Shades of Computational Evocation and Meaning: The GRIOT System and Improvisational Poetry Generation

GRIOT is a computer program developed to implement systems that output interactive computational narratives. The first systems built in GRIOT allow improvisational generation of poetry in response to user input. The system is based on an approach to computational narrative that builds on research from cognitive linguistics on metaphor and conceptual blending, socio-linguistics on how humans structure narrative, computer science on algebraic semantics and semiotics. This paper is a report on the GRIOT system. Foundational theories are discussed, the GRIOT architecture i s outlined, and examples of output from a poetic system are presented and explained. The central idea is that for narrative computational media artwork, values of subjective meaning and evocative expression are inseparable from the formal technical means used to produce them. Despite the use of formal descriptions of semantic concepts, meaning must be understood as contextual, dynamic, and embodied, and implementations of computational narrative systems should reflect this.