Composing With Linguistic Mode: Rationale
For my project for composing with the linguistic mode, I brainstormed various linguistic mediums that connect to my sense of self- song lyrics, poetry, prose, etc, and decided on song lyrics and phrases that stand out to me personally. In another class I’ve been learning about the cut-up method of poetry and prose and was inspired by that, so I wrote down several song titles and lyrics that are meaningful to me, cut up the paper, and chose phrases and lines from songs that I felt flowed well together and stood out to me.
The quotes I chose all say something about myself, my personality, and my outlook on life. I intentionally chose vague and cryptic quotes because I myself am not a straightforward person. I’m very outspoken, but in terms of my personal life I remain very private and don’t like talking about it except to people who I’m already close with. Therefore, I chose quotes that are meaningful to me and express who I am as a person, but only those who are very close to me would probably recognize and understand what they mean in relation to me as a person.
Next, I needed to figure out how to assemble these phrases in a visual way. For this, I chose to make a web page, as what I’m interested in and studying currently is internet culture and communities. I used an online free logo maker to make the phrases into gifs or transparent png files to be added to the website, and used HTML and CSS code to create a web page on the platform Neocities. I used gifs I had already saved from exploring Geocities websites and the GifCities archive to space out the page and add some zest. I also used the website Blingee to edit a recent selfie to include facets of my identity and personality - a cat because I like cats, a Star of David because I’m Jewish, etc.
In class and in the reading “Toward A Theory Of Black Literate Lives” by Maisha Fisher, we learned about and discussed the linguistic mode and the concept of literacy. The linguistic mode refers to using spoken or written words. Literacy is usually defined as proficiency in reading and writing, but as Fisher wrote, this definition excludes people who are proficient in other modes of language but may not be able to read or write, such as Sojourner Truth. In my assignment “Theorizing With the Mode: Black Literacy,” I argued that literacy should be defined more broadly as being adept in more than one mode of communication, rather than limiting literacy to only reading and writing.
I wanted to show a form of literacy that was not the traditional version of writing, but still produced a literaturistic “work.” Therefore, I used HTML and CSS code to build a website. Using language, I sculpted a visual experience that has two faces: the website that everyone can see, and the code behind the website that only I can see. Both operate in the linguistic mode, they both use words, but they use words in different ways.
(HTML code)
(CSS code)
In terms of how this project helped with my self-exploration, I ended up putting a lot of thought into the quotes and how to best display them in a way that represented how I felt about the quotes. For example, the very first quote, “WORLD IS A FUCK” represents my anger at the current level of corruption in the world and my lack of hope for the future. I chose to display this quote using flaming text and big, bold, red block letters to convey a feeling of rage and frustration. Though the web page may look simple, I put a lot of time (over five hours) and effort and thought into making it look that way. I revised it twice, and ended up at the current version, which I’m the most happy with.
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