stigmergy and graffiti

I just learned about a word new to me: stigmergy. The word is very exciting and I keep thinking about it, applying it to ideas of community and transformation.

The word is basically defined as a process through which parts of a larger whole independently act in ways that alert and communicate other parts, thereby changing or transforming their environment.

From what little I've read about it, ants leaving pheromones to communicate the whereabouts of food and nests is the most common example used.

Here are a couple of definitions:

Stigmergy is the process of emergent cooperation as a result of participants' altering the environment and reacting to the environment as they pass through it.

Stigmergy a method of communication in emergent systems in which the individual parts of the system communicate with one another by modifying their local environment.

Stigmergy is a process via which unorganized actions of individuals serve as stimuli to the actions of other individuals, and, in sum, result in a single outcome; a group of individuals who collectively behave as a sole entity.

After reading about this word, the first thing I thought about was communication via stenciled messages, spray-painted art, and other forms of 'graffiti' on publicly observed property. This is a way to communicate with others in a community, to let others know that you and certain beliefs exist. It is also a way in which to expose other individuals to ways of understanding the world. It can be a way to send a different message, to tell another story. For example, when a message on a billboard is changed, perhaps in an attempt to reveal a more accurate picture of consumption and advertising, another message enters the arena of public discourse as manifested in advertising spaces. In other words, part of our environment is advertising. Almost everywhere we go, we are subjected to advertising (billboards, signs, television commercials, text advertisements at checkout aisles, ads on buses and trains, ads at sporting events, name brands pasted on the clothes of those around us, ads in the media we read, imbedded ads in television programming and movies on the bigscreen and those we rent, ads on the radio, product promotion in the very products we use (coffee cups that advertise a product, for example), toys that advertise a movie and vice-versa, adds online, ads on car windows). We can modify and alter our environment by creating other messages.

We can spray paint 'love yourself' on the sidewalk (an attempt to combat the negative self-perception of body engendered by capitalist advertising?--your body is too fat, too thin, to flat, to saggy, too bald, too split-end, too wrinkly, too zitty, too poorly dressed, too thin lipped, and on and on). We can spray paint 'proudly supports sweatshops' next to the logo of whatever corporation fits. We can alter these messages, we can communicate with others out there who might feel similar, we can create spaces for other voices in a domain so constricted by corporate control.

So, by independent actions (reactions and alterations to our environment), we are able to communicate with others, serve as stimuli to the actions of others, and transform our environment!

Of course, spray painting, and other attempts to create spaces for other voices, is only one way that all the above can happen. To me, it was just a simple, concrete way to think about the concept. When I read about the idea of stigmergy, the image of spray painted messages and ideas just immediately lept to mind; like ants leaving scents to tell others about a certain path, someone can tell another human about an idea by leaving some sort of sign or trailmarker. This makes me want to go and spray paint "read about anarchy at your library!" on a bunch of sidewalks.