As we may think, so shall we link. This site features close analysis of certain excerpts from an article written by Vannevar Bush titled "As We May Think" published in The Atlantic (July 1945). The "starred" analysis is influenced by Roland Barthes' methodology as described in his article titled "S/Z". While Barthes uses codes in his writing to symbolically link together different excerpts of text to their common motives and topics, I have decided to divide the topics up into three pages and then literally hyperlink any information I find applicable on other internet pages directly to the text excerpt analysis. Barthes' uninviting convoluted secret code of symbols and letters was intended to help the reader follow along with the connections he was making. These codes act as links that our mind must remember and follow. By substituting these symbolic links with active hyperlinks, we now may navigate the information in a more intuitive and effective manner. The separate pages organize the analyzed text into palatable categories, while the hyperlinks provide immediate transportation to supplemental information. The use of hyperlinks makes our readerly experience more similar to the way we think.
The hyperlink not only eliminates the need for a symbolic code by directly linking words together, it also outperforms the purpose of a bibliography. I have not included a 'works cited' or bibliography, as I normally would have for a paper, because I firmly believe directly linking my content to my sources credits the authors in a way the convoluted codes of the different non-universal styles of citation cannot. I am able to reference Bush's "As We May Think" and bring you directly to the source of the information, rather than require you to find my works cited section, translate the coded information about the article (the now too familiar random mash up of author, publisher and meticulous punctuation we call bibliographical information), and ultimately–God forbid–require you to travel to a library and find the article using an entirely new set of complicated codes.
The hyperlink and the internet it connects us to provide the tools Bush called for to make the collective knowledge of our species almost instantaneously readily available. It is a powerful supplement to our mind's natural way of linking while thinking.
