1. William Hsu
Professor David Serlin
COMM 190 D00 WI16
March 15, 2016
Touch as Communication – Final Project: Subtext in Stationery
For as long as I can remember, my parents would have storebought stationery lying
around in the house. They would constantly remind me to write thank you cards for different
gifts I received, favors that people did for me, etc. And now, even in college, staff that help with
students’ professional development (i.e. employers and career services counselors) still remind
students to be prepared to do the same thing when it comes to their job searches and associated
interviews. But why is this so important? How does handwritten stationery convey the “subtext”
that society has deemed so important in personal and professional contexts? And does
handwritten stationery have to be aesthetically pleasing (with reference to handwriting, spacing,
design of lettering, etc.) to have an impact, or is the impact all situated in touch?
To test this, I designed a research study where I have participants blind touch different
samples of stationery and explore each sample for their haptic and tactile properties.
Synthesizing my research observations and Mark M. Smith’s “Touching,” David Howes and
Constance Classen’s “The Politics of Perception: Sensory and Social Ordering,” James J.
Gibson’s “The Haptic System and its Components” and “The Capabilities of the Haptic­Somatic
System,” and Kevin Hetherington’s “Spatial Textures: Place, Touch, and Praesentia,” I argue
that a person’s sense of touch mediates a lot of how well the person is able to discern the quality
of the stationery they receive, while most of the emotional and aesthetic value of the stationery

2. is, as expected, interpreted through the person’s sense of sight, leaving a subconscious form of
social capital in a piece of stationery to be interpreted by the recipient’s microhaptic sensory.
The nature of my research is very qualitative and observational; therefore, much of what I
synthesize is based on my interpretation of the vocal responses my participants give me.
Throughout their participation, I attempted to transcribe as much as I could using mild
annotating and paraphrasing, while also occasionally taking photos and video of the participants
interacting with the sample. For confidentiality reasons, the participants have been assigned an
alias and their faces were not captured in the frame of any recorded media. I have included an
outline of my script and procedure below:
[Insert background explanation of my final project topic]
Intro Questions:
● Age
● Year at UCSD
● Sex
● Do you have any issues that affect your sense of touch? Nerve damage, blisters, etc.
● Do you have any issues that affect your sense of sight?
● On a scale of 1­5, with 1 meaning less sensitive and 5 meaning highly sensitive, how would you
rate your sense of touch? Why?
● Are you okay with me taking photographs and using them for this assignment? Your face will not
be shown.
With each set, we will spend some time with you blinding touching the objects (i.e. stationery ­ please
have clean hands) in this paper bag. I will also ask you a series of questions regarding what you
interpret/speculate as you tacitly explore the items in the bag. We will then go through the items again in
the set without impairing your ability to see what you’re touching. Each set will not have the same
amount of items, so please be wary; however, also know that there should be plenty of space in the paper
bag to explore each item individually, as you are encouraged to do.
Set 1: Papers (8)
● ACPA
● Green cardstock
● Blue & pink construction paper
Set 2: Cards and Letters (8)
● A. Blank/machine­printed
○ Binghamton​ letter
○ NRHH​ card

3. ● Resume paper ­ Let It Flow
● Brown butcher paper
● White butcher paper ­ thin, and thick
○ ICRA​ card + envelope
○ hand­painted stationery
● B. Handwritten
○ Thank you ­ cream
○ PACURH embossed
○ TTaylor
○ CNer
Set 3: Chinese Red Envelopes (2)
● Embossed
● Foil stamped
Set 4: Written Notes (2)
● Kudos
● High Five
Set 5: Miscellaneous Identifiers (4)
● ICRA business card
● Signed UCSD business card
● Penguin name card
● Blue Crayon name card
General Questions:
● What do you notice about this item?
○ (Tactile vs. haptic properties)
○ (Texture of the medium (paper/envelope))
● Can you feel any of the designs on the medium? How much do you notice?
● What do the details you notice tell you about the item? (subtext ­ high vs. low quality,
socioeconomic class, handwritten, cold vs. warm, level of care/emotional capital, etc.)
○ Why/How do those details tell you what they tell you? (i.e. your personal history, what
you’ve been socialized to believe, etc.)
○ Even though the item you’re touching wasn’t addressed to or intended for you, what kind
of message or news do you think the item bares, if any?
For reference, here is the transcript of ​Participant RM​ and ​Participant CW​’s respective
interviews. An unplanned coincidence was that both RM and CW are 22 year­old second­year
transfer students at the University of California, San Diego; however, I actively sought two
participants that identified as different sexes from each other. In addition, I think that, based on
their responses, both RM and CW have very different degrees of tactile sensitivity and attention
to detail. Further, I purposely chose a range of items with varying tactile and haptic properties
and complexities in order to both set a control for determining how much detail each participant

