“Unlike trees or their roots, the
rhizome connects any point to any other point, and its traits are not
necessarily linked to traits of the same nature; it brings into place very
different regimes of signs, and even nonsign states” (Deleauze and Guattari 21).
This quote helps the reader to understand the reasoning for Landow using the
rhizome as a metaphor for hypertext in his “Hypertext and Critical Theory”. After reading both Landow’s work and Deleauze
and Guattari’s rhizome introduction from A Thousand Plateaus it is easy to
understand the similar purposes and descriptions of the two terms. However,
after our class discussion on Tuesday I found that through these terms the
originality of a work becomes the reader’s responsibility rather than the
authors.
Hypertext
according to Landow is composed of bodies of linked texts that allow for
intertextuality to occur. These linked texts provide readers with an infinite
number of relationships and connections to make. It also has “the capacity to
emphasize intertextuality in a way that page bound text in books cannot”
(Landow 35). The readers task when looking at hypertext is to build a network
of virtual connections. It is clear then that the reader has a huge
responsibility when it comes to hypertext. There is no question that the author
is the one who creates the content and produces it, however it is the reader
who makes sense of it. The originality in a work comes from the reader because
it is up to them to give meaning to it. It is the reader who reads the content
and then makes connections giving it meaning based on personal experiences and
knowledge giving life and purpose to the text. 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). Like hypertext, rhizomes have multiplicity
according to Deleuze and Guattari. This multiplicity originates from the
knowledge, personal experience, and history a reader brings to the text
(Deleauze and Guattari 8).
These
authors believe that through hypertexts or rhizomes people will interact and
interpret it differently making it a truly unique and new process. This process
that allows for the originality of a work to lie with the reader rather than
the writer creating a whole new dynamic when it comes to taking in a text. This
resonates with me because I spend a large amount of time looking at digital
texts and I have become very familiar with using hyperlinks. I think that they
allow for readers to not only learn more about what they are reading but to
also make connections that they would not have otherwise. Hypertexts in my
opinion provide a whole new interactive world for readers that was never there
before. It is pretty interesting to know and be a part of a generation that
gets to read a text and interpret it differently based on our own experiences,
and that we get to be in charge of the originality.
- Cailyn Callaway
Hi Cailyn,
ReplyDeleteI see what you did there! Very clever use of hyperlinks in order to further demonstrate the purpose behind your post. I found myself clicking on each one, leading me to new tabs and then clicking back to continue reading. It is true that this provides a unique experience for readers in that it gives them the freedom to explore the text without any constraints. You summed it up nicely when you said "this process that allows for the originality of a work to lie with the reader rather than the writer, creating a whole new dynamic when it comes to taking in a text." It's true that these texts seem to focus more on the reader as opposed to the author. Of course, we always have to pay our respect to the true author of the work, but this approach takes on something that gives the reader a purpose and his or her own role. Each reader will fundamentally read these hypertexts differently in the end. Some will click on the first hyperlink, while others will click on the last one. Some will click on all of them, while some will click on none of them. While we are not authors of the text itself, we are authors of this unique process of reading. It differs significantly than that of the typical flipping through pages in a book according to their sequential order and storyline.
You briefly mention rhizome throughout your post as a metaphor for this whole idea of hypertexts. I personally feel that the rhizome contributes to originality and ultimately carries a reader’s personal experiences with it. A rhizome is fundamentally the means through which these hyperlinks come about and new pages emerge during the reading process. It does not necessarily have a path; it simply continues on with each click and leads to unknown paths. With the ever-growing emergence of new technology, hyperlink is definitely something we need to appreciate, as you state. We are given the opportunity to make specific connections to other sites that only contribute to a more thorough and understandable reading process.
-Vanessa Coppola
Cailyn,
ReplyDeleteIn reading Landow's essay, I too, believe that the originality of the text lies in the reader. Landow posits "Hypertext here permits one to make explicit, though not intrusive, linked materials than an educated reader perceives surrounding it" (35). So the reader, in his/her perception of a text, links the material based on the context that it is in. Without the reader, the hypertext is useless, because hypertext is completely dependent on interactivity. Someone/reader needs to actually be able to make the connection that needs to be made, the text we be impossible to grasp or perceived if there isn't someone to attach his focus or to interact with the text.
Because the text is so "multivocal" as Landow puts it, it needs to be open to interactivity and multiplicity. The reader provides hypertext with the multivocality that it so requires to be a hypertext. Hypertext needs a reader because it's "...an infinitely recenterable system whose provisional point of focus depends upon the reader" (Landow 36).
If the point of focus depends on the reader, then too the originality. The originality of the hypertext stems from the reader and where his/her focus lies. Because as the focus of the reader changes, so too the centre of the hypertext, and hence, the originality.
You have an interesting opinion on how hypertext and rhizomes work, although your conclusion seems to apply to both. (The part regarding the fact that both hypertext and rhizomes make people interpret and interact in a unique way, which I think is true) The idea that originality lies with the reader as opposed to the writer is quite interesting but the claim of an entirely new dynamic seems a hard claim to make, simply because there was no previous dynamic to begin with, but simply changes our understanding of the dynamic. It seems that according to your interpretation of Landow and rhizome that Landow’s hypertext is simply a rhizome, which I would be inclined to agree with. Back to the originality, I’m still concerned about what makes the reader responsible to originality. The problem for me is that originality by definition is contingent on origin, and thus the writer. Whether the reader understands or recognizes the degree of originality or lack thereof has no bearing on its actual originality. I think that what I’m missing is how exactly the nature of hypertext facilitates this new definition of originality, and I think the reason that’s a problem is that I don’t understand hypertext fully.
ReplyDelete-Matthew Mangiaracina