I follow the CDCF, and have particularly been fascinated by concepts of word salad. I think it's really interesting how often the structure of writing remains intact, but what people are talking about will change mid-sentence. Then I realized that I do word salad a lot. But sort of intentionally? Is that a thing? Like I enjoy running my mouth and seeing where I end up. Using words as pivots to completely change direction mid-idea. It mostly happens when I'm overloaded or tired. I display traits that I've self dxed as autistic traits, but seem to at least have some similarities to catatonic flavored schizophrenia. I'm not really sure what I'm getting at here. I just wanted to write this down and see if perhaps anyone else had ever experienced anything like this.
I have been known to make word-salad-like posts on my tumblr when I'm having strong feelings about something and need to let them out. I just let the words make themselves and, well, it can be an interesting mess and release of stress that's a lot safer than a meltdown or tantrum. EDIT: it frequently leads to a loss of followers, but I can live with that.
Now, I would consider calling purposefully done word salad 'steam of consciousness' writing, which is a type of writing done in effort to distance oneself from narrative structure and write, authentically, whatever comes to mind. Basically, you try to literally write what you think, not write what you think in an acessable way. Some say it is totally impossible, but great writers have occupied themselves trying. I would assume that, like most symptoms of a disorder, word salad is what happens when such steam of consciousness writing is involuntary and potentially impossible to avoid, as in, there is no longer a way to write in normal narrative structure or in a way that makes sense. The brain no longer lends itself to doing so. Voluntary stream of consciousness, I used to cultivate that for creativity reasons. I think I've gotten less good at it >u<
I never intend it to be word-salad or stream-of-consciousness, it just happens because words are hard and I just let them do their thing. Apparently there is a part of my head that does "get" words, it just doesn't work with the part of my head that I am aware of. If I am angry enough it pushes through and lets me express it in ways that make me ashamed of myself when the meltdown is over (I do not like using 'bad words' as they detract from communication). I would like to do voluntary stream of consciousness - it would be nice to not have to focus on making words and losing the stream of consciousness I'm trying to capture.
Word salad is usually mixed up chunks of word. I've had it a couple times as part of a migraine aura.
Word salad usually happens to me when I have the concept in my head but I forgot to line up the sentence before it came out of my mouth ^^;;; Especially when I'm rambling.
I'm word-salading more and more frequently as I get older and have always had some psychotic symptoms, but I can't tell if that's an issue with my brain moving faster than my mouth (because it usually happens when I'm thinking about five things at once) or if it's got something to do with the increased number of migraines I'm getting over the years. Definitely happens more often the more tired I am though, that's for sure. Stream-of-consciousness is always a fun exercise though, and I love doing it in writing and poem format.
