Monday, September 8, 2008

Back for another Semester of Posting


Spending the last six months looking at education and technology policy, it is now time to explore the rhetoric and composition theory of writing in a technological world. Enrolled in Dr. Collin Brooke's CCR 720: Interdisciplinary Influences on Composition and Rhetoric: Computers and Writing, I'm anxious to learn new ways and new ideas about how advancements in technology will alter a student writer's way of knowing.

I've begun by looking at Michael J. Cripps "Hypertext Theory and WebDev in the Composition Classroom" which addresses how hyperlinking disrupts the traditional way of reading a linear text and may alter the ways in which writer's organize their mode of communication (aside: it occurs to me that the hyperlink is actually the "old school" use of a footnote -- it is an aside...a point of reference to continue one's order of thinking, but that is stated 'outside' the essay as that material that brings the writer to the purpose of their writing).

Cripps discussion of visual rhetoric actually parallels much of the conversation being held by those discussing Arts Based Research Methodology and Visual Literacy.

If I am to critique the hyperlink style of composition, it is as follows: Wow. How easy is it to write a document that utilizes hypertext! Boo. Reading hyperlinked text becomes problematic...at least for me...because it interrupts the linear way of reading that I'm used to. Even so, I'm able to see the point of an essay faster, but get frustrated by moving from thought to back up thought as I try to understand a composition. With this said, I am growing more familiar with the difference in reading traditional print-text copies versus reading online and screen-text. Perhaps a day is coming where one can keep their "highlighted" versions of on-screen text (with their hyperlinked notes from their reading), but as for today, this doesn't occur.

As I build on previous knowledge, I am still in favor of a hard copy in my filing cabinet - but also see how an online filing cabinet might also suffice.

Cripps, M.J; (date-you tell me): "FFFFFF, #000000, & #808080: Hypertext Theory and WebDev in the Composition Classroom";
from Computers and Composition Online; An international journal: Elsevier Publishing:
http://www.bgsu.edu/cconline/cripps/index.html

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