Home › Glossary › Letter I

informal assemblage

Form
Pronunciation

Understanding ARPABET Pronunciation

Want to hear it? Click the Listen button to hear the browser speak the word using text-to-speech!

The pronunciation guide uses the ARPABET phonetic system—the same system used in speech recognition and text-to-speech applications.

Vowel Examples:
AE1 = cat, bat
EH1 = bed, head
IY1 = see, me
OW1 = go, boat
UW1 = boot, do
Stress Numbers:
0 = no stress (unstressed)
1 = primary stress (loud)
2 = secondary stress (medium)
Example:
AH0 TH IY1 N AH0
= a-THEE-na (Athena)

The stressed syllable (marked with 1) is pronounced louder and clearer than others.

Quick Definition

A loosely structured poetic composition using casual or unrefined language elements

Detailed Definition
Informal assemblage is a poetic composition method that gathers casual observations, personal notes, and ephemeral thoughts into a loosely structured whole that mimics the flow of consciousness or daily life; eschewing formal rigor for spontaneity, this approach—seen in the New York School—celebrates the provisional and the ordinary, using fragmentation and digression to capture the texture of lived experience.
Example
Example in poetry:
In Frank O’Hara’s “Lunch Poems,” diary notes and overheard talk form informal assemblage; In Claudia Rankine’s “Citizen,” screenshots and anecdotes create informal assemblage; In William Carlos Williams’s “Paterson,” newspaper clippings and letters merge as informal assemblage; In Mina Loy’s work, shopping lists and love letters form informal assemblage.
Additional Notes
informal assemblage: Loose arrangement of casual language or images; conveys spontaneity and everyday speech in verse.
Also Known As
Informal patchwork Casual assemblage Everyday weave Colloquial collage
Skip to main content