4. can notice, as well as provide participants with a wide range of tactile information to explore so
that they do not get too bored from feeling like they are touching the same flat piece of paper.
One of the first commonalities I observed between CW and RM was that they both used
similar terms to describe the items they were touching: rectangular, big/small, sturdy, thick/thin,
glossy/matte, smooth/course, heavy/light, etc. For the most part, there was a binary to the
descriptors that they use. In Mark Smith’s “Touching,” Smith mentions that “Touch was a
critical, authenticating sense in some ancient and early modern legal systems...” (Smith 96) and
that “Touch as a marker of hierarchy was deeply connected to early Christian images of God’s
touch.” (Smith 97). As visual as humans have become, it seems that CW and RM still showed
signs of following the tendencies of our human ancestors before us by showing me their
interpretation of each item’s value and authenticity using only tactile information. If a sample
was stiffer and less likely to bend, or if the sample was textured, then it was interpreted as high
quality. Conversely, if something felt thin, crinkled, or flimsy, then it was thought to be a piece
of scrap paper.
In “The Politics of Perception: Sensory and Social Ordering,” David Howes and
Constance Classen note “the sights and sounds and tastes of elsewhere are often divested of the
particular associations they had in their cultures of origin and imbued with new values in their
cultures of reception.” (Howes and Classen 87). I interpret this statement to apply to touch as
well, as shown by CW and RM’s tactile exploration of one of the Chinese red envelopes:

5. Red Envelope ­ Embossed (RM)
Touching Seeing & Touching
There’s definitely a design on it. There’s an opening
made from a flap that tucks into the other side ­ maybe
it’s a little envelope?
I feel like there’s an embossed design/text. It’s smooth
on one side and has a bubbly embossing on the other.
Maybe it holds a “thank you” note, a gift, etc.
It’s red. It’s definitely Chinese. There seems to be a
Chinese character in a gold circle embossed in gold
print on the front of the envelope with an intricate red
metallic design behind it.
The smooth part of the envelope has a glittery look to
it.
It’s very small.
Red Envelope ­ Embossed (CW)
Touching Seeing & Touching
Is this a red envelope? Not entirely sure.
There’s definitely embossing.
There’s substance to it, and maybe something inside it?
There’s some depth, and maybe layers to the paper that
comprises it.
Feels like an ethnic design ­ there’s a circular outline to
it (maybe the borders of a symbol); I can’t imagine
something generic (or Western) having this design.
Seems like something unopened ­ doesn’t seem like
there’s only one piece of paper; I can tell that it should
be opened because there’s a flap that’s tucked in.
Meaning ­ conveys something personally significant,
needs to be maintained, and probably has some kind of
sentimental value. The embossing seems to be made in
a different material than the rest of the envelope.
It is a red envelope.
I didn’t notice the design/embossing on the corners, or
the foil stamped numbers on the back flap.
It looks how I imagined it ­ red with a gold symbol.
As you can see from the transcribed excerpt above, CW was able to speculate that the item was
of non­Western origin because of the textural designs she felt on the surface of the item. From
that, it seemed her sense of touch helped her visualize the item she was touching before she was
allowed to see it. This could also be an example of how the human senses are all interconnected ­
CW’s exposure to a red envelope in her past history might have also informed her sense of touch
in being able expect a red envelope.

