HYPERTEXT: SAVIOR OR MARTYR By Karen Wendelboe

George Landow, in "Hypertextual Derrida, Post-structualist Nelson" advocates the employment of Intermedia or hypertextuality as a "testing ground" for emerging literary and philosophical theories that propose the abandonment of "conceptual systems founded upon ideas of center, margin, hierarchy and linearity" (1-3). He asserts that the theories of Jacques Derrida and Roland Barthes emphasize hyper-textuality and that "critical theory promises to theorize hypertext and hypertext promises to embody and thereby test aspects of theory". If this is the golden ring academic discourse will seek in the development of hypertext, what will be gained and what can be lost?

The theories of Derrida and Barthes focus on the instability of the meaning of the printed word. Subsequently the application of these theories may, by extension, dissolve meaning, thus erode communication. Studies of the phenomenological relationship between language and reality are not limited to hypertext and have already found expression through poetry, even in its printed format.

Derrida proposes that language is a signifier for a referent or the pre-consciousness of thought, for thought is also a signifier. Writing is even further down a change of signifiers, thus even further separated from the referent or meaning. This concept is philosophically accessible because every statement spoken or written can be interpreted in infinite ways, with each word triggering a range of subjective associations. However, what happens when this precept is applied to the practice of communication? According to Derrida, no matter how precise a writer or speaker strives to be, the absolute meaning can not be found.

Similarly, Roland Barthes, writes in Image, Music, Text, "That the text is not a line of words releasing a single 'theological' meaning (the message of an Author-God) but a mult-dimensional space in which a variety of writings, none of them original, blend and clash. The text is a tissue of quotations drawn from innumerable centres of cultures"(146). Such 'writerly texts' do not conform to the traditional references or symbols of classical literature and are written by the reader, who in the act of reading brings to the text his/her personal interpretations or codes. Theoretically, this acknowledges the diverstiy of human perception, but as with Derrida what does this concept do to meaning? If hypertext is used to re-create the multi-dimensionality brought to the text by the reader via hypertextual links to subjective layers of interpretation it would result in a type of metalanguage. In a metalanguage a second-order-language is used to describe or explain the 'first-order language'. However, each order of language implicitly relies on a metalanguage by which it is explained. Barthes noted that this could lead to an indefinite regression which would destroy all metalanguages -- thus all meaning.

There is always a dialectical tension between the practical and theoretical and the elements of this dialectic should be carefully assessed before applying theory to the shape of reality. Yet, Landow appears to be recommending the potential of such an imposition, without considering the negative consequences to the processes of communication.

Derrida's deconstructionism defies definition for 'All sentences of the type "deconstruction is X" or deconstruction is not X" miss the point, which is to say that they are at the least false' (180). Yet deconstruction has been appropriated by literary criticism as an assault upon the rigidity of structuralism and by Landow as an endorsement of hypertext. Derrida's own deconstructions of philosophical texts focus on ambiguities, hidden metaphors and even footnotes, anything that is normally neglected by conventional readers, requiring a careful and attentive reading. Hyper-text can link this external information, perhaps facilitating a deconstructionist reading. However, in a hyper-textual enviroment, the reader is easily lured into a state of hyper-browsing that results in a cursory scanning of data. This is in contradiction to the attentive reading that is suggested by deconstructionists and results in a loss of meaning.

Landow also views hypertext as "an infinitely re-centerable system whose provisional point of focus depends upon the reader." Decentralization can free intellectual and social perceptions, as shown by the dissolution of Euro-centrism. In post-modernism this has been achieved by defining an ex-centric or marginal position from which to deconstruct the dominant cultural perceptions. This ex-centric position is conceived of as a frontier of possibilities, a space of identity from which to challenge the authority of all kinds of centrisms. However, there is an inevitable ideological complicity with the same dominant conventions that are being challenged because identities are interwoven. Thus, literary de-centralization through hypertext promises Utopian possibilities. But how can a hyper-textual writer avoid the fragmentation and subsequent loss of coherent meaning without a stable literary center? No matter what marginal literary position is assumed it is dependent upon the codes of communication and references of the dominant culture, until it can create its own center of reference.

According to Landow, the theoretical concepts of de-centralization, multilinearity and networking will revolutionize human thought "Hypertextual Derrida. He begins by defining the problem of causality and ironically his theories fall victim to it. These 'revolutionary' concepts have existed in poetry, art, literature and in the minds of all humans prior to the advent of hyper-text. For example, the poetry of bp nichols explores the phenomenological relation between language and reality. For him "sacredness resides neither in the word nor in language itself, but in the activity of language which connects the two"(qtd.in Nikki). In his work, the martyrology, pictures fade in and out. No center is maintained as words build upon themselves and fragments of ideas break out. It is an artform that remains enigmatic and a work that is frequently overlooked because of the meaning is purposely absent. This 'hyper-textual' conceptualization was fixed upon a framed page and published over 25 years ago, just as the Internet was emerging as a scheme to secure military communication.

Rather than accepting that theoretical hyper-text will 'revolutionize human thought', human conceptualization must continue to revolutionize hyper-text. The Internet has the potential to elevate the human condition through communication and accessibility to knowledge. Three years ago, CBC broadcast a journal from a woman, in war-torn Bosnia, that had been sent out via e-mail. She spoke from her center. I listened and heard from my center. My response was anything but linear; no hierarchy separated us. Nor did politics, distance or culture. Through communication made possible by technology, humanity may be brought together and this is a Utopia worth working towards. However, if meaning is lost and the communication dissolves into fragmentation, of what use is theory?

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