Coded Language: Museum Object and Cultural History

The object in the museum catalogue

A long piece of scrolled white paper containing a handwritten copy of Saul Williams' poem "Coded Language." The top half of the poem is written in both black and brown ink; the lower half just uses black ink. The handwriting is in all capital letters and features a distinctive 'E' made with just three parallel horizontal lines and no vertical line joining them. The poem begins, [Whereas, breakbeats have been the missing link connecting the diasporic / Community to its drum woven past / Whereas the quantized drum has allowed teh whirling musicians to / Calculate the ever changing distance between rock and stardom / Whereas the velocity of the spinning vinyl, cross-faded, spun back-wards, and / Re-released at the same given moment of recorded history, yet at a / Different moment in time's continuum has allowed history to catch up with / The present].

Materials, dates and provenance

• Date: 2004
• Written by: Saul Williams, American, born 1972
• Type: scrolls (information artifacts)
• Medium: ink on paper, plastic laminate
• Dimensions: H x W (flat): 147 × 12 1/4 in. (373.4 × 31.1 cm)
• Dimensions: H x W x D (rolled): 2 × 12 1/4 × 2 3/4 in. (5.1 × 31.1 × 7 cm)
• Topic: African American
• Topic: Activism
• Topic: Hip-hop (Music)
• Topic: Language
• Topic: Spoken word (Poetry)
• Object number: 2014.188.1
• Credit Line: Collection of the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture, Gift of Saul Williams
• Data Source: National Museum of African American History and Culture

Sources and reuse

Catalogue descriptions and facts adapted from National Museum of African American History and Culture through the Smithsonian's official Open Access dataset. This record explicitly marks its metadata CC0 1.0; formatting and selection have been changed. The underlying object's rights statement is: © Saul Williams Permission required for use. Proper usage is the responsibility of the user.