{"id":17,"date":"2006-02-08T23:47:51","date_gmt":"2006-02-09T04:47:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2006\/325\/02\/08\/what-happened-to-enjoyment\/"},"modified":"2008-02-13T20:57:41","modified_gmt":"2008-02-14T01:57:41","slug":"what-happened-to-enjoyment","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2006\/325\/02\/08\/what-happened-to-enjoyment\/","title":{"rendered":"What happened to enjoyment?"},"content":{"rendered":"

It has been said that today\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s book is very conservative.\u00c2\u00a0 That is to say, as Professor Sample put it, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153we pick up a book and expect certain things;\u00e2\u20ac\u009d consecutive page numbers, for example.\u00c2\u00a0 In dealing with hypertext, specifically the assigned links and especially \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Hegirascope,” we experience the complete opposite.\u00c2\u00a0 The reader \u00e2\u20ac\u201c or viewer in this case \u00e2\u20ac\u201c still has his or her expectations but they are not met.\u00c2\u00a0 Not only are they not met but that are, in many ways, challenged.\u00c2\u00a0 Nothing seems to flow in a way that one would expect, words flash too quickly for one to take in, there is no specific direction.\u00c2\u00a0 In spending time with each of these sites, one question remained a constant in my mind: What.\u00c2\u00a0 Do.\u00c2\u00a0 I.\u00c2\u00a0 Do?<\/strong>\u00c2\u00a0 One feeling remained a constant: frustration<\/strong>.\u00c2\u00a0 What I find interesting, however, is that, despite my frustrations, I kept returning to the site; I was determined to figure it out.\u00c2\u00a0 As if there were something to figure out.<\/p>\n

\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 In his 2005 Fall For The Book lecture, author Tim O\u00e2\u20ac\u2122Brien discussed the purpose of\u00c2\u00a0reading a story.\u00c2\u00a0 He claimed that it seemed as though everyone was so busy trying to find a deeper message in the story that the reader\u00c2\u00a0missed\u00c2\u00a0a\u00c2\u00a0crucial\u00c2\u00a0aspect: enjoyment.\u00c2\u00a0 Sometimes the purpose of a story is simply to entertain, not to teach a lesson or impart a set of morals.\u00c2\u00a0 I feel that this could also be the case for the hypertext as well.\u00c2\u00a0 In my relentless returns to the site to \u00e2\u20ac\u0153figure it out\u00e2\u20ac\u009d I was missing out on the enjoyment factor, missing out on just being able to read what someone had taken the time to put before me.<\/p>\n

\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 After Professor Sample\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s lecture tonight (and, consequently, after learning how to work a few of the sites, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153The Bomar Gene\u00e2\u20ac\u009d to be exact) I went back to a few of the sites.\u00c2\u00a0 I went back initially to see if I could find that deeper meaning.\u00c2\u00a0 Then I gave up.\u00c2\u00a0 That’s when it hit me.\u00c2\u00a0 These sites should be enjoyed; they should be taken for what they are worth.\u00c2\u00a0 In some of them, the message is obvious and I let that be enough.\u00c2\u00a0 (As I write this blog I’m sitting here listening to an old Red Hot Chili Peppers cd and I’m making a weird connection.\u00c2\u00a0 If you ever read the songs, half of them make no sense whatsoever.\u00c2\u00a0 But you listen and you enjoy, the music is still pleasing to your ear.\u00c2\u00a0 If you like the band, that is.)\u00c2\u00a0 Finally, after letting myself just enjoy the text, I do not feel frustrated anymore.\u00c2\u00a0 I still do not completely understand the meaning behind it, but perhaps there is no meaning other than what is right in front of us\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6<\/p>\n

\u00c2\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It has been said that today\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s book is very conservative.\u00c2\u00a0 That is to say, as Professor Sample put it, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153we pick up a book and expect certain things;\u00e2\u20ac\u009d consecutive page numbers, for example.\u00c2\u00a0 In dealing with hypertext, specifically the assigned links and especially \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Hegirascope,” we experience the complete opposite.\u00c2\u00a0 The reader \u00e2\u20ac\u201c or viewer in … Continue reading What happened to enjoyment?<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-17","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reflections"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2006\/325\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2006\/325\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2006\/325\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2006\/325\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2006\/325\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2006\/325\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2006\/325\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2006\/325\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2006\/325\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}