Introduction

[Nancy Patterson]

When I first saw this question asking to define the smallest unit of a
hypertext, my first thought was that it had to be a lexia.  And like Marty,
I then wondered if the smallest unit wouldn't be a letter or a single image.

But another part of me wants to really rebel against trying to find a
"common denominator" in hypertext.   Espen Aarseth addresses this issue.
Aarseth points out that hypertext cannot be defined by any linguistic form.
He (or perhaps she?) says:

"The unit, which is best conceived as an arbitrarily long string of
graphemes, is identified by its relation to the other units as constrained
and separated by the conventions or mechanisms of their mother text.  It
should be noted that these textual units usually do not upset the laws of
grammatical language, but that is of no importance to our definition.  As a
suitable name for such a unit I suggest texton, which denotes a basic
element of textuality" (60).

George Landow would call a texton a lexia, which he adapted from Roland
Barthes's "unites de lecture" (unites of reading) in S/Z.  Aarseth doesn't
care for this term because he feels it connotes a linearity that is one of
the concepts hypertext challenges.  Others call this a writing space, that
there a problems with that term when a text is accessed by another.

By the way, I would hesitate to define a unit of hypertext in terms of a
reader or writer because those roles blur in a hypertext.  The reader,
because he/she creates a new text through linking, very often creates a text
that is different than that which the writer conceived.  That places the
reader in the role of a writer.

Nancy

At 05:47 PM 1/8/99 -0600, you wrote:
>Well, I don't want to assert a hasty answer here, but I think you've hit
>on an important idea Karen.  Whether it's a graphic or a single word or
>letter, the smallest unit might be the link itself, no matter what form it
>takes.
>
>Other than that, a larger unit of hypertext seems to be the papragraph.
>Paragraphs in hypertext often tend to be shorter than in other forms of
>writing, and the frequent breaks make reading hypertext off the screen
>easier on the eyes!
>
>Susan
>
>On Fri, 8 Jan 1999, Karen McComas wrote:
>
>> is)....I think the minimal unit of discourse in a hypertext environment is
>> either .... oh drats, I was going to initially say it was a single
screen, but
>> just as I started to type that I started to second guess myself...could it be
>> a single letter, linked to another document....could it be a graphic, linked
>> to another document....hmmmmmm....someone else better jump in here ;)
>>
>> Marty Jacobsen wrote:
>
>> > purpose.  What is the minimal unit of discourse in a hypertext
>> > environment? Is there one?  Is hypertext a discourse and can it be
>> > measured this way?  I've got thoughts but not theories about this.
>
>
Nancy G. Patterson

"To educate as the practice of freedom is a way of teaching that anyone can
learn."  bell hooks

patter at voyager.net
<http://www.msu.edu/user/patter90/opening.htm>
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