IEEE Technology and Society Magazine - December 2015 - 18

a couple of studies that indirectly
answer this question.
During the last decade it has
been possible to verify, from an
empirical approach, that Shakespeare's plays are highly similar to
different types of social networks.
For instance, Stiller and Dunbar
[11] confirmed that the average
group size in Shakespeare's plays
is similar to that found in natural
networks. The similarity of characters' exchanges between Shakespeare and these networks is not
casual or unsystematic, and in
fact does not occur in the case
of other dramatists. For example,
Voloshinov & Gozhanskaya [13]
have corroborated that authors as
important as Chekhov and Shaw
wrote their first plays with a smaller number of character exchanges
compared to the ones written by
Shakespeare (see Figure 1).
Finally, and despite the fact that
Krems & Dunbar did not find statistical evidence about the mean
group size in Shakespeare's plays
(mean = 27.8) compared to the
mean number of characters in a
film (mean = 31.42), they state
that "the actual numerical difference is in fact rather small" [4].
Therefore, and according to recent
findings, we should highlight the
fact that group sizes in Shakespeare's plays are similar to the
ones in other social networks (see
Table I). We shouldn't forget what
Shakespeare also expressed in
Othello: "Tis true: there's magic in
the web of it [...]" (3.4.69).

Social Networks

Hyperlink Cinema
Natural Groups
W. Shakespeare's Plays
A. Chekhov's Plays
B. Shaw's Plays
0

10
15
20
25
Group Size Average

Figure 1. Group size mean in different types of social networks.

meter but rather unrhymed lines
of iambic pentameter: a verse or
line of five feet, normally with ten
syllables, alternately unstressed
and stressed [3], all of which could
hardly exceed 140 characters. From
this point of view, it is likely that
Shakespeare could have tweeted
an important portion of blank verse
in Hamlet, just as he could have
done with other plays.
On the other hand, and to go
on with the metaphor of communication networks, Wellman & Rainieen [14] comment in their article
"If Romeo and Juliet had Mobile
Phones" about the impact of communication media in social relationships. They point out that "the story
of Romeo and Juliet is the story of
two individuals escaping the boundaries of their densely-knit groups.
It is a story of the social network
revolution that began well before
Facebook: the move from groupbound societies to networked individuals" [14]. Thus, they conclude
that if Romeo and Juliet had brought
mobile phones with them, they
would not have committed communication mistakes; therefore, the
play would not have ended tragically.
Other authors expand the metaphor of communication beyond
mobile phones and turn Shakespeare's plays into a digital reality
amenable to computer analysis. In

an up-to-date and "human" version
of this topic, Eric T. Nalisnick and
Henry S. Baird (see [6], [7]) analyze
Shakespeare's plays as if his scripts
were true communication traces
in a social network. In their article
"Extracting Sentiment Networks
from Shakespeare's Plays," they
perform an algorithmic sentiment
analysis. They find that through
such an analysis it is possible to
identify positive and negative feelings among the characters.
From a social media approach,
the three cases already mentioned
contribute to reinterpret Shakespeare's plays from a different perspective that not only makes the
playwright more meaningful to
young generations, but also builds
interdisciplinary links between literature and engineering.

Shakespeare's Plays as
Social Networks
Shakespeare's genius undoubtedly lies in his capacity for both
observation and building plots that
capture the essential aspects of
human nature. One of the many
parameters of a social network is
its group size, which shows the
number of nodes that a given network possesses. Is the number of
characters in networks created by
Shakespeare in any way similar to
natural networks? There are only
IEEE Technology and Society Magazine

Shakespeare as a Bridge
The question of who Shakespeare
was (see [1], [2]) has long been a
topic of controversy. Shakespeare
was, above all, a poet and playwright (i.e., a writer of plays; a dramatist) who worked on the basis
of mimesis, or imitation, in his act
of creation. However, there is less
∕

december 2015

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of IEEE Technology and Society Magazine - December 2015