|
The "Kulturmeter" or the Art of Multi-Cultural Mixing
'Wolfgang Hilbert
Wolfgang Hilbert
1. DESCRIPTION, STRUCTURE: The "Kulturmeter" represents a kind of barometer for the cultural life of a nation and measures the degree of development of art and culture. In addition it allows the user to get involved in cultural events by opening borders. He can, as it were, slip into the role of a politician whose influence extends into immigration and border policy, and consequently, cultural policy.
The simulation program is based on the theory that every culture is enriched and broadened by contact with other cultures, by assimilating other ways of thinking and seeing, as well as other traditions. In contrast to states that hermetically seal their borders (e.g. Germany during the Third Reich), multi-cultural states (e.g. Austria during the monarchy, the USA) develop an unusually richer cultural life which provides an attractive power far beyond the border and therefore has a self-affirming effect.
The measuring scale of the "Kulturmeter" is a six-sided shape (screen detail) representing the living space of so-called "culture cells". "Culture cells" is a metaphor for the cultural life of a people.)
Besides the quantitative distribution of culture (number of cells), the main factor is its quality or diversity, which is expressed by bright colours in the cells.
2. FUNCTION OF THE COMPUTER PROGRAM: The cell animation functions on approximately the same principle as J. H. Conway's "Game of Life", with its rules of birth, survival and death, but with the following additions: When the indigenous "Kulturzellen" meet "foreign Kulturzellen", a new mixed cultural cell of a different colour appears. For the viewer, the optical appearance becomes more colourful and more interesting, while giving the impression that the cultural life as a whole has been enriched and broadened.
3. INTERACTION: The user has the opportunity to actively influence the cultural development of the cells. He can use a rotary control to open or shut four different borders of his cultural homeland, thereby controlling the flow of "foreign Kulturzellen".
Goal: Ideal Cultural Mingling
The goal of the user must be to achieve the right mix of foreign and indigenous cultures.
How many foreign "Kulturzellen" and of what colour (what kind of foreign culture) are spread over the cultural homeland depends on the openness and duration of the border in question. The former is displayed optically in a field below the controller in the form of a block diagram. If the controller is turned clockwise, the border opens, the blocks in the diagram move apart, and a larger number of foreign culture cells of the given population group spread out evenly in the cultural region. If the knob is turned the other way, the border closes and the immigration flow is minimezed. The program also processes the simultaneous operation of several knobs, so that the influx of cells from different cultural circles is possible at the same time.
Possible Final States of the Game:
I.
If the user has not sufficiently opened the borders, the result is a colourless, monotonous appearance of the cultural region and the number of culture cells stagnates.
II.
If he opens the borders too wide or too often, the indigenous culture is weakened or dominated.
III.
If one or two population groups are favoured or discriminated against at the border, a colour will be over-represented and a tinge portrays the over-representation of the other foreign cultural cells.
IV.
The user is most successful if he opens and closes the borders at regular intervals and for long enough to effect the best possible cultural mix. The visual reward on the screen is an aesthetic, colourful, interesting cultural landscape. After about two minutes the final result is also output as text in the form of reports, and the game begins afresh from a starting position drawn up at random by the computer.
Programmer: Richard Hilbert
Thanks to IMS-Connection (Integrierte Management Computer), Linz
| 
