Eitan Y. Wilf is associate professor of anthropology at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He is the author of School for Cool and Creativity on Demand, both published by the University of Chicago Press.

• AcknowledgmentsIntroduction: Toward an Anthropology of Computational CreativityPART I Jazz: Mimicry, Originality, Sociality1 “I Prefer Playing with It to Playing with Most People”: The Computer as a Musical Conversation Partner2 An Island of Interactivity in an Ocean of Nonreactivity: The Trade-Offs of a Made-to-Order Artificial Musical World3 “A Device That Would Generate New Musical Ideas”: The Computer as a Source of Musical Inspiration4 Separating Noise from Signal: The Ethnomethodological Uncanny as Aesthetic Pleasure in Human-Machine InteractionPART II Poetry: Indeterminacy, Potentiality, Intentionality5 Computer-Generated Poetry and Some of Its Aesthetic and Technical Dimensions6 “I Randomize, Therefore I Think”: Computational Indeterminacy and the Tensions of American Liberal Subjectivity7 Analog Precursors and Their Digital Logical End: The Oulipo8 Crosscurrents and Opposing PerspectivesConclusion: Neither Our Doom nor Our Salvation: Open-Ended Digital Systems and Cultural CritiqueNotesReferencesIndex

"The Inspiration Machine will be of interest to anthropologists of science, technology, and computing, as well as those interested in matters of aesthetics, particularly in terms of how artists deal with this form of value amid their ordinary decision-making and practical activity. The work really builds on a large conversation in science and technology studies, both within and beyond anthropology, on the all too often overlooked relationship between creativity and scientific practice. Beyond anthropology, the work should be of interest to scholars of music or literature, in which the ethnographic treatment of new arts-technology practices is yet to fully develop as a more substantive research agenda."

Eitan Y. Wilf is associate professor of anthropology at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He is the author of School for Cool and Creativity on Demand, both published by the University of Chicago Press.

• AcknowledgmentsIntroduction: Toward an Anthropology of Computational CreativityPART I Jazz: Mimicry, Originality, Sociality1 “I Prefer Playing with It to Playing with Most People”: The Computer as a Musical Conversation Partner2 An Island of Interactivity in an Ocean of Nonreactivity: The Trade-Offs of a Made-to-Order Artificial Musical World3 “A Device That Would Generate New Musical Ideas”: The Computer as a Source of Musical Inspiration4 Separating Noise from Signal: The Ethnomethodological Uncanny as Aesthetic Pleasure in Human-Machine InteractionPART II Poetry: Indeterminacy, Potentiality, Intentionality5 Computer-Generated Poetry and Some of Its Aesthetic and Technical Dimensions6 “I Randomize, Therefore I Think”: Computational Indeterminacy and the Tensions of American Liberal Subjectivity7 Analog Precursors and Their Digital Logical End: The Oulipo8 Crosscurrents and Opposing PerspectivesConclusion: Neither Our Doom nor Our Salvation: Open-Ended Digital Systems and Cultural CritiqueNotesReferencesIndex

"The Inspiration Machine will be of interest to anthropologists of science, technology, and computing, as well as those interested in matters of aesthetics, particularly in terms of how artists deal with this form of value amid their ordinary decision-making and practical activity. The work really builds on a large conversation in science and technology studies, both within and beyond anthropology, on the all too often overlooked relationship between creativity and scientific practice. Beyond anthropology, the work should be of interest to scholars of music or literature, in which the ethnographic treatment of new arts-technology practices is yet to fully develop as a more substantive research agenda."

Eitan Y. Wilf is associate professor of anthropology at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He is the author of School for Cool and Creativity on Demand, both published by the University of Chicago Press.

• AcknowledgmentsIntroduction: Toward an Anthropology of Computational CreativityPART I Jazz: Mimicry, Originality, Sociality1 “I Prefer Playing with It to Playing with Most People”: The Computer as a Musical Conversation Partner2 An Island of Interactivity in an Ocean of Nonreactivity: The Trade-Offs of a Made-to-Order Artificial Musical World3 “A Device That Would Generate New Musical Ideas”: The Computer as a Source of Musical Inspiration4 Separating Noise from Signal: The Ethnomethodological Uncanny as Aesthetic Pleasure in Human-Machine InteractionPART II Poetry: Indeterminacy, Potentiality, Intentionality5 Computer-Generated Poetry and Some of Its Aesthetic and Technical Dimensions6 “I Randomize, Therefore I Think”: Computational Indeterminacy and the Tensions of American Liberal Subjectivity7 Analog Precursors and Their Digital Logical End: The Oulipo8 Crosscurrents and Opposing PerspectivesConclusion: Neither Our Doom nor Our Salvation: Open-Ended Digital Systems and Cultural CritiqueNotesReferencesIndex

"The Inspiration Machine will be of interest to anthropologists of science, technology, and computing, as well as those interested in matters of aesthetics, particularly in terms of how artists deal with this form of value amid their ordinary decision-making and practical activity. The work really builds on a large conversation in science and technology studies, both within and beyond anthropology, on the all too often overlooked relationship between creativity and scientific practice. Beyond anthropology, the work should be of interest to scholars of music or literature, in which the ethnographic treatment of new arts-technology practices is yet to fully develop as a more substantive research agenda."