Women in Digital Culture

In some of the pieces that our class has looked at throughout the first half of this semester, there has been a theme of women and how they are viewed in society, highlighting the importance of feminism. Two examples of these pieces are Sharon Daniel and Erik Loyer's "Public Secrets", and Hazel Smith, Will Luers, and Roger Dean's piece, "Motions". Both pieces are emotional because of how the authors illustrated the social injustices that some women have had to face.

"Public Secrets" is a piece of electronic literature that basically allows the reader to navigate through the piece by listening to different testimonies of women who are in a women's prison. They tell emotional stories about why they are in there and whether or not they believe that they were treated unfairly. For example, one woman, who was arrested for drug related charges, talks about how the policemen who showed up at her house to arrest her were laughing at her and would not even let her say goodbye to her children. She believes that the biggest injustice in this situation was the fact that she was taken away from her kids without even being able to tell them that everything would be okay, and instead having to leave them scared and confused. This relates not only to women, but to all people who have been arrested for drugs, and how our prisons are overflowing with these people while the real criminals serve a very little amount of time for serious crimes such as sexual assault or rape. This issue also highlights another injustice, with men running free from their serious crimes because of their money or social status, or just the fact that they are a white male, while women are spending their lives in prison for drugs or lesser crimes. Another woman who speaks in this piece tells her story about how she was the getaway driver during an incident of theft. While she is facing over twenty years behind bars, the people who actually committed the crime are free. While I am not condoning the actions of any of these people, I do believe that fair justice is far too often overlooked for women.

In the second piece I mentioned, "Motions", the authors aim to make readers feel empathy and emotion for young girls who have become victims of human trafficking. This gut-wrenching piece starts out by making the reader feel as if he or she is in the position of the victim, being taken away on a train to places unknown. These desperate, young girls from other countries being offered the chance for a well-paying job and for an all around better life in America, are unknowingly about to be sold as sex slaves. The rest of the piece shares detailed, disturbing stories about how these girls were treated and how many people blame them for what happened, for naively taking the opportunity of what they thought would be a better life. This falls directly under the category of victim blaming, which is one of the biggest issues regarding women in our society today. Blaming the victim for trusting others, rather than the abusers who actually planned and performed the acts. This demonstrates the very real idea that many men have, which is that they are superior and reserve the right to sexually interact with any women that they choose, as if the woman deserves no voice. This piece aims to get the message out about these sexual crimes, specifically human trafficking, which is overlooked by a lot of people, and also very rarely addressed in the media. The authors of this piece want the readers to feel connected to the horrific situation that these girls are put into through meaningful words, pictures, and sounds.

These two pieces of electronic literature are emotional accounts of women who have been robbed of their basic human rights. These specific pieces show readers that even though women deserve to be treated equally to men and to not be overpowered by them, that does not mean that is what's actually happening in our world. Both "Public Secrets" and "Motions" are meant to bring attention to the issues that women face in society. They do this by making the readers feel something towards these women and victims, giving them a chance to step into their shoes. This makes the reader really have to think about how they feel about these types of issues that they may have rarely though about before, possibly allowing them to see all of these women and sexual assault/human trafficking victims in a new light.

Hypertext Fiction

Hypertext fiction is a form of e-literature that can really hold the attention of the reader. If you've ever thought about what it would be like if you combined The Sims with your favorite novel, then hypertext fiction is definitely for you. This type of e-lit gives readers different options to choose from throughout the story, meaning they are ultimately responsible for how the story ends. The reader of a hypertext fiction piece would be the equivalent to the controller of a video game, which means the narrative is twisting and turning as they form the destinies of the characters.

The pioneers of hypertext fiction are said to have been Judy Malloy and Michael Joyce. Surprisingly, the first pieces of hypertext fiction were developed and published before the World Wide Web. The first work of hypertext fiction on the World Wide Web was Douglas Cooper's Delirium in 1994, which allowed readers to navigate between four parallel story strands. One example of hypertext fiction from 1996 is Phillipa J Burne's, 24 hours with someone you know. This interactive piece follows the story of a boy entering new territory. He shows up at a house to visit his cousin, only to realize that his cousin no longer lives there. He ends up being welcomed by his cousin's old roommates, going through multiple experiences with the characters that the reader gets to dictate. In this story, the reader "becomes" the main character. At the beginning of the story, the reader has to choose to either go inside with the his cousin's former housemates or to go elsewhere. If the reader does decide to go elsewhere, they will ultimately end up back with the housemates no matter which path they choose. This provides the notion that it is impossible for the story to move on without the other characters. The title of the piece gives away that the protagonist of the story (the reader), spends 24 hours with these strangers, learning and gaining new experiences. This illustrates how much can really occur in only one day, especially without time being wasted by the characters by spending it with technology and social media.