Landow's Hypertext and Critical Theory gives its audience new insight into the meaning of hypertext. The merits of intertextuality (not staying bound to one 'text' but moving between multiple sources, even within the same 'text'), are made clear and yet the question remains, is hypertext simply a remix or does it lend itself to originality?
In this quote from Landow, the link between intertextuailty is not only made evident, it is argued for. There is an obvious need for a change in the way texts are structured,"Thais Morgan suggests that intertextuality 'as a structural analysis of texts in relation to the larger system of signifying practices or uses of signs in culture,' shifts attention from the triad constituted by author/work/tradition to another constituted by text/discourse/culture" (Landow, 35). In class discussion, my group focused on this concept in correlation to hypertext and the question of remix vs originality. There was a surprising amount of debate on the subject, demonstrating the difficulty of this question. While there may not be a clear cut answer, I would like to propose my theory, in an attempt to provide clarification and perhaps even insight.
The music industry was brought into the discussion because of its affiliations with remix. The battle between whether something is original or a remix, is an ongoing battle. The recent example of Robin Thicke and Pharell being sued by Marvin Gaye's estate over Blurred Lines (a lucrative single), was brought up. Did Robin Thicke remix Gaye? In this case he simply stole from Gaye, as he did not pay to sample his song. I quickly realized there are parallels that can't be drawn between the music industry and hypertext when it comes to 'remix vs original'. However looking to music did make me understand how hypertext differed. A musical remix takes something from someone else to create a new sound. It is a clear cut remix, yes it has original parts, but it is very clearly still a remix.
However hypertext is not something taken from another and slightly changed. While hypertext complies information from various sources, creating a new 'text', and in this way remixing. It goes beyond its 'pages' to evoke an entirely new way of reading, and with it a new reader. "Although this absence of a center can create problems for the reader and the writer, it also means that anyone who uses hypertext makes his or her own interests the de facto organizing principle (or center) for the investigation at the moment" (37). This is where we find originality. Hypertext is a humanistic form of organizing, navigating, and interpreting information. It lends itself to the way we actually think, with offshoots to various sources and topics. Are thoughts are nonlinear, and so is hypertext. It puts the power back into the reader (the crux is active readership), allowing them to coauthor by choosing where to go next. It lends itself to multiple interpretations and navigations, "One experiences hypertext as an infinitely decenterable and recenterable system, in part because hypertext transforms any document that has more than one link into a transient center, a directory document that one can employ to orient oneself and to decide where to go next" (37).
This is my argument for hypertext as using remediation (and truly reinvention) of a format to create an original form of active readership. It goes beyond "sampling" other sources, it reorganizes information into a new system, a new web, prompting the reader to navigate and think in a nonlinear fashion.
Samantha,
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed the new perspective you introduced surrounding hypertext. Certainly you provided insight as music and remixes were not something I had even considered when examining hypertext. The controversy of originality in the music world will always exist so long as one beat sounds similar to another in a different artist's song. You invoked in me the thought that while I listen to music, a lot of times I'm thinking "oh, this sounds like something I've heard before" or "this sounds just like another song I've heard". You're right when you say that it's an inevitable hypertextual approach because by "humanistic form" (as you say), we automatically, whether consciously or subconsciously, always try to find something to relate. This is why I am a fan of Landow's arguments and theories. His idea of hypertext gives infinite liberties to the reader and completely uplifts his/her role in reading as to interact and form his/her own way of organizing and analyzing a text.
In music, when an artist hears a certain song and begins to incite new melodies, beats, lyrics, etc. of his own because of the song he just listened to, this is the perfect example of hypertext theory. He is entering the music experience free of prior implications and interpretations of the song merely in efforts to create his own experience with it. *He creates his own center.* While what he creates next may be a remix of an already produced song, he has still gone through the process of hypertextual analysis, and what results is the product of the connections he made to it.
-Samantha Stamps