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Contours of Constructive Hypertexts.

Conference Paper · November 1992

DOI: 10.1145/168466.168517 · Source: DBLP

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MILANO, NOVEMBER 30- DECEMBER 4, 1992 161

Contours of Constructive EIypertexts

MarkBernstein
Eastgate Systems, Inc.
134 Main Street, Watertown MA 02172 USA

Michael Joyce
Jackson Community College
Vassar College

David Levine
Gettysburg College

Abstract 1 Introduction

Discussion of hypertext rhetoric and criticism has How can we deseribe our experience of large and
foeused on small, freed hypertext that am complex hypertexts-hypertexts intended to
typically used by casual readers for comparatively inform and influence a dedicated, thoughtful
short periods. Here we explo~ complex, reader?
constructive hypertext, intended to inform and to
Discussion of hypertext design, hypertext rhetoric,
infIuence dedicated and thoughtful readers.
and indeed of the merits and faults of hypertext
Recurrence and multivalence, both deplored in
itself, has often fbcused narrowly upon the role of
small hypertext, prove from study of mom
isolated links. Calls for “structured” hypertexk
complex texts to be very valuable. While static,
while emphasizing the complexity of large
graph-theoretic measures facilitate understanding
hypertext, have limited their attention to simple,
of Ioeal hypertext structure, the structures of
recursively defined aggregates. IrI contrast, we
meaning or contours we observe in current
argue that complex hyptxtexts are not simply
hypertext fiction and scholarship do not appear to
expanded versions of small hypertext and propose
reside in static structures, but rather in the complex
some initial steps toward a voeabukwy for better
and dynamic perceptions of the engagedreader.
understanding large hypertext.
Understanding of small-wale hypertextual
The yarns of seamen have a dwect simplicity, incomplete, is
phenomen% while still
the whole meaning of which lies within the
comparatively well advanced. Considerable effort
shell of a cructid nut. But Murlow was not has been devoted to promulgating rules for
typicai (tf his propensity to spin yarns be
effectively placing and explaining hypertext links
excepted), and to him the meaning of an (e.g., [5,25,35]). Indeed, discussion of the merits
episode was not inside like a kernel but and faults of hypertext has, since Conklin’s review
outside, enveloping the tale . . .. [10], centered on the alleged tension between the
Joseph Conrad, Heart of Darkness expressiveness of individual links and the
additional complexity or “cognitive overhead”
which the presence of links imposes on the reader
[8,9,16]. Prescriptive, formal models have been
proposed to discipline link creation and enfome
Permission to copy without fee all or part of this ma- consistency [11,23], taxonomies of tinks have been
terial is sranted movided that conies are not made or
distributed for d;ect commercial ~dvantage, the ACM
proposed [15], and clinical studies (e.g. [20,47,481)
copyright notice and the title of the publication and have sought to compare the effwiency of link
its date appear, and notice is given that copying is by traversal to conventional access strategies. Belief
permission of the Association for Computing Machin- networks [22], retrieval models [12], guides [37],
ery, To copy otherwise, or to republish, requirea a fee
and/or specific permission.
and apprentices [3] have been developed to help
@1992 ACM @89791-547-X/92/0011/0161/ $1.50 readerschoose among links.
162
While these studim have yielded a wealth of
valuable material, they share (perhaps of necessity)
a simple but unrealistic view of readers and
reading. Empirical studies have emphasized
retrieval speed and efficiency because retrieval is
easy to measure.Retrieval of facts, however, is but
one of myriad ways we use written information,
indeed, compared to the influence that an impurtant
textbook or favorite poem may exert on our
character, or an influential research study or
theoretical analysis upon OK professional lives,
retrieval seems neither a very common nor a very
important activity. The intrinsic complexity of real
texts has been obscurd too, by the assumption
that texts have a single purpose or intention. Few
texts are one-dimensional, and truly single-purpose
texts are almost always ephernmd (business cards,
advextisements, audit records) or archival (laws,
voter lists). Meaningful documents, even on paper,
are multivalent and polyvocal [4].
In contemplating the atomic act of link traversaL”
we may lose sight of larger structures. The
literature is replete with calls for “structured
hypertext” [16] and taxonomies of hypertext
structure [49], yet the proposed structures are either
very small or very simple. The rhetoric of
hypertext rhetoric, too, has been confined to small
scale, Landow, for example, addresses points of
departure and arrival [35], while Evenson and
Rheinfrank propose a visual language for
typographical representation of isolated links [211.
Many of the most exciting developments in
