the idea portal

Hey everyone - here's some food for thought/research I did on the terms I particularly feel attracted to.

1. Infusion: we could do something like "inFusion," "inFUSION..." you get the idea, something to show both fusion and infusion and how they are both important to us.

Fusion is from the Latin "fusio," to pour out or melt. This refers to something being united as a whole.

Infusion is from late Middle English "infusus," to pour into. It literally means that something is inspired or imbued with something, ie. to infuse someone with enthusiasm, to fill them with it. This can also mean to emotionally charge someone or something.

I think this is appropriate for our show because "fusion" suggests the fact that there are commonalities connecting all of our projects, and infusion suggests that we are attempting to imbue people with a positive energy, emotionally charge them, get them thinking.

2. Metanoia: metanoia is the Greek word for a profound moment of transformation, a conversion. It is literally an awakening, a conversion that comes from understanding. This is vitally important to all of our projects in that the subject matter is something on which we wish to shed more light, comprehension, and resultant appreciation. This plays a different, albeit important, role in all our projects, as well as on a group level. Let's really change how people look at things! =)

3. Paradigm: "shifting paradigms," maybe? "Paradigm Shift" is a really common art exhibition name, from what my Google searches told me, so maybe we could play around with how we name this.

Paradigm is from the Greek word "paradeigma," meaning pattern, which in turn comes from the Greek verb for "to show side by side."

A paradigm is a mold, a standard, an ideal, a paragon, an example serving as a model one should follow, a stereotypical example. Take your pick. Either way, most of our shows truly are about shifting paradigms. Although this title would be a more straight forward approach, I think it's really appropriate.

4. -ness: -ness is a suffix, exemplifying quality of state. It is attached to an adjective or participle phrase to create a noun. It comes from the Visigothic term "assus," the meaning of which is unclear. It seems to have been used as a sort of filler word when no other word seemed appropriate.

The Visigoths were one of many of the Barbarian groups (a derogatory term given by the Romans) like the Ostrogoths, Normans, etc. They're what we think of today as Vikings, basically. From the 2nd to 11th century BCE, they populated areas of Europe like Spain, France, and modern day Italy.

What particularly interests me about this term and its origin is that the goths, as a whole, were a truly misunderstood group (as are, perhaps, modern day "goths..."). They were called barbarians, meaning "bearded ones." This term was given to them by the Romans, a group who looked at clean-shavenness (haha) and youth, which a lack of beard signaled, as the ideal. A beard made someone seem old, dumb, incapable, and inferior. It's interesting to me that this suffix, "-ness," comes from a group of people who were actually very capable, yet taken for granted. This can apply to the subject matter of many of our projects.



Hope this really helps us! Happy word hunting =)