WHITNEY
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phd candidate
english, duke university

m.s.
comparative media studies, mit

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history of the book, digital poetry, dictionaries, digital humanities, medieval robots, media archaeology
whitney[DOT]trettien[SHIFT-2]duke[DOT]edu

PROJECTS

Computers, Cut-ups & Combinatory Volvelles

Speaking of Rivers

Becoming Plant

Hacking the Academy

Puzzling Drumbeat

Alphabet of Stars

An archaeology of text-generating mechanisms from 17th-century baroque volvelles to digital poetry, designed as a combinatory text-generating mechanism itself. Submitted as my master's thesis at MIT. Completed May 2009.

A detournement of the archive of sound, video, poetic and critical responses to Langston Hughes' canonical poem, "The Negro Speaks of Rivers." Co-authored with Jonathan Peter Moore; draft version completed December 2009.

A digital essay magnifying a micro-moment in Nehemiah Grew's Anatomy of Plants (1682). Are plants animals? Are animals plants? How does the book (of the world) enfold both forms of life? Prototype completed May 2010.

A simple permutation poem, and my submission to the Hacking the Academy project, which attempted to compile a digital humanities "book" of blog posts and other projects in one week. Done in one hour on May 28, 2010.

A web puzzle made of my experience at Mozilla Drumbeat Festival, November 2010.

A webby poem that reimagines -- reanimates -- a quote from Mallarme on the materiality of reading/writing: the light/dark, dawn/twilight of ink-on-paper artifacts versus liquid-crystal screens. Published October 2010.

WHIKI