hypertext systems have applied knowledge
representation to create local hypertext structures
and behaviors, but these, too, involve
comparatively small structures. SEPIA [55],
MacWeb [46] and Aquanet [40] let authors express
relationships among typed nodes and links,
providing a rich vocabulary of local structure.
Explicit representation promotes local coherence
and consistency, permitting authors to express
systematic relationships (e.g. between artist and
artifact) in a manner which can be grasped and
anticipated by the reader, searched by a qwxy
system, or used as a basis for computation. In some
sense these local structures function as rich
metanodes which are themselves linked across a
network of metanodes, Thus even these subtle and
flexible systems express essentially local relations
among clusters of entities.
ACM ECHT CONFERENCE
2 Learning From Hypertext Fiction
Hypertext rhetoric should be grounded in critical
examination of actual hypertext. In the absenceof
a hypertext literature, early writers had no choice
but to extrapolate from their expectations or their
own initial experiments. A purely theoretic
~~mh is hazardous, for hypertext are not
electronic simulations of printed Iwoks:
To require hypertext to function like a
book is a bit like expecting a jediner to
behave iike a locomotive: yes it’s very
fasl, but the blasted thing won’t stay on
lhe rails. [42]
Technological changes may have unforeseen
impacc Bolter has shown that an innovation in
binding technology, the codex, transformed the
scale and conception of literary work [7], while
Landow notes that a technical change in page
layout (the introduction of spacesbetween words in
manuscripts) changed reading from a vocal and
public performance to a silen~ personal activity
[36].
It is now (barely) possible to ground a discussion
of hypertext rhetoric in actual hypertexts-texts
which have been deliberately crafted by writers
who devoted substantial efforts and resources to
the task, and whose reputation rests in some
measure with the quality of the resulL The body of
hypertext literature remains sparse,and some titles
are so specialized in topic (e.g. military equipment
maintenance) or intended audience (e.g. preliterate
children) that it seems dangerous to generalize
from them. Many of today’s best-known
hypertext, monxwer, are works of fiction. Some
techniques of fiction m specialized, yet we believe
that insights from fiction can often be applied to
technical and scholarly writing.
The chasm between fiction and technicrd
communication is less formidable than it
sometimes appears. Effeetive language,
informative organization, dramatic integrity and
engagement challenge all writem, regardless of
genre or medium. This approach is not particularly
novel, as Laurel [37] has applied lessons from
classical drama to user interface design and Peter
B@gh Anderson [6] uses semiotic concepts from
cinema to understand hypertextual transitions.
Earlier, Harnmet and Hemingway adopted the
discourse of journalism to the service of fiction.
Where the novelist seeks an extensible,
MILANO, NOVEMBER 30- DECEMBER 4, 1992
constructive hypertext, a “form for what does not
yet exist” [28], the engineer cites a need for
“information [which] constantly evolves as people
contribute parts to a conceptually interconnected
web.” [38]
3 Recurrence is not a defect
As hypertext readers tmvel through a document,
they may return to places they have previously
visited. The impact of unexpected repetition can be
startling; Bernstein [2] introduced the use of
breadcrumbs specitlcally to alert readers to the
possibility of revisiting a recently-visited place.
Rouet [51] assumesthat revisiting a hypertext node
is evidence of disorientation.
This perception is fundamentally wrong. In small
hypertext, to be sure, recurrence is boring.
Recurrence is unhelpful, too, in hypertextual
encyclopedias and reference manuals which are
meant to be consulted in brief episodes. In complex
hypertext, on the other hand, recurrence is not a
defect repetition provides a powerful structural
force, a motif which helps readers synthesize the
experience of the reading. Rhythms of recurrence
announce patterns of meaning.
Malloy’s its name was Penelope is a radically
“chunky” hypertext a densenetwork of very short,
almost stylized texts representing fragmentary
memories of an artist’s girlhood, professional life,
and love affairs [39]. Repetitions help modulate the
story, superimposing an irregular secondary
rhythm of repetition on the uniformity of
successive,brief passages.Moreover, the passages
themselves contain internal quotations and
allusiony a passage which the reader has not seen
before may recall an earlier node, and may itself be
called to mind when the earlier node is revisited.
Similarly, Joyce’s Afternoon [29] exploits textual
cycles to represent (and, simultaneously, to deny
the possibility of) closure [181.
These are not mere artistic effects. Examine, say, a
university physics text, and you will find
conservation of momentum and energy expressed
over and over again, in different contexts and
guises, to ensure that students truly understand
