal, rase, rasher, rasp, albescent, Albigenses, Alcaic, alchemy, alee, alembic, aleurone, alexipharmic, Nisan, Nisei, Nissen hut, nit, niter, nitid, no, vesuvian, vetch, veteran, vernier, Veronal, veronica, verrucose, versant, versed, version, verso, verst, and versus.

Nisei rasing Nissen

a rapparee rapt

with rare alchemy

of veteran Albegenses

in alcaic verso

finds versed alexipharmic

from a verst

of vetch and veronica

on a versant

turns verrucosed Nisei

into a raptorial

albescent rascal

rasing the Nissen hut

with vesuvian

This new verse recouped from unused words in the first version will yield another painted image, this time on a mylar surface which is transparent material on which words as printed and pasted on the original canvas will be traced and copied. Having the static positioning of words makes it more interesting to follow the organic evolution of lines and shapes analogous to the syntaxes, to compare and contrast abstracted images emanating from both versions. As to whether the second version suffers from inanition is a matter of contention. First choice words are not necessarily more vibrant and exciting to use. The artist simply follows his instinct and with some deliberation selects words that suit the concept. The second version has a life of its own. As if words have already been exhausted, there are still remaining from which a possible third version can be webstructed: rapper, rarely, rasher, rasp, alee, alembic, aleurone, Nisan, nit, niter, nitid, no, vernier, veronal, and versus.

no versus on

aleurone on alembic

nitid niter on a vernier

no rapper nit

versus rasher on a rasp

veronal alee rarely on Nisan

From four torn pages of an old dictionary under four different headings of letters V,A,R,N three webstruction verses are generated exhausting all legible printed words. The method however, does not end here. The construction deconstruction reconstruction of verses, shuffling words exponentially can yield as many concepts as possible. Every version can be reinvented, reinterpreted and rewritten. In the third version ‘no versus on’ the idea takes a different turn by simply starting with the word ‘no’.

no versus on

no aleurone but Nisan nit

from rasp is on veronal rasher

rarely alembic or vernier

versus nitid rapper is alee

The metaphorical sense varies as syntaxes are reversed. Granting that each verse is not a perception of reality, does it convey any meaning that might be linked to the real world? What is it a metaphor of?

In the first version of ‘no versus on’ if we go by analyzing each syntax of every line:

The protein aleurone is found in a distillation apparatus alembic.

The shiny white mineral niter is measured by the vernier scale

There is no louse egg on a door rapper that can drop on a strip of bacon skewered by a filing instrument.

Rarely does a hypnotic or sleeping aid substance come toward a lee on the first month of the ecclesiastical year on the Hebrew calendar.

A protein, a white mineral, a barbiturate, a louse egg, scientific apparatus and measuring scale and a piece of meat collected in one verse. What they symbolize can branch out to a wide range of mythological, fantastical, even hermeneutical interpretations. To start with the etymological origin of ‘Nisan’ alone will instigate a thought to shake up the concept:

Nisan, the name of the month is Babylonian. In the Torah it is called the month of the Aviv, referring to the month in which barley was ripe.

As if there are not enough ingredients to the story, a grass cereal is added to the mix. Aleurone is found in a granule, niter is usually found on cavern walls and ceilings, veronal is barbital, crystalline and soluble in water just like niter. The list could very well be an alchemic recipe, its ingredients carefully measured by alembic and vernier.

But the concoction cannot be taken seriously as a cure, a poison or a pesticide to protect barley seedlings though the line separating the literal and figurative language oftentimes gets obscured. It goes to show how imagined concepts can potentially be misconstrued as factual data. The webstruction process is a metaphor in itself. Literary, academic, philosophical, political, historical, biblical and other written accounts are interspersed with verses loaded in ambivalent symbols.

Given the flexibility of words, the artist’s decision to use a particular definition for a purpose lends integrity to the webstruction device. Words such as niter which has been known since ancient times can be taken to mean soap instead of gunpowder, and the complexion of the sentence changes dramatically. If the niter being used for webstruction has Biblical reference to soap as implied by Jeremiah 2:22, “For though thou wash me with nitre, and take thee much sope . . .” the concept canceling out any reference to gunpowder becomes benign. The rest of the verse can be interpreted as ideal season for work in the fields where grains are ripe and household necessities (including soap) are measured to last. It is implied that exhaustion from labor without hypnotic aid puts one to sleep, “veronal alee rarely on Nisan”.

