I’m sorry about that too, Chris. But it had nothing to do with exclusion or fostering an elite community. It was just one thing more than we could handle with the resources at hand for the event.

Ouch: I caught you in an editorial scar. I meant to cite your MLA talk on _afternoon_ and to mention your forthcoming book, and next I mentioned Noah Wardrip Fruin’s anthologies. And then, tightening the sentence, I clobbered the sense.

Oh well. Apologies all round. Stuff happens.

A note to say how much I (& I imagine others who couldn’t attend) appreciate the fact that you’re blogging
this year’s ELO fest. Maybe others are too? Not as good as being there, but a whole lot better than nada.
Do you happen to know if the panels and whatnot are being recorded/documented? I remember how
disappointed I was last year that events at the ELO gathering at MITH (which I was also unable to attend)
were not recorded/podcast. I have very few complaints about the e-writing community as I know it, but one of them happens include lack of thorough documentation of events–which is too often the case, imo (I was pleased this wasn’t
the case at Codework, but it has happened at E-poetry and other conferences). Much credit is due to
ELO (&c.) for having these events in the first place, but I think they’d be even more important (and valued
by a greater number of people both now and in years to come) if sessions were podcast afterwards. It is great to have your reporting on the subject–using such ancient tech as writing and reading–but to hear & or see the proceedings would be even better.
I wanted to say thanks Mark B for mentioning my book. I touch on the issue of e-writing communities in 2 or 3
of the chapters. With regards to this matter at present, I am a little surprised by the fact that the various
e-lit communities prove themselves to be so strong at meetings, conferences, and publications, but how hard it
seems to be to sustain dialogs and discussions through listeservs, wikis, & the like. I thought this issue might come up
at Codework but there was so much else going on that it didn’t…
Anyway, GTA is such a great resource & hub & thanks again for your efforts.
C Funk

I don’t think it’s as difficult for students to study electronic literature, in a critical context, as it used to be. I think e-lit is increasingly established in literature programs. I’m teaching several of the new books you mention in my course in the fall, and I agree with you that the resources for studying electronic lit are richer with each passing year.

I do think it’s difficult to find places to work on its production in a sustained focused way — for instance to get a digital writing MFA in a digital writing program, or for someone who does get an MFA with a digital writing emphasis to get a job afterwards teaching electronic writing to others. I think there is a real divide there in the number and types of opportunities available to people who study and teach electronic literature as literature on the one hand (a lot of jobs out there in a growing field) and those who are focused on teaching e-lit writing practices (very few jobs particularly in “writing” programs, and a great deal of resistance from institutionalized creative writing culture).

That doesn’t mean that interesting new e-lit is not being written. In fact, I have been blown away by the quality and variety of the work being shown here in Vancouver this weekend, and much of it from “new voices.” Last night, in fact, I was really encouraged to see that hypertext per se is alive and well. Several of the most interesting new pieces shown were essentially hypertextual forms, rather than for instance kinetic poetry.

I’m flattered, but I’m not sure what anthologies those would be–

I don’t teach, and I don’t closely follow university catalogs. But this isn’t my impression.

Eastgate sends many, many shipments of hypertexts to university bookstores every semester. Some of these are for courses you wouldn’t expect — visual anthropology, Victorian literature, argumentation — but most of these seem to be in courses on hypertext fiction, or the postmodern novel, or new media. Some of these are brand-new titles, and some are classics that date back five, ten, even twenty years.

I get lots of correspondence from students all over the place — Portland and Poland as well as Pawtucket — asking for various kinds of help or advice. My memory of being a student is hazy, but I imagine that if I receive dozens of requests for help from students, there are lots more students who are asking someone else. And even more who aren’t asking at all! I didn’t have an international correspondence when I was in school!

And there’s a ton of new literature out there that seems chiefly intended for courses. Matt Kirschenbaum’s successful anthologies leap to mind, as well as Hayles’ fine work, and Landow’s _Hypertext 3.0_. But don’t overlook Astrid Enssen’s weighty _Canonizing Hypertext_, or Funkouser’s archaeological _Prehgistoric Digital Poetry_, or Pam Taylor’s guide to _Interdisciplinary Approaches to Teaching Art In Hightschool_ and especially not Cicciricco’s intriguing new textbook on _Networked Fiction_. Where there are textbooks and pedagogical studies, there surely must be courses and assignments.

And of course the sample I see naturally emphasizes the schools most likely to send people to conferences and the people most interested in the sort of literary hypertext with which I’m most associated. Lots of people who do highly visual work — Opie, for example, does marvelous Flash work — have no idea who I am and, if they did, probably wouldn’t think I’d be either interested or useful.

Have a good time in Oregon.