Glyph: n. 1. A carved figure or character, incised or in relief. 2. A symbol, such as a stylized human figure on a public sign, that imparts information nonverbally. 3. "The difficulty in deciphering ancient glyphs comments on the possibility of decoding alphabetic writing only to discover an ambiguous text. In either case, the cultural situation of the text is lost, and with it the implications of its meaning." -- Madeleine Burnside, from "Glyphs"

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Assemblage: n. 1. A collection of people or things. 2. A fitting together of parts, as those in a machine. 3. "Assembly is both 'third work' (final stage in the alchemical process) and 'thirdness' (conceptual leap). It comes new out of the ashes of old concepts and precepts (old assemblies). It is a vigorous and self-perpetuating process of just-in-time renewal: a concoction, potion, elixir, drug, whose result is whole greeny health and not the piecemeal treatment of nagging symptoms." -- Bill Marsh, from "Alchemy, Assembly, and Puppetry:" http://www.factoryschool.org/btheater/works/essays/assembly/alchemy.html

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Gesture: n. 1. The motion of the limbs or body as an expression of thought or emphasis. 2. An act or remark made as a formality or sign of intention or attitude. 3. v. In his essay "Benjamin Obscura," Ron Silliman suggests that language, in its primary form, "takes the character of a gesture and an object, such as the picking up of a stone to be used as a tool." Silliman further suggests that the "obliteration of the gestural through the elaboration of technology occurs across the entire range of cultural phenomena in the capitalist period." For instance, "Gutenberg's moveable type erased gesturality from the graphemic dimension of books." As Walter Benjamin argues, to pry a unique object "from its shell, to destroy its aura, is the mark of perception whose 'sense of the universal equality of things' has increased to such a degree that it extracts it even from a unique object by means of reproduction." Consider, for instance, the scene in Spielberg's "A.I." in which the android "boy" sits at the dinner table with his human "family." He is not human; he cannot eat. But he gestures the act of eating, bringing an empty fork to his mouth, an act that has no practical objective other than its response. By this he enters the enigmatic social discourse of "being human." The resulting moment of decoding is shocking, absurd, and uncomfortably appropriate, as that which was previously alien and "other" becomes adjacent to "self." Thus mechanically encoded/decoded language disrupts this fetish only to return the resulting discourse back to the materiality of the gesture--as in glyphic gestures of moving, resting, or doing, each initiating a response--as in picking up a fork, a sharp stone, or a string of letters, to be used as a tool. Writing is one such form of mechanical reproduction, as is an orchid blossoming into the shape of a moth, or a moth turning the color of ash. Each are gestures that develop as particular social activities, an assemblage of tissues, rather than inertly scripted borders, shells, identities. In this manner, writing becomes verb, rather than unique object--a process of writing, or encryption that enables its own continuous decipherment. This body of writing is gesturing; the object is its response.