In the top left portion of the image, there is a front and side view of the electric guitar to showcase what we are essentially trying to present to the aliens. To the top right side of the image, there are the components of what the electric guitar is composed of. This part was a bit tricky since we weren’t totally sure of how this was going to convey the full meaning of what exactly it is constructed of. In the bottom left corner of the image, there is a depiction of a person playing the guitar. This is especially important since it gives major clues about how to use an electric guitar, and most importantly who uses it. This part of the image is essential to the image as a whole since it shows who this is coming from (humans). In some way, it shows our anatomy and depicts our head, legs, arms, hands, fingers, and overall body structure. To the bottom right side of the image there is a depiction of the pressure and distance, and right beside it is the depiction of the air molecules’ motions and sound propagation.
For human beings, any social system’s formation, development, and functioning depends upon communication. Music is like any other form of communication for us. It is a powerful tool allowing everyone to express their emotions, intentions, and meanings. In a way, it is the tool that connects the human species, their communities, and their generation. Since the aliens in the story “Story of Your Life” by Ted Chiang seem to have more of an organic structure of language. I would describe this Electric guitar to them as “Loud, Electric, Instrument, Musical” it is not much you could elaborate on since they don’t have the same sequence of thought since humans produce sentences in a linear form rather than as a whole.
There were many complications when trying to compose this final image. Such as the top right corner we introduced the idea of musical notes, which later on we found out was not allowed since it is considered a “language” [depicted below] so we thought long and hard about what to replace it with, which is when we thought the simplest and straightforward answer would be the composition of the electric guitar itself. I.e. the many physical parts that come into play when constructing. Another thing that wasn’t necessarily a barrier but rather a mistake was on the bottom right corner of the image we forgot to depict which way the sound was going, this could have been really confusing to decipher if we were just starting to learn sound. [Depicted Below] but overall everything turned out fine.