The Limits of My Interface Are the Limits of My World

Arnaud REGNAULD

doi:10.22901/trans.2016.9.1.63

In the age of digital reproduction, each work is meant to be literally translated onto various interfaces be it through a common structuring language such as XML or emulated, and therefore transcoded, which may affect its instantiation. Code always casts a long shadow on the observer as it cannot be observed in the here and now of its performance. It lines the visible and readable surface of the work while remaining at a distance, withdrawn from the reader’s gaze by an invisible interface meant to mediate it as a system of signs. Hence Donna Haraway’s appeal to the figure of what I will redefine as the oppositional translating cyborg who seizes upon the encoding tools that mark the world to write her own hybrid or creolized version, undermining the metaphysical fantasy of a universal language, interrupting communication by drawing our attention to the “interface effect.” The interface, as a buffer, or a translating device between two informational systems, has become the prevalent paradigm for the delineation of the limits of our world. In other words, rewriting Wittgenstein’s aphorism, one may make the following statement: the limits of my interface are the limits of my world. I will address these questions focusing on the metaphysics of interface and its relationship to natural language, computer code, and prosthetic data bodies in Illya Szilak’s “Internet novel of the future” entitled Reconstructing Mayakovsky (2008), Ben Marcus’s print novel entitled The Flame Alphabet (2012) and a few instances of Giselle Beiguelman’s electronic poetry.

Citation status

KCI Citation Counts (0)
REFERENCES (29)
열림/닫힘 버튼
* 2021년 이후 발행 논문의 참고문헌은 현재 구축 중입니다.

[book] Agamben, Giorgio / 2004 / The Open: Man and Animal / Stanford UP

[book] Beiguelman, Giselle / 2004 / The Aesthetics of Digital Poetry / Hatje Cantz Verlag : 69~180

[other] Beiguelman, Giselle / 2004 / Code Movie 1 / DesVirtual

[journal] Beiguelman, Giselle / 2006 / For an Aesthetics of Transmission / First Monday Special Issue 4

[book] Benjamin, Walter / 2000 / The Translation Studies Reader / Routledge : 15~25

[confproc] Chatonsky, Grégory / 2015 / Le Code Hors Sens / 19th Labex Arts-H2H Hybrid Conference. ENSAD / Lecture

[other] Cramer, Florian / 2001 / Digital Code and Literary Text / Dichtung Digital

[book] Derrida, Jacques / 1995 / Point . . . Interviews 1974–1994 / Stanford UP : 372~395

[book] Galloway, Alexander / 2012 / The Interface Effect / Polity Press

[book] Galloway, Alexander / 2007 / The Exploit: A Theory of Networks / U of Minnesota P

[book] Haraway, Donna / 1991 / Simians, Cyborgs, and Women: The Reinvention of Nature / Routledge

[book] Hayles, N. Katherine / 2005 / My Mother Was a Computer / U of Chicago P

[book] Joyce, Michael / 2014 / L’après-midi d’un phoneme, or la faune of après-afternoon

[book] Manovich, Lev / 2001 / The Language of New Media / The MIT Press

[book] Marcus, Ben / 2002 / Notable American Women / Vintage Contemporaries

[book] Marcus, Ben / 2012 / The Flame Alphabet / Alfred A. Knopf

[book] Nancy, Jean-Luc / 2012 / L’équivalence des catastrophes / Galilée

[journal] Quinz, Emanuele / 2003 / Seuils de mutation. Notes sur la notion d’interface? / Anomalies 3 : 10~15

[journal] Raley, Rita / 2003 / Machine Translation and Global English / The Yale Journal of Criticism 16(2) : 291~313

[book] Sholem, Gershom / 2003 / La kabbale. 1974 / Gallimard

[book] Szilak, Illya / 2012 / A Novel of the Future / Amazon Publishing

[other] Szilak, Illya / 2013 / Last Words and Final Numbers / The Jonestown Report : 15~

[other] Merriam-Webster / Transduction / Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary

[book] Weaver, Warren / 1955 / Machine Translation of Languages: Fourteen Essays / MIT Press

[book] Wittgenstein, Ludwig / 1974 / Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus. 1922 / Routledge & Kegan Paul

[other] / 2004 / Fig. 1. Beiguelman, Giselle. Code Movie 1. DesVirtual

[other] / 2004 / Fig. 2. Beiguelman, Giselle. Code Movie 1. DesVirtual

[other] / 2008 / Fig. 3. Szilak, Illya. Reconstructing Mayakovsky. A Novel of the Future

[other] / 2008 / Fig. 4. Szilak, Illya. Reconstructing Mayakovsky. A Novel of the Future

KJC Korea
Journal Central

Statistics

Tools

Sharing

Issue List

Citation status