Style Guide for Erasing Human Dignity

Style Guide for Erasing Human Dignity responds to the current political climate in America through a facetious writing guide mixed with poetry. The images within it trigger more text when viewed through an augmented reality app.

This “style guide” was inspired by a recent news article about the suggestion to modify language when applying for White House funding. This prospect is incredibly dangerous; what protections disappear when language is changed or erased? Spanish-language and LGBT resources were removed from WhiteHouse.gov, for example. Style Guide for Erasing Human Dignity comments on contemporary political issues (the current attack on immigration, environmental protections and journalism) with the proposal of new linguistic strategies. The guide suggests conflating words (Could ‘weather’ be the same as ‘climate’? Could ‘credible’ be replaced with ‘retweeted’?) and provides alternative definitions (Accountability: An account, and the ability to run it effectively. Also see: Social media).

This satirical writing guide is mixed with poetry and images of burning books.

This project was created for the ELO night of readings and performances at the Modern Language Association Conference in New York City in January, 2018. I propose creating a physical book for the gallery exhibition at ELO2018: Mind the Gap! Attention á la marche! Instructions will be included in the book so that readers can access the augmented reality content with their own smartphones/tablets.

(Source: ELO2018 description)