As I read Kim MacQueen's "HyperTapestry," I found myself simultaneously in agreement and disagreement with some of the main points of the article. Almost immediately, I was impressed by the similarities between the Bayeaux tapestry and hypertext documents. "Hand-stitched by 12th century monks," MacQueen states, "the tapestry is a painstakingly crafted physical document that details how Duke William of Normandy conquered England in 1066.” This description instantly evoked thoughts of individuals today creating webpages or other hypertext documents using HTML and other programming languages. The likenesses between these ideas was underlined for me by the fact that in each instance the created document provides numerous interconnected pieces of information to be read in a fashion and order determined by the reader.
Of course, almost as quickly, I was struck by the dissimilarities between these two drastically different types of creations. For one, it is abundantly obvious that a 230-feet-long tapestry is more tangible than a given hypertext document. It should also be noted that the monks responsible for the creation of the Bayeaux tapestry probably spent a considerably longer period of time creating their document than the creator of an average hypertext document would spend creating his or hers. Bearing this in mind, it seems hypertext, given all of its benefits and virtues, still falls short of accurately recreating the tendencies of the medieval mind and its culture. That's not to say that hypertext works no more like the medieval mind than traditional text; rather I mean to say that hypertext, being less tangible and arguably easier to create than the more concrete works of the Middle Ages, does less to enhance memory and perpetuate knowledge than creations like the Bayeaux tapestry did in their times. In fact, one could even argue that hypertext does a grave disservice to the functioning of the human memory considering the ease with which information can be virtually stored and retrieved. In other words, since we know it's relatively easy to record and recall our thoughts and experiences in a virtual world using hypertext, we devote less of our faculties to managing them within our brains in the real world. Whereas non-literate medieval minds relied heavily on "experience, memory, and their own eyes and ears" to make sense of their lives and the world around them, individuals today forgo these burdens and rely instead on technology's ability to retain information. In this sense, I find it hard to believe that we can ever recreate the worldviews of those who've come so long before us without renouncing the usefulness of modern technologies and reverting to the oral traditions of pre-print societies.
"HyperTapestry" by Kim MacQueen
3 comments:
To an extent, I agree with what you mentioned concerning the disservice hypertext does to the creators of the tapestry. Is one thing to watch this artifact on a screen and another to stand inside a massive room where this medieval creation surrounds you. If one is to compare the two methods based on physical beauty, the medieval version would be superior, but then you would miss the author's point. The author emphazises the convenience the hypertext provides; the connection is with education in the twenty first century. I am also in agreement with you in that sometimes we reject our natural abilities but, we cannot ignore how technology continues to enhance education.
There was one particular point that you made in which I am entirely in agreement with, however you did make good points throughout, but this one I feel strongly about. This point deals with the fact that technology has weakened our memorization skills because we know that we can return to the information with just the click of a button. As a result of making things more simplistic and easily accessible we have sacrificed our expansive memories. Despite this huge fault, hypertext has been of great assistance to the education world in that it is able to convey information in such a way that books could only dream of.
You are doing beautiful work, here. Your commentary is insightful and articulate.
I also like the way you have incorporated the links to which you are referring. so that the blog reader can click right to them.
Very nice work. :-)
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