A rhizome has not beginning or end; it is always in the middle, between things, interbeing, intermezzo.  Between things does not designate a localizable relation going from one thing to the other again, but a perpendicular direction, a transversal movement that seeps one and the other a way, a stream without beginning or end that undermines its banks and picks up speed in the middle. (Deleuze & Guattari, 1980/1987, p. 25)

        The process of growing a rhizome began as all research and writing--with a question.  What is it like for students to experience learning in online environments and specifically in web based computer conference spaces?  This broad experience based question led me to phenomenology and hermeneutics as a research method.  Phenomenology seeks to understand experience rooted in our life context.  Hermeneutics is an interpretive method that has philosophically been grounded in text.  As I explored my question, I wanted to use the the spatial context of a web format to create a dissertation matrix.  This paper is a description of the process of growing a rhizome.

        Experience that is lived takes place within a lifeworld or context.  It is described by van Manen in terms of four existential themes that guide the reflective process in phenomenological research: lived space, lived body, lived temporality, and lived human relation (1990, p. 101).  To capture the lived experience within its context, phenomenologists have used writing to express experience as it is situated in the lifeworld.  The challenge of writing is to capture in a holistic sense the richness of experience.  Traditionally in hermeneutics, several techniques provide a tension and an imaginative sense of the whole experience (e.g., metaphor, poetry, etymological tracings, etc.).  The phenomenological writer explores through the hermeneutic circle ways to represent the essence of the experience and to limit the descriptive reduction of the lifeworld.  How does writing limit the bringing forward of lived experience?  Are there other ways to describe the essence of an experience that provides a different view or perspective?  Ihde (1999) expands hermeneutics to include visualization with the sciences.  Why not expand hermeneutics to a web format of spatial representation?  Answers to these questions are formed from the struggle of a student writing in a multimedia/hypermedia web format and faculty guiding the process.

        As I struggled with these questions, I found myself chafing at the presentational limitations of a textual world that my advisor is quite accomplished.  How can I describe and draw the reader into an experience that is so much more than can be expressed in textual language?  How does my advisor guide and help me find a structural expression?  My exposure to creating web pages and instruction in a web format has opened the possibility for me to express experience in a spatial and sensual manner that captures more of the richness inherent in experience.  In web spaces, experience is transformed into a rhizome of hyper links between text, graphics, animations, sounds, virtual reality, and video to enrich and display lived experience.

Herstory of the Process

        Human science research as it is described by van Manen (1990) is rooted in the writing and rewriting process.   As I began to become engaged in this writing process, I found myself chafing at not only the linear presentation of written text, but the limitation of using only words to describe the experience of students in web based computer conferencing.  Text has been used quite successfully by phenomenologists to describe and interpret experience. But for me, written text limits my interpretation of the experience.  Is there an alternative approach for me to capture in my interpretation of the phenomenon the sensual complexity and interconnected quality of experience?

        Experience is multifaceted with senses woven in complex sets of inter-relationships.  While phenomenological descriptions have been crafted to capture a sense of the experience, I want to be able to deepen the representation.  My exposure to the World Wide Web and the ways it represents information spatially through multimedia and hypermedia offered me an alternative approach.  As I learned more and worked more with the Web, I began to appreciate how this format could extend my description of experience.   It offered me a way to broaden and extend written text and includes multimedia and hypermedia components.  The addition of multimedia as text extends my interpretation of the experience to a broader range of senses, deepening the metaphors and the level of description.  Hypermedia, the linking of text and media within a document space, creates a body of interconnections.

        At first I thought this approach to writing would never be accepted.  It challenges the traditional linear approach to scholarship and dissertation writing.  Not only is the structure of how information is presented radically changed, but the roles of the reader, writer, and text are reconfigured (Landow, 1992/1997).  In spite of my doubts, I began to imagine how a dissertation could represent experience in a web based format.  It was time to test the waters or opt for tradition.  I first discussed my idea with a few trusted friends, who were phenomenologists, for their reactions.  They were basically positive, but wanted to see what it would look like.  I then asked members of the Web Collective on campus what they thought.  They were all encouraging, particularly a member of the English faculty.  I decided to ask the Graduate School if they would consider a web based dissertation that would be pressed onto a CD-ROM when it was completed.  University Microfiche Incorporated (UMI) had just completed guidelines for multimedia dissertations on CD-ROM.  It would be accepted as a format for my dissertation.  The next step was to approach my advisor with the idea and then form a committee.

