The essays in Hypermedia and Literary Studies discuss the theoretical and practical opportunities and challenges posed by the convergence of hypermedia systems and traditional written texts.Consider a work from Shakespeare. Imagine, as you read it, being able to call up instantly the Elizabethan usage of a particular word, variant texts for any part of the work, critical commentary, historically relevant facts, or oral interpretations by different sets of actors. This is the sort of richly interconnected, immediately accessible literary universe that can be created by hypertext (electronically linked texts) and hypermedia (the extension of linkages to visual and aural material). The essays in Hypermedia and Literary Studies discuss the theoretical and practical opportunities and challenges posed by the convergence of hypermedia systems and traditional written texts. They range from the theory and design of literary hypermedia to reports of actual hypermedia projects from secondary school to university and from educational and scholarly to creative applications in poetry and fiction.ContentsHypertext, Hypermedia, and Literary Studies - Theory - Reading and Writing the Electronic Book - From Electronic Books to Electronic Libraries: Revisiting Reading and Writing the Electronic Book. - The Rhetoric of Hypermedia: Some Rules for Authors - Topographic Writing: Hypertext and the Electronic Writing Space - Reading from the Map: Metonymy and Metaphor in the Fiction of Forking Paths. - Poem Descending a Staircase: Hypertext and the Simultaneity of Experience - Reading Hypertext: Order and Coherence in a New Medium - Threnody: Psychoanalytic Digressions on the Subject of Hypertexts - Applications - Biblical Studies and Hypertext - Ancient Materials, Modern Media: Shaping the Study of Classics with Hypertext - Linking Together Books: Adapting Published Material into Intermedia Documents - The Shakespeare Project - The Emblematic Hyperbook - HyperCard Stacks for Fielding's Joseph Andrews: Issues of Design and Content - Hypertext for the PC: The Rubén Dario Project - Hypermedia in Schools

Reviews the features and applications of a broad range of computer software systems that allow the user to choose the sequence of text or other display at the time of use. Contains a well-annotated bibliography. Annotation copyright Book News, Inc. Portland, Or.

This most unusual book results from the NATO Advanced Research Work shop, "Designing Hypertext/Hypermedia for Learning", held in Rottenburg am Neckar, FRO, from July 3-8, 1989. The idea for the workshop resulted from the burgeoning interest in hypertext combined with the frustrating lack of literature on leaming applications for hypertext. There was little evidence in 1988 that hypertext could successfully support learning out comes. A few projects were investigating hypertext for learning, but few conclusions were available and little if any advice on how to design hyper text for learning applications was available. Could hypertext support learning objectives? What mental processing requirements are unique to learning outcomes? How would the processing requirements of learning outcomes interact with unique user processing requirements of browsing and constructing hypertext? Should hypertext information bases be restruc tured to accommodate learning outcomes? Should the user interface be manipulated in order to support the task functionality of learning outcomes? Does the hypertext structure reflect the intellectual requirements of learning outcomes? What kinds of learning-oriented hypertext systems were being developed and what kinds of assumptions were these systems making? These and other questions demonstrated the need for this workshop. The workshop included presentations, hardware demonstrations, sharing and browsing of hypertexts, and much discussion about all of the above. These were the experiences that you, the reader of this book, unfortunately did not experience.

Barrett's opening essay further explores his original and thought-provoking application of social construction theories of knowledge to the development and analysis of multimedia systems. Some of the chapters that follow look at the effectiveness of particular multimedia systems across the curriculum, from medicine, sociology, and management to language learning, writing, literature, and intergenerational studies. Other chapters examine the implied pedagogy within these systems, or the effects of using multimedia and hypermedia in the classroom.

In his widely acclaimed book Hypertext George P. Landow described a radically new information technology and its relationship to the work of such literary theorists as Jacques Derrida and Roland Barthes. Now Landow has brought together a distinguished group of authorities to explore more fully the implications of hypertextual reading for contemporary literary theory. Among the contributors, Charles Ess uses the work of Jürgen Habermas and the Frankfurt School to examine hypertext's potential for true democratization. Stuart Moulthrop turns to Deleuze and Guattari as a point of departure for a study of the relation of hypertext and political power. Espen Aarseth places hypertext within a framework created by other forms of electronic textuality. David Kolb explores what hypertext implies for philosophy and philosophical discourse. Jane Yellowlees Douglas, Gunnar Liestol, and Mireille Rosello use contemporary theory to come to terms with hypertext narrative. Terrence Harpold investigates the hypertextual fiction of Michael Joyce. Drawing on Derrida, Lacan, and Wittgenstein, Gregory Ulmer offers an example of the new form of writing hypertextuality demands.

This book outlines the development currently underway in the technology of new media and looks further to examine the unforeseen effects of this phenomenon on our culture, our philosophies, and our spiritual outlook.