Abstract

Wedded to the air is the substance of data, the drift of code in atmospheres of the natural. The word on the ground is ‘locative’ but the mood in the skies diffuse; commentary, memoranda, a trace. This paper contemplates the significance of place in the process of electronic writing, giving thought to particular negotiations of corporeality in the aesthetics of interaction. Considering the proposition of digital social networks, it evokes moments of generativity from the electronic turbulence of the air, asking of the silence its manner of speaking. One voice writes: ‘Will reply to your thread in the next hour.’ Another, ‘I struggle dicing onions.’ Contingent practices require provisional processes of recognition, philosophies which wrest surprise. It is with this spirit that the paper makes its theoretical engagements as buoyant as its affective intent—call it inspired, call it heuretic, call it a narrative towards flight. How shall we address the torrents of the air that tempt the entanglements of the earth?