Boxing: Choose your own adventure or sweet science?

Here’s where I attempt to organize my thoughts on boxing/hypertext.

My initial response to Janangelo’s ideas was much like his response to his students’ projects: doesn’t meet the assignment. I spent the first few minutes of reading the article by constructing reasons to dismiss it. Then I started to see some good points, and it reminded me of other writing/art I’ve enjoyed. And I’m a sucker for anyone who quotes Eco.

I agree with his evocation of Margaret Mead’s “prefigurative” culture; I’m sure that my students will be much more technologically advanced than I am, and I believe in trying to stay current with what technology is out there- I agree with Court’s assessment that this is the wave of the future, and we’d be better off getting in on it early. I don’t think that pure prose is outmoded, though- even someone writing hypertext needs to write clearly. I don’t care if a student is able to build a website full of bells and whistles- if the prose is crap, it’s not effective communication. There’s good collage, and bad collage. Janangelo even has some caveats: “a fine collage may seem like a casual construction while being in fact a complex work of deliberate artistry representing the artist’s ability to carefully recompose existing texts in thoughtful and persuasive ways” (276). This pushes me to two points: first, the problem of getting students to see the difference between random mishmash (“casual construction”) and “complex work of deliberate artistry.” Cornell’s boxes, the mash-up Court played for us; these are examples of something complex and deliberate. But Janangelo himself points out the danger: “my concern…is that [students] may confuse the ability to link materials with intellectual enrichment, subscribing to the idea that saying all you know (or linking as much as you can find) about a topic is better than selecting your evidence based on an analysis of your reader’s questions, knowledge, and needs” (278). Further, Janangelo discusses the problem of focus: there’s no prioritizing of strongest point, no flow to argument, no sense of building a case; random “accretion,” in which the reader selects a direction apparently at random, feels more like a choose-your-own adventure paper (were those books hypertexts?).

The second point this raised in my head is that collage is art- and art is deliberately obscure in meaning. Janangelo frequently replaces “artist” with “writer” in applying his sources’ ideas to his own reading of hypertext. I have no problem with hypertext as art; my issue is that we’re not teaching art, we’re teaching argument and composition. Yes, hypertexts and collage can have effective argument, but does that mean we should teach students to compose them? If I have them write about a film’s argument, I don’t make them construct a film.

My primary concern is that I don’t think a hypertext assignment is entirely appropriate for what we’re doing. When we have students who can barely construct a complete sentence, let alone a paragraph or a four-page paper, I don’t think they’re ready for more complex forms. I’d worry that such writers would avoid real composition in favor of flash. I do think it would be good for honors-level writers, or upper-division courses; in fact, a dissertation in hypertext/multimedia form would be pretty cool, and I expect Court will pull it off. Janangelo’s goal is to “model intelligent ways of composing persuasive nonsequential text” (287), and I support that- I just don’t think freshmen writers will pull it off. I’m intrigued by the idea of a hypertext novel that includes links to its intertextual references. Eco on hypertext: “one works on its pre-existing links and can navigate this labyrinth indefinitely by establishing (and inventing) personal connections” (qtd. 277). This would be nice in Eco’s novels in particular! I could get Latin translations, see a quick précis of a medieval text to which he refers, etc.

Side notes: there’s a recent book on Joseph Cornell called _Utopia Parkway_. My art school-graduate fiancée says it’s great. Also for other examples of box-type collage, I’d suggest looking at Dave McKean’s covers for the _Sandman_ graphic novels; I’ll bring in my copy of the collected covers next time we meet in case anyone’s interested.