Recurrence communicates the existence of
structure, the linkage among ideas which weaves
disparate facts and arguments into a single coherent
work.
163
4 Multivalence is not a vice
Repetition also opens the possibility of multivalent
passages,episodes whose meaning changes when
revisited because the reader has gained new
understanding or insight. Formal, prescriptive
approaches to hypertext have usually regarded
multivalence as undesirable, preferring to assign an
explicitly-~presented role (or role set) to each
writing space (cf. [1123]). In large and complex
hypertext, however, multivalent writing is neither
undesirable nor, indee& avoidable.
Consider, for example, the role of Emily Runbird’s
death in Stuart Moukhrop’s novel of the Gulf War,
Victory Garden [41]. Emily is a graduate student
who, by virtue of her ROTC scholarship, finds
herself stationed in Saudi Arabia. In some readings
of Victory Garden, Emily is killed by a SCUD
missile. The meaning of many passagesis changed
by Emily’s death; passagesthat had one meaning
while Emily is believed to be safely ensconced in
the desert mailroom mean something else entirely
after we are led to suspect that Emily has been
killed. Her sister, Veronica, is brooding and
irritable. Does her unease mirror her professor’s
irritation with patriarchal politics, or does it arise
from her intuitive consciousness that her sister’s
life has just ended in flames? Elsewhere, another
student, Jude, seducesEmily’s lover while wearing
a blonde wig. Is Jude a tramp, callously seducing
Emily’s lover while Emily is at war? Or is her
impersonation a reincarnation, a purifying ritual, a
gesture that life will go on? Meaning emerges not
from a single sequence or interpretation but from
the coalescenceof multiple readings [17].
Hypertext, after all, was originally motivated by
the realization that a single passage may play
several different roles in discourse. Discussion of a
single astronomical object, say M31, may appear in
an astronomy text as an example of a gaseous
nebula, as an object of interest to
archaeoastronomy, as the home of a pulsar, or as a
pretty object to look for on a warm summer
evening. Indeed, technical texts deliberately reuse
examples not becauseof a shortage of material, but
in order to establish ~lationships within a
discipline. The “same chemical reaction may be
cited as an elementary example, may appear
elsewhere as a useful synthetic tool, and be cited in
yet another context as evidence for a mechanistic
theory. If a text is large enough and important
164
enough to change the reader, multivalence
expresses that change, and recurrence
change apparent.
Recurrent structures can also be seen as an author’s
instantiation of the ephemeral memories of creating
a text which itself anticipates the reader’s
instantiation of similar (though not
structures. This “constantly replaced present tense”
of hypertext contours [31] calls to mind
intention of the text:
A text is a device conceived in order to
produce its model reader .. . The
empirical reader is only an actor who
makes conjectures about the kind of
modei rea&r postulated by the text.
Since the intention of the text (intentio
operis) is basically to produce a model
reader able to make conjectures about it,
the initiative of Ihe model rea&r
consists in figuring out a model author
that is not the empirical one and that, in
the end, coincides with the intention of
the text. Thus . .. the text is an object that
the interpretation builds up in the course
of the circular eflort of validating itself
on the bash of what it makes up as its
result. [19]
As hypertext dissoIves the distinction between
readers and writers, each mider forms her own
working model of the intention of the text,
appropriating the role of Eco’s model author.
5 Depth and Contour
As the text discloses its shape and intention to the
reader, the reader creates hypothetical predictions
of its shape and possible continuations. These
expectations change as the reader examines the
work more completely, much as our interpretation
of a painting changes while we look at it. The eye
perceives suggestions of three-dimensional
structure in a two dimensional painting---even a
non-representational painting. We borrow the
terms depth and contour from the painter’s
vocabulary to describe a similar sense of form
which the mxier gains as she reads.
By conrour, we mean a perceived pattern of
meaning within the hypertext an observed
stnictum that a reader can describe and appropriate
for her own use Some contours may coincide with
ACM ECHT CONFERENCE
explicit paths in the hypertext, while others may
makes that appear to us only when we think of them, or when
a colleague points out an overlooked structure of
meaning. Texts like dictionaries and integrated
circuit catalogs, are essentially flat they may be
large and informative, but they convey little sense
of structure. A few texts-business cards and
identical)
military orders-offer only a single structure and a
single contour. Most texts, however, m richer, and
Eco’s
present varied contours as we read and reread
them.
