BE: Composing the Digital Self

In class on Thursday…

We discussed equipment and online system for reservations available through the DLC – though we (I) did learn that it took a phone call to reserve a laptop.  I’ll mention again that the DLC is the place to go for hardware and software concerns as they relate to coursework on campus.  We spent a few minutes discussing Online Caroline¸ an experience with new media literature and the conflation of character through which the story its plot line.  A handout to the class guided students through the possibility of enhancing WORD documents with applications internal to the program: hyperlinking (linking inside and outside the document), inserting borders, highlighting, commenting, and watermarking.  Finally, we spent time again visiting selections of writing to edit for many of the items about which we’ve learned in the first weeks of class.  

I’d like to highlight the use of the dash here.  From C. Edward Good’s Who’s Whose Grammar Is It, Anyway? (386), “the dash is one of the most effective punctuation marks of all.” Good describes the dash as the biggest of punctuation’s pauses, able to demand attention of the reader in a variety of situations:

1. as an explanatory or defining phase: “Of the three punctuation marks producing a pause – the comma, the dash, the parentheses – the dash produces the most abrupt pause of all.”
2. as a parenthetical insertion:  “The dash can halt readers in their tracks – it makes them pay attention – as they read through your words of wisdom.”
3. as an introductory explanation: “Em dashes, parentheses, and commas – these are the major punctuation marks used to create a pause.”
4. as appositive phrases: “Pauses in sentences – explanatory phrases, defining phrases, parenthetical material, and introductory defining phrases – prompt many writers to use the dash.”
5. as a sudden break in thought: “The committee’s expansive logic – it went far beyond any previous decision – increased the available remedies rather dramatically.”

The last of these explanations seem closest to the sense of use we discussed in class.

A wrangling with the understanding of the use of “which” and “that” may have left us more confused than when we started, and the discussion sent me back to the books to get a better handle on the topic.  I’ll talk more about this in class on Monday.