Claudia Westermann and Kate Doyle
I have noted the arbitrariness of Wilkins, the unknown (or apocryphal) Chinese encyclopedist, and the Bibliographical Institute of Brussels; obviously there is no classification of the universe that is not arbitrary and speculative. The reason is quite simple: we do not know what the universe is. (Borges, 1999: 231)
We can choose who we wish to become when we have decided on an in principle undecidable question. (von Foerster, 2003: 293)
Humans have attempted to order their worlds throughout history. Among these ordering endeavours, we can count religions, cosmologies, and science. Encyclopedias are prominent examples of attempts to record all knowledge. Dictionaries and glossaries, similarly, attempt to provide an ordered record of a particular domain of knowledge in their dedication to the meaning of words. Thus, a glossary commonly relates to reductionist ideas of language in action. Yet, following Jorge Luis Borges’ insights, as cited at the beginning, we need to acknowledge that not knowing something with absolute certainty means that any response is always speculative, even if it comes with the allure of an assertion. A cybernetician’s task, as Heinz von Foerster has pointed out, is to understand the opportunities that linger in such uncertainty. Turning constraints into possibilities, cybernetic languaging, in all forms and media, can thus be understood as sharing a logic of the uncertain. It is informed by an understanding of processes of living as they exist and may exist. Within the context of cybernetic languaging, playing is a means to reach out into possible futures. Playing affirms speculation. It initiates the not-yet-existent.
The idea of a glossary has some tradition in the American Society for Cybernetics (ASC). Definitions for cybernetics that can be taken more or less seriously have had a place on the ASC’s website for many years, and they have been featured in previous publications. Among the glossary examples, Allenna Leonard’s Cybernetic Bestiary from 2008 is one of the more experimental kinds.
In this workshop, we would like to explore what it means to create an experimental glossary. We will introduce the session with some examples of cybernetic glossaries, link them to the idea of a new language, touch upon the idea of wordplay, and show some examples from the field of experimental literature. The main intention of this workshop session is to develop a basic structure for the Experimental Glossary. We hope our experimental acting will carry the glossary into a new realm where language becomes languaging. This workshop’s duration could be between 2 and 4 hours.
References
Borges, J. L. (1999). John Wilkins’ analytical language. In E. Weinberger (Ed.), Jorge Luis Borges: Selected non-fictions (A. Hurley, Trans., pp. [insert page numbers]). Penguin Books. (Original work published 1934)
von Foerster, H. (2003). Ethics and second-order cybernetics. In H. von Foerster, Understanding understanding: Essays on cybernetics and cognition (pp. 287–304). Springer.
Profiles
Claudia Westermann
American Society for Cybernetics
Claudia Westermann is an artist-researcher and licensed architect. She has held faculty positions at the TU Vienna in Austria and Xi’an-Jiaotong-Liverpool University in Suzhou, China, and, since September 2025, she is Associate Professor of Creative Practice in the School of Design and the Built Environment at Curtin University in Perth, Australia. She is a licensed member of the German Chamber of Architects, Vice President of the American Society for Cybernetics (ASC), and managing co-editor of Technoetic Arts, a journal that has fostered transdisciplinary and creative-practice-based research for more than two decades. Claudia Westermann’s projects have been shown in many prestigious exhibitions. She has received awards for her practice and teaching, including two provincial and three national awards related to studio teaching and a county-level award for a Philosophy of Art module. For her visionary engagement fostering systemic research and practice, she received the Margaret Mead Prize from the American Society for Cybernetics in 2024.
Kate Doyle
Rutgers University
Kate Doyle’s work explores art practices and forms through the framework of cybernetics. An attention to the processes and poetics of creative reception serves as the foundation of her teaching-learning, which encourages new modes of conversation and interaction. With Paul Pangaro, she co-organizes #NewMacy, an initiative that spans geographies and generations and transcends disciplines to catalyze conversations in navigating the complex challenges of our time. With Damian Chapman and TJ McLeish, she runs The Reading Group, a think tank for embodied research, learning, and creative archiving. Trained in the visual arts and violin performance, Kate received her PhD in musicology from Case Western University in 2018. She has been an invited speaker or collaborator at the Chelsea College of Art of the University of the Arts London, the Dia Art Foundation, and the Library of Congress. Kate is currently Assistant Professor of Music in the Department of Arts, Culture & Media at Rutgers University-Newark and based in New York City.
Kate Doyle, Assistant Professor, Department of Arts, Culture & Media, Rutgers University-Newark. kate.c.doyle@rutgers.edu. Rutgers profile.