        My advisor wanted to see what I meant by a web based spatial dissertation.  For my advanced phenomenology class, I produced a demonstration of one theme in the format I had only been able to describe for the class.  It caused quite a stir! While she is a "technologically-shy" phenomenologist, my advisor decided to leap in with me and help guide me through the creation of this new form. The next step in the process was to choose a committee who would be willing to help nurture this process.  In the end, I found five additional faculty members (two from English, two from Education, and one from Art).  It was like a dream come true for me.  I had six educators who believed in what I was trying to do and were willing to help me in the journey.  It was scary and exhilarating at the same time!

        Our first step as a group was a pre proposal meeting.  It was exciting for me to have a group of individuals I respected think with me about the direction I needed to take.  I had been mulling over my dissertation in this format alone for a year.  It was amazing to have others discuss the creative possibilities.  The group helped me reflect on what I had been doing and encouraged me to deepen my application of multimedia and hypermedia.  The predominant feeling was that if I was going to use this format, I should push the medium beyond what I could do on paper and into the edges of the medium's capabilities.  They posed good questions.  My advisor had been unable to attend the meeting, but listened to the audio tapes of the meeting.  It was clear that phenomenology as a research method was new to the committee members. She suggested I write my proposal in a three chapter format, phenomenologically, to give the committee a better idea of the basis for the multimedia and hypermedia representations.  A couple of examples of multimedia/hypermedia were created for the committee to view in the proposal meeting to stimulate discussions on the criteria for evaluating the dissertation.

        At the dissertation proposal meeting, faculty had read the proposal and were exposed for the first time to a completed theme, Will Someone Tell Me How to Get In.  They were able to compare the web based interpretation with a written version.    The committee had tasked me to write evaluation criteria for the web based interpretive "writing."  The predominant discussion at the pre proposal meeting was the use of a web based format.  At the dissertation proposal meeting, the discussion focused on phenomenology as a research methodology.

        Two major concerns about the use of a web based format surfaced at the proposal defense.  The first concern was with the "writing" effectiveness of hyper linking.  A committee member was concerned the reader could easily miss important information which he thought could lead the reader to erroneous conclusions.  He felt a traditional textual approach with some media and linking of references would be a more plausible approach.  I was philosophically committed to the postmodern structure and approach and supported by the rest of the committee. The second concern was voiced by the majority of the committee.  They felt it was necessary to orient readers before they began interacting with the dissertation.  It was suggested that I include a brief orientation section to prepare the reader.  I agreed to prepare the orientation as an initial guide.

        The task of the "writing" has taken on a life of its own as most creative efforts often do.  I have found the process of first writing my ideas in a draft form and then using the text to hermeneutically turn to the web format.  The writing-webbing process required a thoughtful approach to file organization, navigation, and indexing.

Creating a Webbed Dissertation Space

        Webbed dissertations are not unusual.  However material is presented in the form this paper is presented, in a traditional linear text with hyper linking to aspects throughout the text.  In this way, the text takes advantage of natural links within the material, but still maintains the "look and feel" of a traditional textual document.  My dissertation is an effort to take advantage of what the web does uniquely as an expressive space--how it is different.  With expression comes the need to create a structural support that is taken for granted in textual writing, but must be reshaped and reinvented in a web space.  File organization, navigation in and through the dissertation, indexing and orientation, and an exploration of web writing as a form of interpretation.

Assumptions

        Phenomenology as a research method interprets experience to find the essence that is underneath.  Experience by its nature is spatial and not linear.  Our perception, intuition and interactions with others are interconnected in a complex social nexus.  We experience our world spatially.  The web based format of this dissertation allows me to describe and interpret experience more closely to its spatial reality.  I am using images, animations, student voices, poetry, hypermedia text and etymology to interpret the experience of students using web based computer conferencing.  The only sound that you will hear in the dissertation is student voices.  It is their story and their voice that this dissertation is based.

