The future plan

The goal:
目標
In the future, I will continue to my research on the methodology of anthropology in urban landscapes, identity, technology and cyborgs. My study will focus on the application of metaphor in creating the connection between the material cultures and the representation medium.
在未來，我將會繼續進人類學方法論上的研究，並且將其運用在都市景觀、認同、科技與人機混合體的相關研究上。我的研究將會專注在應用隱喻創造物質文化與再現媒介之間的連結。

The motives:
動機
When it was born, anthropology is a visual, acoustic and sense-based discipline. Anthropologists studied the craftwork, food, architectures, languages and music to realize the social and cultural connections behind them. That approach was criticized for their lack of the context. With the emphasis of “the native point of view”, contemporary anthropologists obtain the information from the mouth of the informants and the data becomes the main “object” that anthropologist analyzed and the other objects are auxiliary. For example, anthropologists talked about house in the text but physical houses have the different appearances. The former is signifier and the latter is signified as Ferdinand de Saussure proposed. The information was transcribed with text but it results in the differences of material cultures that were ignored with the universal appearance of the text. The physical houses cannot be described/represented completely in the text. To deal with this issue, I chose to abstract the elements from the material cultures to become conceptual metaphor. Material cultures are the solid and visible metaphors of human life and they are another kind of informants. My study plans to create/produce a new methodology to organize the connections between different objects to grasp their information of “native point of view.”
當人類學誕生之實，其是相當以視覺、聽覺與感官為主的學科。人類學家研究工藝品、食物、建築、語言與音樂以理解存在於這些背後的社會與文化的連結。不過這樣的研究取向被批評缺乏脈絡。在強調土著觀點的前提之下，當代人類學家透過報導人的嘴巴獲取資訊，而這樣的資訊也成為人類學家主要的“研究物”，其他的物質文化反而成為了輔助。這些資訊被轉譯為文字，物質文化之間的差異也被文字的普同樣貌而被忽略，如人類學家所提到的家屋，其所指的家屋的面貌是各有不同，前者即為語言學家Ferdinand de Saussure所提到的語言中的能指(signified)，而實體的家屋即為所指(signified)。人類學家研究的是實體的家屋，但是當其化為文字，無論人類學家如何去描述，都無法再現這個家屋。解決這個困境的方法是不去描述物質文化的整個樣貌，而是萃取存在於當中的元素，成為概念隱喻，成為新的研究物體。物質文化是人類生活中的可以感知的隱喻，也是另外一種形式的報導人。我的研究計劃創造/產生新的方法論，組織整理不同物體之間的連結，用以探索不一樣的土著觀點。


Wi-Fi is a wireless technology that contains two parts, the personal devices and access points. The users utilize their Wi-Fi-equipped electronic devices, such as laptops and mobile phones, to connect to Wi-Fi access points and go on-line. This is the popular landscape in metropolitans and the landscape becomes the metaphor of the interpersonal interactions in daily life. With the municipal Wi-Fi plans and rapid-growing commercial Wi-Fi distribution, more mobile device vendors added Wi-Fi chips to their machines and the spectacle attracted me to analyze and present them in visual and acoustic way to obtain the unspoken and invisible information of “native’s point of view and action.”
Wi-Fi是一項無線連線技術，包含了個人設備與無線網路基地台二個部分。使用者使用其具有Wi-Fi功能的電子設備，如筆記型電腦與手機，連線到無線基地台以連上網路。這是在大城市當中常看到的景象，而這景象也成為了日常生活中人際互動的隱喻。隨著城市無線網路建置計畫與快速發展的商業無線網路擴展，越來越多的行動裝置廠商將無線網路晶片放到他們的機器當中，這樣的景觀吸引我分利用視覺與聽覺的方式分析與呈現，並從中獲得無法言說與看不見的土著觀點與行動的資訊。

The plan:
計畫
Granada Centre of Manchester University produced a series of films to overcome the restriction of discourse to challenge the previous anthropological studies “from a different epistemological position.”(Anna Grimshaw and Amanda Ravetz 2005: 2) They also acknowledge their result maybe not accepted by the academic world but it is important to extend anthropology to study the human on various of perception, such as hearing and seeing.