Wittgenstein once offered ‘Milk me sugar’ as an example of syntactical nonsense, but one wag imagined being accosted by a cow who said, doubtless in a sultry voice, ‘Milk me, Sugar’.

As to the abstract image created from the syntax of the verse, threading words by drawing lines, the meaning is immanent. It has no equivalence in visible reality, autonomous as a melody is understood in music. It follows its own rule of forging a pictorial composition founded on webstructionist versification. The reality it depicts is the workings of the imagination, the inversion of observation through the senses. “What the picture tells one, Wittgenstein suggested, is itself, ie. Its telling one what it does, its depicting what it depicts, consists in its own internal structure of forms, generated by its own lines and colors.” The orbiting line that follows the sequence of words in the case of webstructionism depicts nothing observable in nature which parodies other discoveries of abstraction giving credence to the spiritual.

Abstract painter Kandinsky spoke of the inner necessity which encapsulates his principle of art. “Art work is born from the inner necessity of the artist in a mysterious, enigmatic and mystic way, and then it acquires an autonomous life; it becomes an independent subject animated by a spiritual breath.” Kandinsky’s explicit theory of abstract painting however downplays the effect of a random process. Though the point, the line and the plane are analyzed on the point of view of their inner effect on the living subjectivity of the observer who looks at them and lets them act on his sensibility, the horizontal calmness of a line or the dramatic effect of angular planes still allude to aesthetic ramifications of seeing art within the realm of science. The spiritual breath though subjective is monitored by clinical aesthetics and precision of an effort toward the inner beauty; a black plane does not offer hope as opposed to white which opens up to possibilities. This is, at best, highly misleading. If translucent white is emitted by a nuclear explosion or black leads to divine infinity then the original premise no longer holds true. The abstraction is trapped by its own theory. Just as grammarians are inclined to say that ‘Blue dreams awaken tomatoes’, is semantically deficient and hence makes no sense negates its use in discourse.

‘’Metaphysical propositions such as those of Wittgenstein’s Tractatus, though nonsensical, are deep, important and illuminating, in as much as they try self-consciously to say something that can only be shown. So what they try to express is surely a deep truth, even though an ineffable one.”

Webstructionism in both versification and abstraction follows Wittgenstein’s argument on the grain of truth that the nonsensical possibly carries in contrast to what is deemed sensible only by the strict rules of grammar. The ungrammaticalities and their nonsensicality have a dimension of depth to them and hence are important as opposed to trivial nonsense. The mysterious way words are versified and have taken shape in pictorial sense asserts itself in a conscious effort to make a meaningful collage out of random words and colors. The result is neither static nor crystalline for the meaning is effusive. The initial verse can branch out into various interpretations as far as webstruction can possibly allow. Same goes with the compositional structure rooted in word connections. The fluidity of its pattern traces the workings of an unbridled mind; the force of the line emanates from the sequencing of words without obstruction. To explore the unexplored is the intent of the webstructionist, in verse as well as in its generated image.

Looking back at the method as reflection of the imaginative use of the English language, Hume’s theory of imagination conveys some salient points to further understand webstructionism. All types of thinking take place by means of ideas. The data of imagination must be ideas as the imaginative activity is a process of thinking for which the having of ideas is absolutely indispensable. The materials are the same as those of all other types of thinking; memory, imagination and reason. Ideas are images and to have them is to imagine. Words are materials out of which webstructionism is built. The idea (mental image) flows from understanding of the word definition. The experience of the word as defined brings memory of the object that is depicted. Without direct experience or past encounter with the word only an approximation of it is understood by the perceiver. In other words, what is perceived or understood lies on the extent of experience of the word which is then stored in memory. A katydid for example is a particular grasshopper that the faculty of the imagination can have a mental image of. Depending on the extent of the perceiver’s experience the image can at best resemble the insect. Otherwise, the perceiver relies on fragments of memory or generalities identifying familiar words in the definition, i.e. an insect with long antennae. The experience determines the quality of image being imagined. Memory brings a vivid mental picture of the object, in this case the grasshopper. The idea of the grasshopper flows in upon the mind in a forcible manner triggering the imaginative activity to then explore possibilities beyond what is remembered. Throwing in the idea of katydid in combination with other words stimulates the imagination ‘hopping’ from one idea to the next until a sequencing gestates in a mystical verse impregnated with variable meanings.

