Monday, December 22, 2008

Hyperdrama's changing meaning

If I coined the term "hyperdrama" as Astrid Esslin suggests in Canonising Hypertext, it was a technical term referring to stories with branching narratives. But pop culture has taken over the term to mean "extreme drama," as in "the trite hyperdrama of its title" or "novels where the girls are going through hyperdrama all the time." This really trivializes the term and doesn't help legitimate hyperdrama gain a wider audience. But I'm not surprised. The whale always swallows the minnow.

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