John Muckelbauer captures perfectly my past frustration in teaching invention: it “cannot be explained representationally (as if it were a theme or an idea). Perhaps it can only be demonstrated performatively” (in his fantastic The Future of Invention: Rhetoric, Postmodernism, and the Problem of Change, SUNY Press, 2008, xi).
So, taking inspiration from Erasmus’s strategy of copia (but funneling that inspiration through a 140 character limit), my graduate
Networked Rhetorical Theory class invented 100 definitions of invention in under ten minutes to perform inventional processes.
The prompt: “Define” invention Twitter style, in 140 characters or less.
1. Invention is the result of juxtaposition.
2. Invention: when collision becomes collusion.
3. Invention: the initial frontier.
4. New. Knew. Invention.
5. Invention is the process of reworking the tradition to address contemporary issues.
6. Invention…when =/ and =/ become =D and =/ and =(
7. Invention: a social reaction to “waves of agitation”
8. Invention is thoughtful novelty.
9. #invention is hermeneutical
10. Invention improves upon the wheel
11. Invention results in arrangement
12. Invention: where collisions create relations.
13. Invention: the result of unpredictable solutions
14. The ways by which arguments are brought into being.
15. Invention requires wisdom.
16. Birth of beginning
17. ?? ??????= invention
18. Making the wise sound appealing
19. Because even if nothing is new under the sun, we can damn well try.
20. Amalgamating that which is out there into a statement that reflects your desired position
21. Rhetorical Bricologe
22. “When two become one” – Spice Girls
23. Invention is the process of reconciling difference in pursuit of the common.
24. Invention is the process of reconciling the common with our desire to pursue the different.
25. Ulmer’s student’s invent MyStory
26. Invention is legos: make what you can imagine out of the things you have
27. Rhetorical Invention is composition
28. Instructions to rhetorical jenga
29. Invention: my enemy is my enemy, but I cannot pretend that he does not exist.
30. Invention is innovative, new, and old.
31. Invention occurs without citation, but hey. Who’s keeping track?
32. Wants an eclipse despite nothing new under the sun
33. Invention is basically your wedding; something new. something borrowed, or something blue.
34. Invention is fetishized. Invention is choosing what not to say
35. Invention is the first step
36. Invention: all the best parts of Scrabble
37. Invention is what happens at the point of articulation.
38. Tag you’re it, now you know we are playing
39. Invention comes from word vomit
40. Understanding of invention are narrow in composition
41. Invention is the means by which identification is fostered
42. Invention is an orgy of creative processes
43. The space between imagined and repeated
44. A mashup of disparate ideas
45. Invention is more than prewriting
46. Invention is collaborative
47. Invention is the toolbox of any spin-doctor
48. Invention: when tension demands mention and extension.
49. Invention apparently happens in silence!
50. Invention: when you subvert convention.
51. Invention is strategic.
52. Invention is like your grandma: inseparable from tradition.
53. double edged sword of religion
54. Invention is the argumentative remix
55. Invention: It’s what’s for dinner
56. Invention: it’s the reason why there’s “the other white meat”
57. Invention is dialectical
58. Invention is the toolbox of any spin-doctor and of the band the spin doctors
59. Hermeneutic invention relies on the sturdiness of a final object
60. Apparently, Invention is judged as well as leading to judgment.
61. Invention things outside the box and likes long walks on the beach.
62. Invention what is gained by noticing the fact there are two number 62s
63. the need to continue numbering
64. Invention is contextually bound
65. Invention is creative.
66. Invention is what we are doing right now
67. Invention would sure be helpful right about now.
68. Invention is why you don’t proofread first.
69. Invention created you and I
70. Invention is the juxtaposition of results.
71. Invention is intertextual
72. Invention created hip hop.
73. Hoping the dropbox can drop the mic
74. Superfluous if not tied to substance
75. Invention is NETWORKED
76. Invention expands the hermeneutic
77. Is the only probability I am interested in
78. Weirdly enough, audiences aren’t too stupid for invention.
79. Invention never ends
80. Because what is ‘naturalized’ is really the product of our terministic screens.
81. Invention is a tango sensemaking and reality
82. Invention is on purpose or by accident.
83. Because we still have so many to go before 147.
84. Because my invention may lead to your invention.
85. The internet affords invention
86. Invention is open source
87. Anonymous panda keeping us on track
88. Invention is pirating
89. Invention is free
90. ^^ But not free from outside interpretation.
91. Invention can be fashionable.
92. Invention drives the enthy-meme.
93. Invention is changing the borders on the map.
94. Invention: not in, not about vents. Discuss.
95. Trying to figure out if remix is a byproduct of reduce, reuse, recycle
96. Invention is not necessarily scientific
97. IS the process of encouraging or enabling a specific specific text
98. Invention is plagiarism
99. Invention is monkeys with typewriters, even if they don’t get to Hamlet.
100. Invention is grad students with typewriters, even if they don’t get to Hamlet.
The top 5 (ok, 6) as nominated by the class:
31. Invention occurs without citation, but hey. Who’s keeping track?
89. Invention is free
90. ^^ But not free from outside interpretation.
36. Invention: all the best parts of Scrabble
79. Invention never ends
48. Invention: when tension demands mention and extension.