The Humean contention that the ideas of memory are more lively and strong than those of the imagination, and that the former faculty paints its objects in more distinct colors, than any which are employed by the latter precludes novelty of language. Imagination does not function in a manner like diluted memory. It retrieves empirical data stored by memory whereby imagination takes over the material, manipulate it without obstruction and limitation. It paints its own vivid colors independent from the vividness of ideas of memory. To undermine the imaginative faculty not only sets limitation to itself but constrains the organic power of reasoning and subverts the vitality of a priori knowledge. What hampers the discourse curtails the syntax and restrains creative language of dreams and desires. Anarchic impulse of the imagination challenges the tyranny of memory as opposed to being subservient to it.

Imaginative activity of the mind has the rebellious spirit that severs its ties to reality described by memory. It has the autonomous quality which parallels the relation of language to perceived reality. Truth or falsity is only relevant to a reality that it self creates which recalls Rorty’s theory of “contingency of language”, that all language is contingent. He speaks of the ironist who discovers that he has been operating within someone else’s final vocabulary all along, that he has not ‘self-created’. It is his goal, to re-contextualize the past that led to his historically contingent self so that the past that defines him will be created by him rather than creating him.

The contingency of Webstruction language lies on the sovereignty of imagination versifying words that are not selected through memory but by its affinity to definitions as well as its chronological appearance on a dictionary page. There is no final vocabulary that takes precedence over the relation of vocabularies to other vocabularies. Imaginative webstructionist activity refuses the straitjacketing of thoughts to encounter realities through vocabularies that stretch beyond the borders of rationality. In similar vein Rory explains the irrelevance of the argument over rationality; “a father calls his son irrational by being afraid of the dark, son calls his father for not checking under the bed for monsters, the vocabulary of ‘real monsters’ is not shared between father and son and so accusation of irrationality fly.”

The analogy of ‘real monsters’ not only challenges the ‘sanctity’ of rationality but also leads to the importance of exposure to what is deemed nonsensical in enhancing the cognitive mechanism. In a recent psychological research conducted, subjects exposed to something which “fundamentally does not make sense” responded by “looking for some other kind of structure” within the environment. Sitting down with a Kafka story ‘The Country Doctor,’ a disturbing and surreal tale, people were motivated to find structure. It creates an unconscious desire to make sense of their surroundings.

Similar propulsion of the webstructionist state of mind happens when exposed to the task of arranging ‘fundamentally nonsensical’ vocabularies, the tendency to find a structure is inherent. As in the first verse, ‘the rapine of Alcalde’s rapturous nimbus of vernal alcohol,’ the spiritual in the rapturous (spiritual ecstasy) and nimbus (radiant light about the head of a divinity) suggests a correlation though rarely used, to vernal (spring) alcohol (the liquor spirit). Both the animating and the intoxicating breath in the Alcalde’s head is the object of rapine or plunder. Nimbus could also mean rain cloud or thunderhead, often appearing before a thunderstorm, in which case, alcohol is expected to pour like rain. When explained, the irrational at the onset hints on a deeper level of meaning excavated from cross referencing ideas buried under surface reality. The ‘real monsters’ inhabit a ‘real phantasm world’ which breathes the same air as that of webstruction never land.

Deconstructing webstruction language into Chomskyan syntactical structure to lay out its set of rules is counterintuitive as it does not set out to highlight the generative principle of a universal language or prove the existence of modules in the brain responsible for creationism, nonetheless, the major influence of Chomskyan linguistics lends support to the assumption that there is an innate predisposition grounding the fantastical into a more accessible structure.

