ITH - Centrum för studier av IT ur ett
humanvetenskapligt perspektiv
vid Högskolan i Borås
2-3/2001
New Links: Computerization and Narrative Fiction
- Editorial
- Erik Peurell
You've got mail. Is that
all there is?
Use of the Internet
for literary studies in Swedish university education and research
- Erik Peurell
Presentation and
Representation
A study of Swedish
literary classics published on the Web
- Anna Gunder
Forming the Text,
Performing the Work
Aspects of
media, navigation, and linking
- Johan Svedjedal
Ergodic Nightmare
The world of choices in Philip K.
Dick's The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch
- Svante Lovén
Even Better than the
Real Thing
Counterfeit realities and
twentieth century dystopian fiction
This issue of Human IT contains a number of articles
originating in one of the most active research communities in Sweden that are
focusing on the use and study of information technology within the humanities.
When trying to find a unifying term to describe the articles, I am suddenly
struck by the difference in perspective that they offer. A few have a distinct
trait of what is often termed hypertext theory, but not all. The authors all
have a connection to the Section for the Sociology of Literature at Uppsala
University, and more specifically to the research project "IT, Narrative
Fiction and the Literary System" funded by The Axel and Margaret Ax:son Johnson
Foundation, but not all of the articles would be properly said to deal with the
study of literature from a sociological perspective. They could all be included
within the discipline of literature studies, but are also bordering other
disciplines such as media studies, library and information science, and
sociology. In the end, I find myself returning to the title we have given this
special issue, namely Computerization and narrative fiction, as a unifying term
for the thematic content in the articles. And perhaps that is as close as we
get in defining the spectra that these articles cover.
The issue begins with a study conducted by Erik Peurell
in which he investigates the use of the Internet for teaching and research
purposes among teaching staff at Swedish Literature Departments. These are
times of increasing hypermedia usage in education, of new technology for
disseminating research results, and of new channels and networks for
information distribution. To be able to analyze differences and to follow the
possibly historical changes that are taking place, it is of great importance
that we map the use of the Internet in different academic areas. Peurell's
study shows certain changes compared to an earlier survey made among American
MLA members, but indicates that the main incentive within this discipline for
using Internet resources continues to be communication and information
retrieval, rather than the publishing of research results or educational
purposes. Peurell discusses this in light of differing research traditions
within and between disciplines.
In what I would like to see as a companion piece to his
previous study, Erik Peurell in "Presentation and Representation" then
goes on to make an inventory of what material by and about classical Swedish
writers of fiction is available on the Web. Of vital importance for the use of
web material in education is naturally the existence of reliable scholarly
material. In order to be able to say anything about the textual quality of the
material, Peurell carries out two case studies, one of web resources containing
texts by and concerning Georg Stiernhielm and his work Hercules, and one of
resources with texts by and about Erik Johan Stagnelius. Peurell also tries to
uncover the background and source of the web sites publishing this material in
an attempt to lay bare the motivation for the publication, which in turn
influences the concern, or lack of such, with textual quality from a
bibliographic point of view.
In order to be able to talk about and analyze works in new
media as well as old ones, we need a terminology that is well defined. How do
we, e.g., describe the relationship between the typographic text we are reading
aloud to our ten-year-old from the book Harry Potter and the Philosopher's
Stone, the text we listen to in Stephen Fry's reading in the audio cassette
version, and the story we see unfold on the screen in the movie theatre? And
how does the computer game Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone fit
into all of this? Drawing on such traditions as textual criticism and hypertext
theory, Anna Gunder provides us with a framework and a terminology to
discuss such questions. This might shed some light on the varying
manifestations in which works are being stored, preserved and reproduced. It
might also be of assistance when trying to describe in detail how the texts are
structured and navigated in different media. The article constitutes, along
with Gunder's previously published article on narratology - "Berättelsens
spel" (Human IT 3/1999) - the first part of her dissertation about
hyperliterary narration.
The last two articles in this issue are examples of more
traditional analyses of literary works, with focus on the genre of science
fiction. In "Ergodic Nightmare", Johan Svedjedal applies Aarseth's
concept of ergodicity as an instrument to uncover the theme in a novel by
Philip K. Dick. The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch serves as an
illustration of a trait common in many narratives that base the nerve of the
plot on a discrepancy between different levels of simulation. Svedjedal
compares the situation in which the protagonists in the book find themselves to
the ergodic situation facing the reader who has to make choices of a
non-trivial nature in his or her reading.
Svante Lovén brings us an historical exposition
of how technologies of representation and simulation are rendered in dystopian
fiction and science fiction, pointing out that this is accomplished by the use
of similar images or themes that come to illustrate basic humanist ideas.
Beginning in the pre-computer era of the late nineteenth century, he
exemplifies his argument with works from the literary canon as well as lesser
known genre writing up to Gibson's influential - and computer-studded - novels.
The following two issues of Human IT will focus on ICT
as a tool for pedagogy and communication (4/2001) and on E-democracy (1/2002).
There is still room for new articles in 2/2002, and we invite contributions for
that issue before May 17.
Borås in December
Helena
Francke