A contour is “a contingent order, a linearity
perceived in tension against the possibility of other
lines” [43], While paths [571 may tlilow (and
illuminate) contours, contours are not paths, A path
is, in essence,a traceable record of a trajectory. If
that trajectory is meaningful, we might describe the
path as following a contouq on the other hand, we
may easily imagine a trajectory which is
convenient or functional but not intrinsically
meaningful.
Depth describes the presence of multiple contours
within a text. When a ~ader fiit glances at a
hypertext, of course, she sees a set of independent
nodes comected by links, just as when we look at
an abstract painting we initially perceive daubs of
color placed on canvas. The perception of structure
arises as we rationalize our initial impmssion. Just
as adjacent blue patches coalesce into an object, or
adjacent figures coalesce into a group, interlined
and interrelated nodes coalesce into a contour [1].
A hypertext will appear to have depth-to offer
many contours-when it can be seen as the
projection of a recurrent structure that is
structurally simpler than a non-recurrent one.
Rather than viewing recurrences as anomalous
phenomena, the reader will try to cmt them into
consistent, large-scale patterns.
A simplified “model railroad” representation of
hypertext contours can begin to illustrate the depth
of recurnmt structures. The mder of the hypertext
shown in Figure 1, ffom her current perspective (M
in Figure 1), perceives &me distinct contours-the
contour she has chosen, and two contours she has
(for the present) foregone. One contour lies before
her the other two contours were once readily
accessible, but can no longer be reached by
following links. A choice has been made, and the
reader’s attention is not limited to a specific sector
MILANO, NOVEMBER 30- DECEMBER
of the text. IrI this way, navigational choices lead
readersto model the text’s intentional structures.
+5 cl--n
❑-
r E cl---n
cl---a-- Cl-WI
Figure 1. The reader at Hperceives three contours.
In actual hypertext systems, of course, the reader
could still t%d ways ‘to reach the sections she has
bypassed. She might be able to retrace her steps
and follow a different trajectory, or to jump (as if
by magic) to a node whose name she knows.
Though choice is not irrevocable, it influences
perception. Patterns of links suggest patterns of
intention.
Now let our reader (or author) add links to the
hypertext. We imagine the perspective of a reader
who has followed the same trajectory as before,
arriving at the sameplace in the hypertext.
Figure 2. An added link provides a shortcut.
In Figure 2, the reader will still perceive several
distinct contours, for her decisions have made
some parts of the texts easily accessible while
others can be attained only by extraordinary means.
In Figure 3, on the other hand, the added link
threads the contours together into a knot. The
reader perceives that she has not been forced (at
this point) to choose among contours, and what
formerly were distinct sections or contours have
coalescedinto a single aggregate cluster.
During the reading of a complex hypertex~
contours may emerge and recombine as we
encounter new links and connections. Contours that
once’ seemed to pose irrevocable choices may
4, 1992 165
rejoin, while other links, that once seemed to be
mere annotations, may gain significance in
retrospect. The rhythm of these shifts between
recurrent structures takes the form of what Joyce
has called replacement within contours [31] and
Jay Bolter describes as the principle of interactive
oscillation [44]. “Even in ostensibly clear and
instrumental text”, Moukhrop argues, “the
language and hence the hypertextual situation, may
shift into oscillation.”
l=L-
I
WI
1
I
C1--n
Figare 3. An added Zink knats contours tagether.
In an abstract painting or polyphonic music,
complex, textured shaWs seemto oscillate between
foreground and background [1]. Similarly,
intersecting contours may give rise to oscillation
and replacement in our mentat model of the
recurring structures of our hypertext. These notions
of shifts, oscillation, and replacement call to mind
Deleuze and Guattari’s notion of “transcoding or
transduction [as] the manner in which one milieu
serves as the basis for another . . . is established
atop another milieu, dissipates in it or is constituted
by it.”[14] The rhythmic recurrence of hypertext
contours enables the reader to form her own
working model, one which in its shifts
communicates the intention of the text.
6 Contingency and Contour
The hypertext reader not only chooses the order of
what she reads, but by her choices chooses what it
shall be [17]. Patterns of allusion and reeumence,
familiarity and novelty shape themselves into a
transient sense of coherence; for a moment, we
may look up from the screen and say, “Yes! Now I
see where this hypertext is going.” What we
discover is as much where we are going as it is
what paths the author has laid out.
‘Ile text rewritten by the act of choice becomes
constructive hypertext [28]—hypertext that is open
166 ACM ECHT CONFERENCE