For example, “the albino alchemist alerted the vestry,” can qualify as a sentence following Chomsky’s notes on syntactic structures. The sentence can be described as “S goes to NP VP,” meaning that a sentence (S) consists of a noun phrase (NP) and a verb phrase (VP). In the phrase structure analysis, “the albino alchemist,” is the first noun phrase (NP1) “alerted,” is the verb phrase (VP) and “the vestry,” is the second noun phrase (NP2). A passive version can also be derived “the vestry was alerted by the albino alchemist,” from the first active sentence. “A grammar generates all possible utterances of a language,” Chomsky said, “in the same way that chemical theory generates all possible compounds.” The innate basis of webstruction language therefore adopts a syntax (a perfect, mathematical system) that determines the competence of a plain language that is the same from speaker to speaker. The subsequent assemblage, on the other hand, alludes to what Chomsky described as “discreet infinity.” The sentence above is embedded in the original verse cited earlier “The Rapine of Vernal Alcohol.” The text will be analyzed later to expound on the infinite merging of unrelated words acquired by poetic language.

The metaphorical meaning, however, cannot be contained within a set of rules. The combination of nouns, verbs and adjectives do not replicate a physical reality that is confined to literal interpretation. Though the verse can be dissected into sensible sentences like “the albino alchemist alerted the vestry,” the ad infinitum mutations of ideas escape through the grating of logic. Words are scattered in the infinite mindscape of the unknown webbed in various ways by daring imagination. If words were like stars connected by lines, a recognizable ‘big dipper’ will occasionally manifest itself among the myriad of images. It does not follow that what looks familiar makes more sense just as the ‘big dipper’ formation does not say anything intrinsic about stars. It only makes it convenient for the perceiver to catch something describable in the vastness of ‘nonsensical’ formations.

The evolution of webstruction language can be mapped out through the playful method of versifying words that have been randomly extracted from the pages of a dictionary. The thought behind the webbing construction deconstruction of the verse is stimulated by clusters of definitions provided by words as materials for the visual-lingual creation. The resulting verse provides the web for the ensuing pictorial composition by connecting sequenced words with lines. Each verse is a blueprint of every swirling line design. It is the syntax that is complex. The shape that evolves from the syntax goes through a process similar to tracing a figure by connecting numbered dots.

Other than following the syntax by drawing lines to connect the sequence of words there is nothing in physical reality that webstructionism represents. If a shape of a ‘big dipper’ is formed as in the constellation of stars, it can only be explained as accidental residues of the drawing process, independent from the ideas formed out of versification. Sometimes images are manipulated to illustrate an object described in the verse otherwise every picture only serves as a chronological map of ideas contained in the verse.

The thought process involved in making the verse is intuitive and follows no step by step procedure of stringing word for word to make a phrase by phrase building of a concept or idea. The exercise is not an attempt to popularize theories of evolution of language in which case the question of how it evolves remains a mystery. If rationalists and empiricists are still arguing about the origin of language, poetic extrapolations from existing words will just have to go on unimpeded by linguistic theories. There is no point to discuss at this stage how metaphorical language works in the mind of a webstructionist if studies on man’s ability to use language have scientifically only determined its relative complexity over that used by non humans. The school of thought explaining how we manage to create syntactic sentences assumes that the human brain is ‘hard-wired’, that humans possess an innate ability or an access to what has been called a ‘universal grammar’. This view claims that complex syntactic features such as recursion are beyond even the potential abilities of the most intelligent and social non-humans. “The doctor whose clinic is adjacent to the property I bought last year is my father-in-law,” is an example of recursion, which includes the use of relative pronouns to refer back to earlier parts of a sentence.

Imaginative activity is the least studied in terms of qualitative analysis. To investigate the why and the how ideas are formed in the mind of an abstract painter or a surrealist poet is problematic from the stance of defending universality of language. It will require God to explain the reasons that govern the creative outpourings of geniuses. Measuring craniums and brain matter for comparative analysis is a dead end route for scientists whose antiquated method bears haunting influence of eugenics.

