"Silent Spaces" in Thinking, and the Evaluation of Visual Language

[Lion Kimbro]

Often times, I show people visual language that I, and others,
have read, and they say things like, "I don't get it," or, "I can't
understand this," or, "what's going on here?"

I had an easy time reading Robert Horn's book, but one visitor
wrote,

"Ironically, the parts that made the most sense to me were
written in old fashioned text."

http://visual.wiki.taoriver.net/moin.fcg/HornsVisualLanguageBook

I have difficulty understanding this reaction. When someone
critiques my *own* visual language efforts, saying, "I don't get
it,"
then I can blame myself-- going, "Well, I wrote this, of course it
makes sense to me. Perhaps I just assumed that parts of the
layout would communicate something, because they do to me,
but not to others."

But, this is different-- here's something written by somebody
else, somebody who I've never met, in a visual language, and
I follow it fine-- enthusiastically, even, as a breath of fresh air.

So I wonder, "How does this happen? What is going on here?"

One idea I've been working out, is that perhaps part of the
reason is that people expect everything to be spelled out for
them.

That is, that they're operating from a sort of "pre-constructivist"
notion of education and communication: The speaker has
something to say, and then they say it, and then if you heard
all the words, "you've got it."

I think that visual language is often times a lot more *demanding*
on the reader;

It's the job of the "reader" of visual language to engage in a
conversation with the written materials, sort of like a map.

If you see a diagram, it's **your** job, as the reader, to perform
a "puzzling over" of the diagram, and putting together *your own
understanding* of what is "spoken" in the diagram.

Often times, like a map, it's not just one story that's being
spoken,
not just one path through the forest that's being conveyed, but
rather, a *number* of stories and narratives being conveyed.
It is a map, a hypertext, a multiplicity.

There is an analog in conversation that people can follow
easily; There are "silent spaces" in conversations, where
somebody is realizing something, and both parties *pause*
for the person who's just coming to realize something, to
come to terms with it, and "piece things together" in their mind.

The conversation sort of resembles:

"A,"

"Right, I'm with you,"

"So, then, B follow, ..."

"Un-hunh,"

"Okay, and here's the punchline: A, to B, to **C**."

"AHH!"

"..." (smile)

"Yes!"

"..."

"I see it!"

"Give me a moment here..."

...

"And, that would also mean: U, and V, and Y, ..."

"Yep! You got it!"

There are similar moments in reading a straight text as well,
of course, ...

But I think visual language is much more demanding on the user's
part. So there is a lot of "silence" in visual language
expressions,
lots of places where the person reading goes, "Well, wait- you're
not **saying** anything here," and it's really--

--rather, that it's the job of the "reader" to piece things
together,
and use the expressions to piece things together, until it makes
sense in their minds.

(Thoughts?)
(On a good track? Bad track?)
(Is there research I should be aware of, or read through?)
(Something I should be staring at?)

Thank you,
Lion Kimbro {:)}=