to change and addition and revision, hypertext in a choice of only two or three links that lead to
which the authorship of the reader is made explicit. dramatically contrasting contours.
Readers constantly make inscriptions in the text—
We can define a crude but computationally-
not ordy by adding bookmarks and margin notes,
tractable measure of the texture T(n) of node n
but also by choosing one link and bypassing
from the following observations:
another, or by remembering an encounter with a
familiar passage. ● Each node we can reach from n contributes to the
texture of n.
A constructive hypertext, like a collaborative
● Nodes that are close to n contribute more texture
design [38], is a foundation for what does not yet
than nodes that can only be reached from n by
exist. Collaborative design and argumentation
following many links.
systems provide a framework that reifies the
transient structures of design and dispute If we define d(n,v) to be the minimum distance
[11 ,53,55]. These collaborative structures are between nodes n and v in the underlying hypertext
continually being replaced as readersperceive (and digraph, a possible definition of T(n) might be:
create) new connections and disjunctions.
Coextensiviry [31] refers to this kind of T(n)=~ 2-d(n’v)
replacement of one writing by another. We vtin
recognize coextensivity in the degree of oscillation
Nielsen [48, p. 169] alludes to a similar measure.
and replacement among recurring structures of a
Some simple examples of fiwniliar substructures
hypertext. Constructive hypertext environments
may clarify texture:
often make these virtual contours explicit through
virtual structures [27] like the Storyspace Path ● The texture of each place in a long, linear
Builder [54] or the implicit links of Perseus [45]. sequenceapproaches 1=(1/2 + 1/4+ 1/8....)
● If A is a footnote connected to B, T(A)= 1/2+
7 Tension and texture T(B)/’2