Art inquires and science is supposed to supply the answers. The problem is when scientists do not acknowledge or are inept to recognize the novelty of questions posed by the more imaginative. If say an artist in tuned with nature suspects that a bird is poetic in its own way the scientist would readily dismiss it as ridiculous assumption. Birds don’t speak, don’t write, and don’t poeticize. The hierarchy of linguistic capabilities remains to be the domain of man and English language being the property of dominators of civilization and precursors of globalization. The irrational assumption that birds are poets ostracizes the artist as possessing a ‘birdbrain’. The testing of intelligence stops at studying the responses to sensory stimuli for which birds rank low amongst non humans. It does not venture into decoding bird songs since words do not apply. It makes the subject difficult for scientific study thereby hampering the study of creativity for humans as well. Unfamiliar syntax is considered nonsensical therefore useless to go through an in-depth study. What cannot be graphed in mathematical terms is thrown out the window of the lab.

Cognition and behaviors measured by Anglo centric science preclude the understanding of phenomena outside the monolithic culture that shapes the language. The many uses of a dominant language are confused with the functions of the brain. Ill equipped scientists whose hubris overshadows imagination mistakenly linked English proficiency to level of intelligence. In the history of I.Q. testing, the lack of knowledge of the English language posed a problem to new immigrants arriving in Canada. The Sexual Sterilization Act of Alberta enacted in 1928 unfairly categorized immigrants with marginal English skills as having impaired intellectual functioning based on their I.Q. test scores. As a result, many of those sterilized under the Sexual Sterilization Act were immigrants. The eugenics inspired Act peaked during the Depression blaming defective breeding to explain for the financial problems of the nation. An immigrant with poor English skills who failed the I.Q. test then categorized as subhuman became the perfect scapegoat. Since the yardstick used for determining intelligence was a language not spoken by immigrants, examiners blinded by their faith in the English language equated it with mental superiority thereby dehumanizing English deficient subjects as having ‘birdbrains’.

By subverting the English language and exposing its use as a medium of subjugation, art through both visual and verbal expressions is sending a signal or bird alarm call regarding the hegemonic nature of its so called ‘universality’. A hierarchy of languages predetermines the status of communicators in the language game. To not comprehend the rules of the ‘universal’ English language is to exclude non English speaking participants from playing the game. Wittgenstein compares the myriad aspects of language to games and speaks of ‘language games’ just as the moves in a game are governed by rules so there are rules and regularities in our use of language. Webstructionism underscores the set of rules governing what on face value seems jabberwocky verbiage. The activity of language as a game is played by the inventor of the game. The private meaning becomes accessible by explaining the structural component of the language game. Now imagine if the phrases germinating from webstruction are used in pragmatic communication evoking multiple semantics and nuances. Decoding the language would subject the users of conventional English today to an ordeal not unlike that of the ‘nitwit’ immigrant. Imagine if the self directed evolution were initiated by webstructionists, the coded message embedded in concatenations will not be distinguished by English speakers themselves whose cognition of symbolic language is close to nil. Their interpretation of meaning would bear no resemblance to the intransitive Meaning in the webstruction language. Non webstructionists would fail the test and suffer the consequential damnation of eugenics.

Wiittgenstein gives us some examples of the many different uses language has; giving orders and obeying them; describing to appearance of an object; constructing an object from a description (a drawing); reporting an event; speculating about an event; forming and testing a hypothesis; presenting the results of an experiment in a diagram; making up a story; play-acting; singing catches; guessing riddles; telling a joke, solving a problem in practical arithmetic; translating from one language to another; asking, thanking, cursing, greeting, praying. What do telling jokes and saying prayers or obeying speed limits have in common? It is pointless to insist on a common denominator if what it means and what it signifies have different uses. There is no general theory of language that encompasses language. Wittgenstein found that the varieties of linguistic usage of words in many cases pointed to a ‘family resemblance’ between them rather than one single essential meaning.

Merleau-Ponty sought to establish the real and the imaginary as two separate but corresponding realms. A central theme in his philosophy is the dialogical nature of imagination. It is by means of the imagination that we are able to free ourselves from ordinary experience and explore a world of possibility. He differed from Sartre in arguing that the fact that the image is an intentionality different from all other modes of consciousness does not mean that it is some sort of negative entity. To Sartre, there is no interior except me, and every other is exteriority. To Merleau-Ponty, imagination is both a presence in absence and an absence in presence. It does not just create an image as a ruse for making the absent present. It elicits vision – much in the same way marrow elicits the growth of a bone. The artwork serves in some sense as a ‘blueprint of the genesis of things’.

