The New Lexicon I.
Philosophy of Music Technology [research group]
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WHY THE NEW LEXICON?
The title The New Lexicon names the need to reconsider the languages through which musical technologies describe, classify, promote, and evaluate themselves. Established terms such as instrument, tool, interface, signal, data, recording, liveness, fidelity, automation, intelligence, interaction, participation, immersion, innovation, and obsolescence remain central to technological discourse.
These terms emerge within engineering traditions, markets, aesthetic movements, institutions, standards, and relations of authority. A system described as intelligent may depend upon extensive human labour; an interface presented as intuitive may privilege particular bodies, habits, and cultural assumptions; a recording called faithful may impose a specific model of the original; an automated process may relocate work rather than eliminate it. Language does not merely describe technology after the fact.
A new lexicon does not mean replacing one vocabulary with another definitive system. The programme does not seek terminological novelty for its own sake, nor does it presume that inherited concepts have simply become obsolete. Its task is more exacting: to examine what existing words allow us to perceive, what models they carry, where they generate confusion, and where new distinctions become necessary.
Lexical work is inseparable from technological and artistic work. To distinguish agency from control, automation from autonomy, access from participation, signal from data, instrument from interface, repair from restoration, or novelty from transformation is not merely to refine discourse. Such distinctions can alter design decisions and relations among users, performers, systems, and institutions. Conversely, artistic experimentation may expose phenomena for which no adequate term yet exists. The new lexicon emerges through movement between making and naming, operation and reflection, technical proposition and critical response.
The programme therefore treats vocabulary as a site of collective research. Participants will identify key terms within their practices, trace the assumptions attached to them, compare their uses across disciplines and contexts, and formulate alternatives where necessary. The aim is greater conceptual precision while preserving the plurality of artistic and technical positions. A productive lexicon should make disagreement more intelligible, not eliminate it.
DATES
MENTORS
PROGRAMME FORMAT
RESEARCH PREMISE
WHY THE NEW LEXICON?
CENTRAL QUESTIONS
WORKING METHOD
PARTICIPANT VALUE
WHO THE PROGRAMME ADDRESSES
TOWARDS MULTIPLE PHILOSOPHIES OF MUSIC TECHNOLOGY
APPLICATION
APPLICATION FORM AND
PARTICIPATION FEES
The New Lexicon program is produced by .abeceda Institute
.abeceda [Institute for Research in Art, Critical Thought and Philosophy], a public-benefit NGO and non-profit organisation dedicated to advancing contemporary artistic practices and critical inquiry. Through its innovative programmes, .abeceda has gained international recognition as one of the leading platforms for contemporary music and artistic research in the Adriatic region and across Europe: www.abeceda.io