6. CW and RM took details a little further in some rare instances where they seemed to
equate the intersectionality of different properties of the sample to some kind of emotional value.
In “The Capabilities of the Haptic­Somatic System,” James J. Gibson states, “The hand can
discriminate the weight of an object as well as its surface layout and surface texture. The passive
skin can be stimulated by an object resting on it, the amount of pressure (that is, skin
deformation) being proportional to the weight of the object...” (Gibson 127) and “Besides
weight, one can detect the rigidity, elasticity, viscosity, or softness of a thing by effortful touch.”
(Gibson 128). I would take Gibson’s statement farther by arguing that humans are capable,
though effortful touch, to determine some degree of emotional intimacy an object has through
nearly subconscious sensors in the skin. This information interpreted through touch would be
microhaptic because it particularly alludes to the socioemotional detail embedded in the haptic
physical properties of the item being touched.
In the Kudos note example of this research project, CW noted that she felt the size and
feel of the paper, coupled with being able to touch the actual indented ballpoint­pen handwriting
on the paper, alluded to the lasting emotional intimacy embedded in the written words that she
couldn’t visually read. Although I was not able to obtain the same amount of detail for this item
in my interview with RM, he provided me information of similar detail in touching the
Binghamton letter example. RM noted that the feel of the paper (e.g. texture in the paper fibers,
debossed watermark, etc.) with the way the envelope was uncleanly opened with a letter opener,
some text feeling more bolded than others, and the plastic film window in the envelope all

7. attributed to his assumption that the letter held some official importance that meant a lot to the
recipient.
Even though many of the speculated assumptions CW and RM made about various
different samples can be argued that they were due to microhaptic information informing their
interpretation, I think it is more accurate to say that the microhaptic information couples with the
observer’s past experiences –that may overlap with the visceral detail they notice in touching the
object– in order to tacitly inform the observer of what the sample could be. This idea of
microhapticity pairing with the observer’s past experiences connects with Kevin Hetherington’s
theories about spatial textures and praesentia. Hetherington mentions that “It is through the feel
of a thing that praesentia is revealed.” (1941) – this feeling could be connected to someone’s
past memory, a reminder of the present, the feeling of being situated in a certain place or spatial
context, etc. Hetherington also states that “the experience of praesentia is prior to representation.
It is the manner in which we make contact with a subjectivity found through the encounter with
what is to hand.” (1941) From observing CW and RM interact with the different samples, I think
that the social capital embedded in a piece of handwritten stationery is accessed through
microhaptic sensory, but triggers the holder’s own feelings of praesentia in order to induce
situated empathy and memories which inform their interpretation of what the item they are
holding really is and what meaning it holds.
This research project was meant to explore how handwritten stationery conveys subtext
and if the appeal or importance of handwritten stationery is fully situated in tactile or visual

8. information. From this study, it would appear that most of the economic value of stationery is
interpreted through touch and assessed by the holder using a sliding scale of various binary
descriptors, while a vast majority of the emotional value is interpreted visually. However, there
seems to be some level of emotional value conveyed through touch that can be explained and
understood with the help of Smith, Howes and Classen, Gibson, and Hetherington. Although my
arguments and assumptions are based on the synthesized qualitative observations of only two
research participants, it is apparent that some kind of chain reaction exists in the milliseconds
between the instance someone touches an item and the instance they produce an assumption or
empathic evaluation of that item.

9. Bibliography
Mark M. Smith, “Touching,” ​Sensing the Past: Seeing, Hearing, Smelling, Tasting, and
Touching in History​, University of California PRess, 2007, pp. 93­116.
David Howes and Constance Classen, “The Politics of Perception: Sensory and Social
Ordering,” ​Ways of Sensing: Understanding the Senses in Society​, Routledge, 2014, pp. 65­92.
James J. Gibson, “‘The Haptic System and its Components’ and ‘The Capabilities of the
Haptic­Somatic System’,” ​The Senses Considered as Perceptual Systems​, Houghton Mifflin
Harcourt, 1966, pp. 97­135.
Kevin Hetherington, “Spatial Textures: Place, Touch, and Praesentia,” ​Environment and
Planning​, Pion Ltd., 2003, pp. 1933­1944.
Link ­ Research Materials:
https://drive.google.com/folderview?id=0B3Ez2n5V9kjja1doN3dTOW9jd2s&usp=sharing