Standardising hypermedia format for literary studies

Abstract

This paper suggests a standard format for creating hypermedia software. Teachers and students of literature have taken up the use of hypermedia technology enthusiastically and so we are rapidly arriving at a situation where a mushrooming of software for language and literature teaching will be faced. We will arrive much sooner at a situation where searching for an appropriate software would be as difficult as finding an appropriate article today. Technology is expected to optimise information to maximise knowledge: the confusion created by Gutenburg's invention is because duplication cannot be avoided. The suggested format is based on the major pillars of literary criticism — author centred, text centred and reader centred—and develops from the word to the work level. The findings have been demonstrated in the form of Technocriticism, a hypermedia program created on HyperCard.