This document provides an overview of digital literature, including its contexts and definitions. It discusses how digital literature has blurred boundaries between author and reader due to its interactive and networked nature. Key points include: - Digital literature exists beyond physical ("atoms") and digital ("bits") forms. It is defined by interactivity, multimedia, instability, and collective/participatory nature. - The social context of digital literature includes information overload and new media that allow more autonomy and participation for readers/users. - Sample digital literature works mentioned include interactive fiction and collaboratively produced works. - The roles of authors, readers and their relationship have changed, with power more shared and blurred in digital literary spaces.

1. Digital
Literature
Beyond Atoms and Bits
Lic. Mariana Ferrarelli
Universidad Nacional del Litoral, June 2012

2. Overview
a. Contexts
b. Digital Literature: Towards a
Definition
c. Social Practices
d. Sample Texts

3. “Por lo tanto, la cultura digital y su
entorno siempre fluctuante deben
examinarse como un conjunto de
prácticas discursivas que tienen sus
propias normas y convenciones, que
tienden a debilitar y a perturbar las
categorías y los valores establecidos.”
(Doueihi; 2010)
a. Contexts

4. a. Contexts
Social
Context
Technological
Context
Historical
Context
DigiLit

5. a. Historical Context 1:
Modernity/Postmodernity
Modernity Progress & Rationality
Hierarchy
Metanarratives:
Marxism; Structuralism
Universal Theory which provides a
unified schema (Lyotard; 1984)

6. a. Historical Context 2:
Modernity/Postmodernity
Postmodernity Irrationality
Multilinearity
Destruction of
Metanarratives
Fragmentation
Liquid Modernity (Bauman; 2005)
“Nowherevilles”

7. a. Social Context:
Information Society
Information Society
Information Anxiety (Hurst; 2007)
Noisy media environment
3 options: Stress
Rejection
Bit literacy
MEDIA DIET
Active Portfolio

8. a. Technological Context:
New Media & Digital Natives
Traditional Media: Controlled by adults
Unidirectional
Hierarchical / Inflexible / Centralised
New Media: Allow for autonomy
Interactive / Flexible
Children can inquire, discuss, play, shop,
ridicule, inform themselves, interact

9. a. Technological Context:
New Media & Digital Natives
María Jesús Sanhuesa George Hotz

10. a. Contexts
Infoxication
Digital
Natives
Fragmentation

11. b. Digital Literature
“I recently visited the headquarters of one of
America's top five integrated circuit manufacturers. I
was asked to sign in and, in the process, was asked
whether I had a laptop computer with me. Of course I
did. The receptionist asked for the model and serial
number and for its value. "Roughly, between one and
two million dollars," I said. "Oh, that cannot be, sir,"
she replied. "What do you mean? Let me see it." I
showed her my old PowerBook and she estimated its
value at $2,000. She wrote down that amount and I
was allowed to enter the premises. The point is that
while the atoms were not worth that much, the bits
were almost priceless.”
(Negroponte; 1995)

12. b. Digital Literature:
Towards a (re)definition
 Material Support:
ATOMS
BITS (Negroponte; 1995)
 Structure:
LINEAR
NON-LINEAR

13. BITS
NON-LINEAR
LINEAR
ATOMS
b. Digital Literature:
Towards a (re)definition

14. BITS
NON-LINEAR
LINEAR
ATOMS
b. Digital Literature:
Print
PRINT Literature

15. PRINT
 Stable: unified / fixed
 Linear: Aristotelian plot
 Predictable
 Writer-centred: tyrannical / individual
 Broadcast-like: univocal

17. BITS
NON-LINEAR
LINEAR
ATOMS
b. Digital Literature:
DigiLit: Electronic (HYPER)TEXT

18.  Born digital
 Interactive
 Multimedia Multisensorial
 Unstable: fragmented / in motion
 Multilinear: multidirectional
 Writer & reader –centred: democratic /
collective / participatory
 p2p: Multivocal / Maze-like
 Screen: note - link
 Unpredictable: Hypertext as Rhizome
(Landow; 2006)
DIGITAL

21.  Multiple layers of meaning:
 Verbal Language
 Images (photographs & drawings)
 Use of colour
 Light
 Camera Shots
 Movement
 Animation
 Sound (diegetic & non-diegetic)
DIGITAL

22. "Con la cibercultura el lugar de la obra se
dispersa. Los roles se reconfiguran y ya no
se puede hablar de un escritor y de un
lector como entidades separadas, sino de
un escrilector, alguien que despliega una
inteligencia colectiva y produce sus
propios textos en forma casi simultánea
con su recepción".
Jaime Alejandro Rodríguez Ruiz (2003)
c. Social Practices

23.  “The medium is the message“
 Wheel
 Camera
 New Technologies
 Social Practices
 Writing
 Reading
 Education
c. Social Practices

24.  Transference of authorial power
 Shared with Reader & Programmer
 Eroded role
 Collaborative Writing (Text, image,
sound & animation)
c. Social Practices:
Writing

25.  Active / Intrusive role - PROSUMER
 Merging with Writer’s role
 Personal & Individual
BUT ALSO Social & Collective
 Site of choice & empowerment
c. Social Practices:
Reading

26.  Learner-centred classroom
 P Professions
 Teacher as facilitator & CURATOR
http://digilit-reflections.posterous.com/
http://electronic-art-forms.posterous.com/
c. Social Practices:
Education

27. d. Sample Texts
 Luke’s Message, by Kate Pullinger & Cris
Joseph
 Paths Crossing, by Kate Pullinger, Cris Joseph &
participants
 Entre Ville, by J. R. Carpenter
 These waves of girls, by Caitlin Fisher
 Gone Fishing, by Paul Seymour & Noya Miller

28. e. Further Research
 Classification
 Signifying Practices
 Materiality

29. Sources & Credits
Barthes, B. (1971), “From work to text” in Modern Literary Theory, Ed. Philip Rice and P.
Waugh. London, E Arnold.
Bauman, Z. (2005), Modernidad Líquida, Bs. As. FCE.
Foucault, M.(1979), “What Is an Author?”, en Textual Strategies: Perspectives in Post-
Structuralist Criticism, J.V. Harari(comp.), Ithaca, Nueva York, Cornell University
Press, pp. 141-160.
Genette, G.(1989): Palimpsestos. La literatura en segundo grado, Madrid, Taurus.
Hurst, M. (2007) Bit Literacy (Kindle Edition)
Landow, G. (2006), Hypertext 3.0. Critical Theory and new media in an era of
globalization, Baltimore, Johns Hopkins University Press.
Lyotard, F. (1984) The Postmodern Condition: A Report on Knowledge, Minneapolis:
University of Minnesota Press.
Negroponte, N. (1995) Being Digital.
Piscitelli, A. (2001) El Paréntesis de Gutenberg. La religión digital en la era de las
pantallas ubicuas. Bs As. Santillana.
Rodríguez Ruiz J. A. (2003) El Relato Digital. La escrilectura.
http://www.javeriana.edu.co/relato_digital
Schreibman, S. & Siemens, R. (2008) A Companion to Digital Literary Studies, Oxford:
Blackwell.
www. urbagram.net ; www. theatlantic.com : www. futureofthebook.org
www.flora.dempstercountry.org ; www. lordalford.com ; www.ublawcso.wordpress.com
www. rustyparts.com ; www. outandemployed.wordpress.com
www. afamousartist.com