Every word evokes meaning and every meaning transcends the parameters set by linguistic conventions. Seeing the printed word on a page is receiving message that the word communicates. The specific word in the case of webstructionism is not borrowed to bridge a thought outside the language game of combining finite words from torn pages of the dictionary. The genesis of thought comes from word combinations extracted for the webstruction project. It is work of the imagination that is in full gear in weaning substance of meaning from what is normally retrieved by common language use. The invention of realities emanating from the puzzle of words branches out to orally transmitted or written knowledge. Redundancy of everyday expressions using worn out vocabularies is eclipsed by this uprising of reservist terminologies. They serve to incite the intellect by challenging perceptions of reality as well as excite the imagination by offering fresh images from untapped resource of deeper reality. There is no break at all in syntax from the imaginary and syntax from reasoning. What seems like a pointless joke at face value reinforces the desire for deeper understanding of the world. It instigates curiosity out of the communicator of ideas to balance reason with the weight of imagination.

Going back to the same webstruction example ‘Rapine of Vernal Alcohol’ a phrase ‘versifying nirvana’ appears somewhere in the end of the verse which may lead one to link Sanskrit articulation of Buddhist teaching sequestered by a Sunni Muslim Nizam who belonged to the wealthiest scions in the world who ruled Hyderabad for two centuries. The preceding line which recounts ‘nine Alexandrian nincompoops’ together with rapscallion Rasores rashly versifying nirvana could imply flying further back in time in Egypt, the bird scratching a page in history to indicate the mystery behind the burning of the Royal Library of Alexandria, once the largest library in the world. The nine Alexandrian nincompoops disgracefully allude to the nine muses who had inspired so much of ancient history, literature and learning but were inutile in preventing its loss during the tragic destruction of the library. A large seabird albatross literally having a birdbrain that feed on fish connive with an alewife which is related to herring in the rapine of a ‘’ sacred’ alcohol used in the vestry. The special Alcalde’s alcohol was prepared by the albino alchemist supplying the body of bishops administering the temporal affairs of the Episcopal parish. The looters albatross and alewife carry an omen of bad luck which consequently brought tragedy to Alexandria. Completing the cycle of rapturous obsessions, from stealing alcohol from the bishops to rashly versifying the calmness of nirvana, the Nizam’s rapier seals the fate of stupid birds and fish.

Wittgenstein compares language to a set of tools and reminds us that just as the tools in a toolbox have different uses, so do words. As tools are used to perform specific tasks in the physical world, so speech is used to accomplish certain functions in the social world. “Think of the tools in a tool-box: there is a hammer, pliers, a saw, a screw driver, a rule, a glue-pot, nails and screws. The functions of words are as diverse as the functions of these objects.” He goes on to say, “Look at the sentence as an instrument, and at its sense as its employment.”

Webstruction toolbox is more eclectic fitting in multi purpose tools for a special function just as intertextuality is a precondition of poeticity. Words are outsourced from utilitarian matrices and are actualized in the literary form of webstructionismSuccession of absurd metaphors which seem to say one thing but mean something else permeates in webstruction text, chameleon words morphing its way out of its caged definitions. Though there are instances during fanciful flights of words thought of as being freed from conventional usage where trite symbolisms are not shaken off.

Stumbling upon words like albatross which originally referred to the large seabird also means encumbrance or a wearisome burden, an allusion to Coleridge’s poem The Rime of the Ancient Mariner (1798). Webstructionism snatches the adjective ninny to go with the albatross without the intention of dragging the Coleridge connotation into the foray. But the albatross character popularized by Coleridge lingers in the webstruction interpretation.

In Coleridge poem, an albatross starts to follow a ship. The albatross was generally considered an omen of good luck. However, the titular mariner shoots the albatross with a crossbow, which is regarded an act that will bring curse to the ship which indeed suffers terrible mishaps. As punishment, his companions forced him to wear the dead albatross around his neck indefinitely until they all die from the curse as it happens. Thus the albatross can be both an omen of good or bad luck, as well as a metaphor for a burden to be carried as penance.

