Abracadabra: Language, Memory, Representation

MWF 10-10:50
Sewall Hall 303

Instructor: Christopher Kelty
Office: Sewall Hall 580
ckelty@rice.edu
Office Hours:

What exactly do language and memory have to do with knowledge? Are they passive tools or essential components? Are all languages equal, or are there better and worse ways of saying something? What's the difference between natural language and mathematics? Between logic and language? Between memory and storage? Between information processing and thinking? Do words do things? Do algorithms have meaning? What's the relationship between technology and thinking, or between remembering and archiving? Between meaning and information? And what does Dracula have to do with all this?

Abracadabra: OED | Webster's

Revised Syllabus March 5th: ( pdf | html )

Syllabus ( pdf | html )

Lectures

1. Introduction
   • Jan 13: Introduction
   • Jan 15: Magic Words
   • Jan 17: Magic Birds
2. Literacy, Numeracy, Print
   • Jan 22: "Print Culture"
   • Jan 27:The Space between words
   • Jan 29: Dick and Jane
3. Ars Memoria: Techniques of Memory and Creativity
   • Feb 3: Part 1 Memory | Part 2 The Ancient Arts or Memory
   • Feb 5: Medieval Art of Memory | Renaissance art of Memory
   • Feb 10: Camillo's Theatre of Memory
   • Feb 12: Camillo's Theatre Cont'd (Part 2)
   • Feb 17: The Craft of Thought
   • Feb 19: From Memory to Logic...
   • Feb 24: Experiments in/of/on Memory
4. Perfect Languages: from tables to algorithms
   • Mar 7: The study of perfect and universal languages
   • Mar 17: Ramon Llull ( Part One | Part Two )
   • Mar 19: GW Leibniz and the Universal Character
   • March 24: Taxonomy
   • March 26: Universal Characters: Bacon, Dalgarno, Lodowyck
   • March 31: John Wilkins
   • April 2: Artificial Languages after Wilkins
5. Dracula
   • April 7: Dracula, Introduction, Chapters 1-4
   • April 9: Dracula, Chapters 5-9
   • April 14: Dracula, Chapters 10-14
   • April 16: Dracula, Chapters 15-17
   • April 21: Dracula Chapters 18-22
   • April 23: Dracula Chapters 23-27
   • April 25: Conclusion

Assignments

Assignments appear here as they are issued

1. Assignment 1: Introduce yourself (Instructions)
2. Assignment 2: Ongoing Assignment (Instructions)
3. Assignment 3: A Memory System (Instructions)
4. Assigmment 4: Essay/Review (Instructions)
5. Assignment 5: Journal (Instructions)

Readings

Readings are available at from the Electronic Reserves Desk at http://www.rice.edu/fondren/circ/reserves.html

Archive

Archive of lectures can be downloaded here.