“Understanding New Media: Principles, Perspectives, and Digital Rhetoric

Defining New Media

Much like digital rhetoric, and visual rhetoric the term “new media” had been the subject of discussion regarding its meaning. Some say “new media” refers to the description of a type of objects, while others the study of these new objects. Cynthia Selfe defines “new media” as “texts created primarily in digital environment (Eyman 52).  I believe that it is platforms we use like social media, websites, apps, and blogs that allow us to interact, communicate and access information.

Key Features

Although the definition of the term is not concrete. I agree with the author that our definitions “will inevitably be replaced, as new applications merger over time” (Eyman 52). Two important features of multimedia, and new media is, they mix different types of media. And require people to use multiple literacies. This means you need digital literacy to use or create new media. I agree with Selfe’s that new media text is different from traditional print and it should be taught in classrooms. Even though both use alphabetical writing, they go beyond it. Both require skills in seeing, listening and interacting.

In Remediation: Understanding New Media, Bolter and Grusin study how new media changes and reshapes older media when they interact (Eyman 53). To their point no medium functions alone, each is influenced by other media, and social and economic forces. This places new media in a cultural context, by building on earlier media studies. And what makes it new is the way it remakes older media and how the older media adapts in response to these newer forms.

Manovich Principles of NM

Conversely, Manovich views it differently. He believes that new media differs from older media because new media was built from “computer-readable numerical data” (Eyman 55). This means all traditional media, images, sound, video, text, and can be  translated into numbers a computer. Thus, making them computable or digital. He introduces 5 principles, numerical representation, modularity, automation, variability, and transcoding  which are underlying processes that shape the new media objects. These principles are the framework of explaining what counts, and how new media text functions. Together they provide a method for analyzing and understanding its compositions.

• Numerical representation- digital code, subjected to the algorithmic manipulation
• Modularity- New media text (NMT)  is composed of discrete units and can be combined tin lager objects without losing its meaning.
• Automation- numerical code and modular structure make it possible for computer to automate many parts of creating media.
• Variability- The non-fixed nature of new media (NM), and the result of automation. Giving variations of different results
• Transcoding- Two distinct layers of NM, the cultural layer and the computer layer

Implications for Digital Rhetoric

Regardless of the definition of NM, the framework and definition work well within a digital rhetoric context. I find that each scholar’s perspective helps build a fuller understanding of how digital texts function today. Whether we view new media through its blending of multiple literacies, its remixing of older media forms, or its foundation in computable data. The frameworks highlight the complexity of composing in digital spaces. For me, what matters is that new media expands how we read, write, and communicate. It deserves a place in conversations about digital rhetoric because it shapes the way we create and engage in a digital world.