The ninny albatross which was taken up by the webstruction ‘Rapine of Vernal Alcohol,’ functions in a similar ominous trait in the destruction of a site in Alexandria, the library as opposed to the ship. The Nizam however does not have the crossbow of the mariner to shoot the albatross. He has his rapier which he intends to use against the carriers of the curse. The word ninny does not categorically say anything about the ominous nature of the albatross or allude to how Coleridge used it. Had the thought of destruction in Alexandria not been included in the text, ninny albatross would not serve the whole idea as a referent to omen or curse. It will stay ninnyish in the open and not have to ‘hyde’ its ominous side. The destruction of the Royal Library of Alexandria was a historical fact. The mystery surrounding it was the uncertainty of knowing who was responsible for the destruction. Some would blame Julius Caesar himself others would point to the Moslem Caliph Omar. Expanding the kernel of an imagined idea to include intriguing details of history, legend or myth reinforces Humboldt’s phrase often cited by Chomsky, ‘the infinite use out of finite means’.

Going back to ‘Rapine of Vernal Alcohol,’ the mention of nine Alexandrian nincompoops guided the outcome of the story within the text. Under the patronage of Ptolemy 1, Demetrius organized the construction of the Temple of the Muses or the Musaeum, from which our word museum is derived. The temple was to be the first part of the library complex at Alexandria. The nine muses, Thespiades, are goddesses believed by poets, artists, actors and musicians to be the source of their creative impulses; their inspiration. To describe the muses as nincompoops is outrageous. But not in the text where any claim is possible, nonsense and the absurd dancing to the music of reason. The curse brought by looters of alcohol from the vestry destroys symbols of civilization, the temple and the library. Intoxication gets the upper hand pulverizing sources of inspiration. Muses are brought down from their pedestals losing their aura of creative inspiration to ‘stupid’ forces of destruction.

The meaning of the text in webstruction is uncovered by reflecting on the syntax formed through the imaginative activity. The meaning is derived after the scaffolding activity as opposed to structuring the syntax based on a blue print of a concept. The process of assembling words to make a verse is guided by creative impulse without any preconceived idea of how it will turn out or what it will mean or what new symbols will surface out of it.

Riffaterre’s theory of poetic writing discusses the idea of a nucleus that governs the entire process of writing a literary text. For Riffaterre, any text is derived through the complex interplay of variations and modulations on one single structure – thematic, symbolic or whatever and the sustained relation to one structure constitute the significance. The text, then, is composed of variants on a single invariant, the semantic nucleus which brings to mind psychoanalytic theories on the resurfacing of repressed memories and dream development.

In Riffarterre’s semantic nucleus, the nucleus acts “as if it were a suppressed neurotic symptom, its very suppression causes it to pop up elsewhere in the text with a flourish of other symptoms, that is, of other symptoms or periphrases.”

What determines the use of webstruction as poetic device is what constitutes the meaning of an utterance. The intended task is to find meaningful cosmos out of metaphorical chaos during the practice of webstructionism. The incorporeal frame of mind seeks reinvention of subjectivity in the dual exercise of intuitive construction- reflective deconstruction of the text. Words are in a flux and the contemplation of its expression, extricating from one dimensionalities and penetrating into different metabolisms of organic language present themselves as cells of resistance against despotism of socially stratified narratives. Instead of avoiding the disquieting strangeness of generated thoughts from imaginative praxis, a creative imperative to enrich the world by re-composition of generalized matrix becomes the authentic goal of communication.

Metaphor is constitutive of reality. There exists a confluence of speech and reality whereby they constitute each other. It is in the metaphoric mode that we experience life as form. It provides the fabric within which we come to know the world. Language constitutes a sine qua non of being human. Wittgenstein stresses language-games as ‘providing the hinges for our interaction with the world.’ The world takes on its reality in relation to human existence, grounding language in general and metaphoric speech in particular within the broader spectrum of human activity.

Roberto Lavidez, 2008

Ontario, Canada

The writings, photos and videos contained in this website are protected by Canadian and International Copyright laws. Reproduction of these contents, in whole or in part, is prohibited, unless permitted by the author.

website designed by joyne lavides