Key research themes
1. How has hypertext fiction evolved as a postmodern, intermedial, and digital literary form?
This research area focuses on tracing the historical development and theoretical underpinnings of hypertext fiction as it emerged from postmodern and poststructuralist literatures in the late 20th century to the present digital era. It examines how hypertext fiction embodies poststructuralist concepts such as fragmentation, non-linearity, and intertextuality while integrating multiple media forms (intermediality). This theme is significant as it contextualizes hypertext fiction within literary and media studies, highlighting its impact on narrative construction, media specificity, and reader interaction across evolving digital platforms.
2. What cognitive, psychological, and evolutionary factors explain the reception challenges and marginalization of hypertext novels?
This theme investigates why hypertext fiction, despite early bursts of theoretical enthusiasm promising a literary revolution, has remained a marginal form with limited mainstream readership. By integrating cognitive psychology, literary reception theory, and evolutionary perspectives on narrative consumption, this research area seeks to identify the mental processing constraints, reader preferences, and storytelling functions that impact the adoption and enjoyment of hypertext novels. It also critiques prior poststructuralist hypertext theories for ideological biases that neglected empirical evidence on human cognition and literary engagement.
3. How do narrative agency, choice mechanics, and second-person narration function in hypertext and interactive digital fiction to shape reader engagement and identity?
This theme explores narrative structures unique to hypertext and interactive fiction, focusing on the mechanics of reader choice, the use of second-person narration ('textual you'), and their combined effects on narrative agency, identity construction, and metalepsis. It examines how hypertext fiction's interactivity negotiates between authorial control and reader co-creation, complicates traditional narratological categories, and uses choice as a literary and ethical device. Insights contribute to understanding how hypertext fiction blends ludic and literary features, expanding narratology for digital media.