● T%e texture of the root of a complete binary tree

Linear reading is essentially passiwz the author has
established an argument which the reader follows.
As we read a hypertext, however, we are constantly
summoned to choose one path or another, to pursue
one goal and avoid a different goal. On occasion,
we may know exactly what we want to find, and
bypass the hypertext entirely for a simple query
mechanism; more frequently, we do not know
exactly what we seek, and our goak shift as we
learn.
is the tree’sdepth.
The densest places in a hypertext are those where
many contours intersect. For example, consider
Bolter’s Writing Space [’7], a monograph on “the
computer, hypertext, and the history of writing”
containing of 451 writing spaces and 888 links.
The most textured places in the document are
section headings that describe key topics and
supply a hierarchical navigationat framework:

Not all places in a hypertext afford equal degrees 15.4 Writing Spaces
of choice. Some places are fraught with tension, 14.51 III. Mind
offering many choices which wiU shape our entire 13.23 II. Conceptual
reading; others are flat and simple, offering few or 13,09 I. Visual Space
unimportant choices. Texture measures the 12.99 VIII. Interactive Fiction
capacity for meaning-shaping choice among
elements of a hypertext-the ability of a reader to The least textured places are notes that illustrate or
transform the text and structure. Where contours comment upon specific points in the texfi
intersect and interact, texture is dense, whe~ a
0.75 electronic writing turns
single contour prevails, texture is smooth. The
0.75 unbounded
texture of a writing space is not merely a matter of
1.00 Iamsorrytohearthat
counting linky a writing space with thirty
footnotes, each leading to a bibliographic It can be interesting to keep one eye on the “texture
reference, is flatter than a writing space that offers gauge” while reading a hypertext. Texture climbs
as we approach a major navigational crossroads,
MILANO, NOVEMBER 30- DECEMBER 4, 1992
and declines as we pursue more specialized
material. User interfaces can give textural cueq for
example, we may raise the pitch of a sound that
signals the turning of a page as the texture grows
more dense. Because highly textured regions are
clearly critical to the coherence and
coextensivenessof a hypertext, a software agent or
a link apprentice (see [3]) might profitably be
programmed to recognize and represent local
structures which occur at highly textured spaces.
8 Static Structure and Dynamic
Perception
The search for better methods of identifying and
visualizing hypertext structures forms a central
thread in hypertext research. While the
computational intractability of graph layout
algorithms continues to mandate ~eliance on hand-
crafted diagrams [2], interest in layout heuristics
[33,50], interactive manual layout [30, 46], and
visualization [34] has not abated. Other
investigators have sought to simplify the
visualization problem by automatically discovering
reduced or clustered graphs adapted to individual
reader’s interests [13, 22. 24]. Since the placement
of individual links and the organization of small
neighborhoods can be powerfully expressive, it
seems only natural to seek a hypertext’s meaning
through study of its underlying graph structure.
Following Botafogo and Shneiderman [7a],
sought to identify clusters of meaning in hypertext
by identifying strongly connected components,
sections of the hypertext so interconnected that any
node in the section can be reached from every other
node. We first observe that secondary navigational
modes (bookmarks, history menus, navigational
undo, bmadcrumbs, search, and link-creation by
readers) transform almost any hypertext into a
single strongly connected componenc we are thus
forced to ignore them, even though Walker [56]
has shown that th~e are common and important
activities even for readers of unalterable technical
documents.
Botafogo and Shneiderman found that they could
obtain meaningful component clusters in Hypertext
Hands-On! [52] by ignoring highly textured nodes.
Applying the same approach to more densely
interconnected hypertext fictions, such as kzme
Pass [26] and Woe [32], we find it very difficult to
obtain meaningful clusters. If the texture threshold
167
is set too high, we find a only single large
component in each hypertext, accompanied by
many singleton components and very small
clusters. This result was not expected, especially in
Woe, since Woe’s “Mandala” node with 38
outgoing links is so central to navigation through
the text’s 63 nodes. Decreasing the texture
threshold sufficiently does eventually break up the
single strongly-comected component, but also
dissects the work into many isolated nodes rather
than a few meaningfid chunks. Thus, if we delete
the ten nodes with texture >5.0, we find one large
cluster (39 nodes) and ten small clusters . If we
delete the 24 nodes with texture, M.0, the large
cluster has disappeared, but the 39 remaining nodes
are broken up into 23 components, all small. While
readers describing these hypertext consistently
perceive them in lerms of aggregates like scenes
and episodes, these aggregates & not easily
emerge from the graph structure.
Nor do these aggregates emerge from simple
models of reader behavior. In an effort to formalize
the notion of contour, we sought to model the
reader’s trajectory through the hypertext as a
Markov process. Starting at distinct points in the
hypertext, and assuming that readem were equally
likely to follow any link (and that they completely
ignored secondary navigation), we expected that
different probability distributions would emerge,
reflecting differences in contour.
we IIwilr’mmww
Figure 4. Transcripts of two sets of random walks in@ernaan, starting
from two different nades. The nades of the hypertext are laid out frwm
lcfi to right, and t)w probabiliq disoibwion of each successive
generation is shawnfiom back to front. Random walk$ begin at a single
node (rear of graph) but rapidly spread thraugh ths hypertert until most
nodes share a sin”larly small probability (front of gmph).
Much to our surprise, however, the observed
distributions become very broad within ten or
twenty steps. Even in the large, episodic Victoty
Garden (993 nodes, 2804 links) we could not find
structure in the 15th-generation Markov
distributions; random walks on the hypertext graph
starting horn a bunker in Sandi Arabia and from a
168 ACM ECHT CONFERENCE

