Even after reading George Landow's "Hypertext and Critical Theory," I still am very unsure of what hypertext truly is. From what I can understand, hypertext is not a paper product. A book, nor a magazine, or newspaper can be considered hypertext. Unless said book, magazine, or newspaper is located online, therefore making the text "hyper" by using technology.
From what I've gathered, hypertext tries to come to a conclusion by connecting similar and competing ideas. Hypertext allows the author to arrange information and text into a digital database, which is then sent to more ideas in other digital databases.
The article combines hypertext with four main ideas: Intertextuality, Multivocality, Decentering, and Hypertext as Rhizome.
Hypertext and intertextuality are interrelated as hypertext is able to emphasize the use of intertextuality. Intertextuality includes both explicit and implicit hypertextualities, both in electronic form. I'm not really sure what that means, so hopefully the responder can assist.
Hypertext and multivocality relate because the novel is multivocal, meaning the novel has many interpretations. The novel's entire consciousness is then formed by the interaction of more conciousnessess. These individual conciousnessess take on the form of lexias, or ways of reading, therefore creating hypertextual fiction.
Next comes decentering, in which the bodies of the linked text no longer have an access of organization because of the abundance of consciousness within the novel. The printed form, whether a book, work, or single text, no longer contains a center.
The term rhizome is more commonly used in botany and science. Defined as such, a rhizome is a continuously growing horizontal underground stem that puts out lateral shoots and adventitious roots at intervals. Although this may seem like an odd way to describe something like rhetoric or hypertext, it is very similar. Hypertext is uses "stems" as intervals between similar and competing thoughts and ideas, therefore creating a digital data system that allows the reader to understand the information more clearly.
So how does a book, magazine, or newspaper become a hypertext? Through networking, a print text is transferred into a hypertext during the gathering of lexias (your ways of reading) into an electronic system made of many terms. This is called the nonlinear model of the network in current critical theory. The discussions and designs located in the hypertext share contemporary critical theories and emphasize the model of the network.
So I guess this blog is meant to give more information on a hypertext, while I tried to help myself understand it more as well. Which, I still kind of don't. HELP!
Koral:
ReplyDeleteI think an important way to try and understand hypertext theory is to think of a Wikipedia article. Within an article, there are links that you can click on which will take you to another page or article. Or, while you are reading it, you stumble upon a word you don't know so you open up dictionary.com and look up the definition, but while you are doing that you notice an article about Bradley Cooper so you click that and next thing you know, you are reading an article about yoga. I like to think of hypertext theory as a giant, endless web of information.
It is also helpful to think about hypertext in terms of yourself as the reader. My blog post was about how I think that hypertext theory is based on the originality of the reader. Landow states that hypertext is a system in “whose provisional point of focus depends upon the reader, who becomes a truly active reader in yet another sense” (Landow 36). You as the reader of a website are consciously searching different aspects of whatever you are on and your search, whether it be on a band or on your most recent health ailment, are the one in charge of your search. You decide how to navigate through google by choosing what links you explore and you decide what words to research within an article. Take the example of googling a health ailment. Say that you have a stomachache. You google "stomach hurts left side" and it tells you that you could have some random, unknown disease and then either links to information about it or just names it, so then you click the link or open another tab of that website. The cycle is endless, but if you think of hypertext in terms of internet tabs, it shows how the search is in your hands, which is the reason for hypertext theory in the first place. The authors have created the hypertext to enable readers to understand and further gather information about information they created. Hypertext is there to assist the reader.
Lastly, I wanted to hit on your statement about decentering. That is a really good way to think about hypertext, because a search does have a starting point, but through hypertext, we lose that point (the center of the search) and thus have a different one or different ones through our search. (Landow, 36-38)
I hope this helped!
To continue on decentering because I just thought of this to add, but the goal of a search is to try and solve the "center" of our search, but the point of a search is to come to some sort of center. Hypertext is there to assist you on your journey to the center of the text, because it enables you to find and make connections.
ReplyDeleteHi Koral,
ReplyDeleteIn regards to your post, I would have to say while I was reading your highlights it made me understand Landow. I found your title to be quite comical and well played in regards to the advancement of ideas in this article.
In regards to your first paragraph, you state that even after reading George Landow's "Hypertext and Critical Theory," you are still very unsure of what hypertext truly is. I find this quite comforting because I still find this reading quite mind boggling even after going over it in our class discussion.
In regards to your second paragraph, it is indeed true that hypertext allows the author to arrange information and text into a digital database, which is then sent to more ideas in other digital databases. I think this is a key thing to understand because when we look at say, a hypertext in a passage and we then click on it then we are taken into another article, picture, video, etc. Now, we understand that this is very intentional but by the author adding more information to his page, I think it can be argued that the author is trying to back up his claim.
In regards to the rest of the information in your post, I would have to say that you did a good job at highlighting key moments that correlate to hypertextuality and information regarding rhizomes. I really think that adding the examples of magazines and books' hypertextuality was a good idea. I think that adding information about networks really aided this post to back up your arguments.
I as well find myself struggling with Landow's ideas and theories. So, a tip of advice is to read the article a second time and outline all of the key points that you think are important. Once outlining the information try relating the ideas to everyday scenarios. Once doing all of this, it might help you understand Landow more clearly. Overall, great post and I hope the tip helped!
-Anjelica MacGregor-