When most people think of hypertext, they associate them with computers. Why wouldn’t they, many websites like Britannica and Lenovo say that Hypertext is text that contains links to more text. Wikipedia even outright says that it’s “displayed on a computer display or electronic devices”. It’s what I thought when I first read about it and didn’t really think about it too much after that. That wasn’t until I read Angela Haas’ study, Wampum as Hypertext: An American Indian Intellectual Tradition of Multimedia Theory and Practice.
In her study, Haas argues that hypertext isn’t exclusive to computers with the example she gives is the Wampum bead. It has been used the Native Americans of the woodlands hundreds of years before the invention of computers. Haas argues that Wampum is a form of hypertext because they contain various points of information, like treaties and alliances. Haas also notes that the Wampum tends to use stringing devices like sinew and hemp to string together these the information like links.
It was a unique perspective that wanted to expand from traditional interpretations. So after this, my next thought was what else could apply as hypertext? Then I thought, why not Haas’ study itself. She’s writing information about hypertext and Wampum. Additionally at the end of her paper, she cites the sources she got her information from. In a way, she’s providing a link to those sources of information. And then I thought, maybe even this blog post. Sure, I’m writing this on a computer for a website that you can only be access by electronic means but I could just rewrite this on a piece of paper and all I have to do this change the past few sentences. I’m still writing information and I am referring to other non electronics sources like Haas’ study and the Wampum, creating a link. So either way, this would still be hypertext.
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