campus nightclub each yielded similar probability [6] P. B@ghAndersen, “Towards and aesthetics of
profiles in which hunhds of nodes achieved hype-~xt systems: a semiotic approach,
essentially equal likelihood. Similar mults were Hypertext: Concepts, systetm and
obtained from Afternoon; sku$ng from two very applications, A. Rizk et al., eds., Cambridge
different places---places that readers usually University Press, Cambridge. 1990. pp. 223-
consider completely different episodes-we found 237.
that the random walks spread rapidly and
uniformly through the text. This contrasts starkly [7] Jay David Bolter, Wriiing Space: The
with our own reading experiences, where we often Computer, Hypertext, and the History of
find ourselves striving, to extricate ourselves from Writing, Lawrence Erlbaum and Associates,
an episode. Hillsdale. 1991.

The distributions are not, of course, identical, and
our failure to identify meaningful patterns in the
data does not demonstrate that such patterns do not
exist. Still, random link choice is a very poor
model for hypertext navigation. The experience of
reading these hypertext cannot be separated from
the construction of meaning and perception of
emergent contour.
[7a] Rodrigo A. Botafogo and Ben Shneiderman,
“Identifying Aggregates in Hypertext
Structures”, Hypertext 91, ACM, Baltimore,
1991. pp. 63-74
[81 peter J. Brow, “Do we need maps to navigate
round hypertext documents?” Electronic
Ptiblishin&- Origination, Dissemination and
Design 1 (1988) 45-53.

[9] 1Davida Chamey, “Comprehending Non-linear

Acknowledgments Texti The Role of Discourse Cues and
The authors are grateful to Nancy Kaplan, Martha Reading Strategies”, Hypertext ’87
Petry, Stuart Moulthrop, Eric Cohen, and Carolyn Proceedings, ACM, Baltimore, 1987. pp. 109-
Guyer, and to four anonymous referees, for helpful 120
comments on early versions of this paper.
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Computer 20(1987) pp. 17 ff.
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