Humanist Discussion Group, Vol. 14, No. 321.
Centre for Computing in the Humanities, King's College London
<http://www.princeton.edu/~mccarty/humanist/>
<http://www.kcl.ac.uk/humanities/cch/humanist/>
[1] From: John Lavagnino <John.Lavagnino@kcl.ac.uk> (30)
Subject: hyperlinking
[2] From: Einat Amitay <einat@ics.mq.edu.au> (14)
Subject: Re: 14.0313 readings & thoughts on hyperlinking
[3] From: Mick Doherty <mickwrites@yahoo.com> (18)
Subject: Re: 14.0313 readings & thoughts on hyperlinking
--[1]------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Fri, 06 Oct 2000 20:27:00 +0100
From: John Lavagnino <John.Lavagnino@kcl.ac.uk>
Subject: hyperlinking
I guess I don't find the explicitness issue that Willard raises very
compelling. The examples he gives just look like perfectly ordinary
citations of previous discussions, there more as professional duty than
because you are expected to go look at them ever. And generally I'm
not very sympathetic to arguments about the subtle hints that people
build into scholarly prose, especially in something like a commentary
that presents itself as more factual than interpretive. I suspect
these hints are not getting interpreted properly by many readers, and
certainly they're the first thing to go when someone cites or
paraphrases your remarks. It's also very often something you could
express directly but don't; the direct expression would really be
better. I'm reminded of a comment of Jorge Luis Borges in his essay
"The Superstitious Ethics of the Reader" from 1931:
The perfect page, the page in which no word can be altered
without harm, is the most precarious of all. Changes in language
erase shades of meaning, and the "perfect" page is precisely the
one that consists of those delicate fringes that are so easily
worn away. On the contrary, the page that becomes immortal can
traverse the fire of typographical errors, approximate
translations, and inattentive or erroneous readings without
losing its soul in the process.
What he's describing in the last sentence is not a universal
criterion, but I think a good one for a lot of scholarly writing.
Perhaps I'm touchy about this because I recently read a piece of
writing that cites one of my own writings, and describes it as arguing
precisely the opposite of what I was saying; that does lead me to feel
we should all write everything in crayon rather than with a battery of
finely gradated pencils.
John Lavagnino
Centre for Computing in the Humanities, King's College London
--[2]------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Fri, 06 Oct 2000 20:28:07 +0100
From: Einat Amitay <einat@ics.mq.edu.au>
Subject: Re: 14.0313 readings & thoughts on hyperlinking
Hi Willard,
After reading your explanation I thought of these two people and their work. It
is more in the technical writing / rhetoric domain - but they too have thought
about the problems you describe:
Davida Charney - http://www.drc.utexas.edu/faculty/charney/
Clay Spinuzzi - http://english.ttu.edu/spinuzzi/ (especially his recent PhD
thesis that can be found online).
I guess it will leave you with more questions than answers - but at least they
discuss similar problems.
+:o)
einat
--
Einat Amitay
einat@ics.mq.edu.au
http://www.ics.mq.edu.au/~einat
--[3]------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Fri, 06 Oct 2000 20:28:46 +0100
From: Mick Doherty <mickwrites@yahoo.com>
Subject: Re: 14.0313 readings & thoughts on hyperlinking
Back when I was editor of _Kairos_, I named my
editor's column in homage to the great and powerful
(oh, sorry, wrong cultural reference) Vannevar Bush.
Now with this thread I am starting to believe Willard
should turn it into the meat of a scholarly review
article and appropriate the title of my column ...
"As We May Link" ...
------------------------------------------
Mick Doherty
Corporate Communications Editor
American Airlines
E-mail: mick.doherty@aa.com
Personal: mickwrites@hotmail.com
mickwrites@yahoo.com
------------------------------------------
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