Our Working Definition of Hypertext

Hypertext, a term that includes hypermedia, signifies text composed of blocks of words (or images) linked electronically by multiple paths, chains, or trails in an open-ended web (or electronic book). Hypertext, in other words, is an information technology in which a new element -- the link -- plays a major part. All the chief practical, cultural, and educational characteristics of this medium derive from the fact that linking creates new kinds of connectivity and reader choice. Hypertext is therefore properly described as multisequential or multilinear rather than nonlinear writing.


  1. Hypermedia or Multimedia?
  2. Forms of Hypertext
  3. Definitions Continued
  4. Forms of Linking
  5. Hypertext and Education
  6. Hypertext and Literature: Fiction and Poetry
  7. Writing in and for Electronic Space; or the Rhetoric of Hypermedia Authoring

Resources in the Cyberspace, Hypertext, and Critical Theory Web


Studies in new media Information technology

Last updated: 23 July 2000