曼徹斯特大學的Granada中心的Anna Grimshaw與 Amanda Ravetz製作了一系列的影片去克服人類學文字論述的限制，“從不同的知識論位置”以挑戰過去的人類學研究。他們也承認其結果或許無法被學界所接受，但是這些作品對於拓展人類學研究人類聽覺與視覺的感官是相當重要的。


Their idea is similar to me and I want to begin my project with a series of combination of fieldwork data and the elements of visual/sound art, including shapes/colours and notes. As Anna Grimshaw and Amanda Ravetz pointed out that contemporary art break the conventional understanding for the objects and concepts, my works also aim to inquiry anthropology knowledge and present the fieldwork data to a new view.
他們跟我的想法相當類似，我計畫從一系列的田野資料與視覺/聽覺藝術的元素的結合開始我的研究，這些元素包含了形狀/色彩與音符。如同Anna Grimshaw與Amanda Ravetz指出當代藝術打破了原本習慣上對於物體與概念的認識，我的作品也會去質疑人類學知識，並且呈現以新的樣貌呈現田野資料。

I had visualised urban Wi-Fi landscapes and translated them into music to explore how Claude Levi-Strauss’s “house society theory” was transformed an artistic approach to provide us the broader and deeper way to analyze the relations between technology and identity. The steps are listed in the below:
我曾經視覺化了都市的無線網路風景，並且將其轉變為音樂，以探索Claude Levi-Strauss的家屋社會裡論如何轉化為藝術創作方法，以提供給我們更為寬廣與深刻的方式，以分析存在於技術與認同感之間的關聯，研究步驟如下：

1. Codes of Wi-Fi Access Points -> Colour Codes ->Colour Squares->Colour Brick->Colour House->Colour Landscapes->Wi-Fi Networks

1. 無線基地台辨識碼->色彩編碼->彩色方塊->彩色磚塊->彩色家屋>彩色地景->無線網路
a) Codes of Wi-Fi Access Points => Colour Codes : Dividing the serial number of Wi-Fi access points to web colour codes , but both of them have the same format - numbers and alphabets.
a)無線基地辨識碼=>色彩編碼：將無線基地台的編碼分段成為網頁上的色彩編碼，二者都有相同的形式 - 數字與字母。

b) Colour Codes => Colour Squares: The web colour codes are embodied in shape. The squares are not the combination of numbers and alphabets, but the visual difference are more obvious than codes.
b)色彩編碼=>彩色方塊：上一階段的網頁色彩編碼被具體化為形狀。方塊並非是數字與字碼的結合，但是在自覺差異上較編碼更為明顯。

c) Colour Squares => Colour brick: the shape is the same but the role and the concept of the colour object are changed from the square shape to building material - brick. Brick has the different "function" and the brick implied the possibility of "construction" that is similar to the concept of "constructing a network."
c)彩色方塊=>彩色磚塊：形狀上是相同，但是彩色物體的角色與概念從方形轉變為做為建築材料的磚塊。磚塊有不同的功能，而磚塊隱含了構築的可能性，這與”構築網路”的概念是相類似的。

d)　Colour Brick => Colour House : Embodied the function of the "construction" and create an object to be analyzed.
d) 彩色磚塊=>彩色家屋：具體化磚塊的構築的功能，並且創造了可以被研究的物體。 
e). Colour House => Colour Landscapes: Expanding individual conceptual object (house) to the cultural and social objects (urban landscape that was composed of houses). This change highlighted the conceptual and material aspects of Wi-Fi codes rather than a combination of numbers and alphabets.
e) 彩色家屋=>彩色地景：在這個階段，擴展個人概念物體(家屋)到社會層次(由家屋所構成的社會地景)。這個變化強調了無線基地台的辨識碼的概念與物質層次，而非是數字與字母的結合。


f). Colour Landscapes => Wi-Fi Networks: The sudden change from the metaphor (house and landscapes) to the original context (electronic devices) offer an distinguishable spatial representation to emphasize the multiple aspects of Wi-Fi, especially social, political and economical distribution.
f) 彩色地景=>無線網路：突然的從隱喻(家屋與地景)轉變到原本的脈絡(電子設備)提供了一個獨特的空間再現，用以強調無線網路的多個面向，特別是社會的、政治的與經濟的分佈。

The conclusion: Wi-Fi codes are the identifiers of users, owners and manufacturers but their connection between the distribution and the social factors are easily ignored. The obvious bias is considering the codes are random in the cities, but the final change marked the distribution is the result of social behaviour and cultural products.
結論：無線基地台的辨識碼也可以視為是使用者、擁有者與製造廠商的識別物，但是其作為無線網路分佈與社會因素之間的連結很容易被忽略。顯著的例子是認為這些辨識碼是隨機分佈在城市當中，但是在最後從“彩色地景”到“無線網路”的變化標註了這些分佈是社會行為與文化產品的結果。

2. Wi-F Codes ->Decimal Number-> MIDI Notes->MIDI Music->Sheet Music.
2. 無線基地台辨識碼->十進位數字>MIDI音符->MIDI音樂->樂譜
a). Wi-Fi Codes => Decimal Number: the change and division from the hexadecimal to decimal was to create the MIDI notes.　Hexadecimal is positional numeral system with a base of 16. From 0 to 9 represents zero to nine, and abcdef (case-insensitive) means ten to fifteen. Hexadecimal is widely applied in digital equipments. The transformation of positional number system changes the appearance of "numbers and alphabets" to "number" for fitting human’s conventional numeral system.
a) 無線基地辨識碼=>十進位數字：無線基地台的辨識碼是十六進位，也就是是由以16為基數的數學進位制，從0到9代表零到九，abcdef(大小寫不區分)代表從十到十五，十六進位被廣泛應用於數位設備上。將十六進位改為十進位是為了符合人類對於數字的習慣形式。

b). Decimal Number => MIDI Notes:　MIDI is the abbreviation of “Music Instrument Digital Interface” and it is a protocol for communication between different electronic music instruments and digital devices. The communication is transmitting electronic signal and digital information not audio signal. MIDI notes can be notated by decimal or hexadecimal. The format of decimal number and MIDI notes is the same but the quality (mathematical to music) and the function (number to notes) changed. The notes also implied the composing songs.
b) 十進位數字=>MIDI音符：MIDI是 “Music Instrument Digital Interface”(樂器數位介面)的縮寫，它是一種溝通電子樂器與數位設備的通訊協定。它的溝通是藉由傳遞電子訊號與數位資訊，而非是聲音訊號。MIDI的音符可以使用十進位或者是十六進位表示。十進位數字與MIDI音符的格式是相同的，但是其性質從數學轉變為音樂，功能則從數字轉變為音符。在這一個階段中，音符也隱含其夠成為一首曲子的可能性。

c). MIDI Notes => MIDI Music: Embodied the notes and make it acoustic (quality).
c) MIDI音符=>MIDI音樂：將音符數字具體化為音樂音符，使其產生質變，成為可以被聽見的音樂。


d). MIDI Music => Sheet Music: The transformation of "digital to analogous" and "acoustic to visual". In MIDI music, sound will be affected by the neighbouring notes and our ears can not distinguish too high or too low sound. We may ignore the detail in the music but sheet music make it clear and the contour of the notes highlighted Wi-Fi codes in an analogous way.
d) MIDI音樂=>樂譜：這個階段的轉換是從數位到類比以及從聲音到視覺。在MIDI音樂中，聲音會被鄰近的音符影響，而我們的耳朵無法辨識太高或太低的聲音，我們也許會忽略音樂中的細節，但是樂譜將音樂的細節變得清晰，音符所構築的音樂羅括，也將無線基地台的辨識碼用類比的方式呈現。

Above all, the change in every step leads us to rethink how the fieldwork data are expressed and analyzed. In the future, I will collect more data and produce a series of textual, visual and acoustic works to explore the new methodology and new information of “the native’s point of view.”

從上面的轉變過程來看，可以發現每次的轉變，都可以讓我們去思考人類學的田野資料是可以有多樣化的表現方式，引領我們去思考這些田野資料的鋪陳與分析方式。在未來，我將會持續收集更多田野資料，製作一系列的文字、視覺與聲音作品以探索新的方法論與從新的研究方法中所獲得的土著觀點的新資訊。