        The overall design of this webbed dissertation space is postmodern to take advantage of the spatial nature of a web based format.  This spatial postmodern design suggests that the reader is not only encouraged to start anywhere in the dissertation and end anywhere, but also becomes the writer in terms of constructing the dissertation.

The beginning [of a hypertext], then, is the step in the intentional production of meaning....Hypertext makes determining the beginning of a text difficult because it changes our conception of text and permits readers to "begin" at many different points, it similarly changes the points of ending.  Readers can not only choose different points of ending, they can also continue to add to the text, extend it, to make it more than it was when they began to read. (Landow, 1992/1997, p. 78).

        If you think about how you organize your files within your computer, you may choose to loosely structure them in spaces that include most of your files or carefully "file" all of your documents into folders specific to the type or topic of the file.  I quickly discovered in creating my dissertation that I was going to generate hundreds of files that included images, sounds, animations, and hyper linked web pages.  It was apparent at an early stage that a loosely conceived file system would make revision and linking an impossible task.  I revised my file structure for my dissertation three times to find a consistent set of "rules" or decision points for myself.  It was necessary not only for revision and linking, but it projected locations of where future files would be located.

Navigation

        The ability to move-in a web based piece is critical.  Since my postmodern design requires an organic spatial navigational look and feel, the structure for the menus is based on animated and spherical symbols.  Lines in the menu structure represent connections.  This structure allows me to emphasize an organic model of choice.  The reader-writer-discoverers can through choice construct the dissertation in any manner they choose.  Choices can be made after the conclusion of the menu rotation.  Each reading of the dissertation could be conceivably very different.  The dissertation has several levels of menu, but there is consistency in the look and feel of all levels.

        The main menu, which contains what could be thought of as the "chapters" of the dissertation contains seven sections.  The menu is animated. When the mouse is passed over each of the sections a brief description appears to give the reader more information about the section.  When a section is selected by clicking on it, the section rotates to the top of the menu and launches the second level of menus.  The second level menus offer choices of major themes within the section.  When a choice at this level is selected, a third level menu is launched.  At this level, the menu is an index of choices for all of the files associated with a particular theme.  Each theme is organized around specific types of files that include hyper linked text  , poetry , etymology , voice , images , and bibliographic references .  Each of the file types are represented by icons embedded in spheres to provide another level of consistency and recognition for the reader-writer-discoverer.   If there is more than one file of a particular type, then there is a constellation of smaller spheres connected to the larger sphere.  For example, if there are three text files for a theme, then there would be three spheres connected to a large sphere that represents text.

        A second option for navigating in the dissertation is provided in the form of an image map for each theme.  It allows the reader-writer-discoverer to go to another section in the dissertation, another theme in the current section the participant is in, or to open another file in the current theme the participant is located.  This option is provided to give the reader-writer-discoverer an easy and quick alternative for changing direction within the dissertation.

Orientation and Indexing

        Closely related to navigation is orientation and indexing.   Critical to the creation of this type of writing is a concrete way for the reader-writer-discoverer to know where they are located in relationship to other portions of the dissertation.  In traditional writing, we have over time created conventions that orient the reader (e.g., linear presentation, table of contents, chapter headings, page numbers,  and an indexing system).   While these same conventions have been used in a more linear presentation of information on the web, a spatial presentation of information requires the invention of a set of conventions to aid the participant to have of a sense of place within the "writing."

        The image maps already discussed offered one way of helping reader-writer-discoverers place themselves within the dissertation.  The use of icons also offered at the level of theme an orientation within the theme.  At the level of each element, I have created an information box that gives the participant information on the section, theme, type of medium, and index number.  A colored sphere offers a quick visual cue to the section the element is located within.  An animated icon  in the left hand corner of every dissertation element opens the information box.   The other orientation device that I have created is an index.  The index is organized by section.  Each section index has a list of files color coded by theme.  A linked title of the file and an index number with a letter representing the section and a number to distinguish the file from other files for reference is also offered.  The linear representation of the index is arbitrary in terms of order to reinforce the idea that there is no order from which to read the dissertation.  The index offers the reader-writer-discoverer a quick way to find and view a specific file.

        The structure that has enabled me to create the dissertation has evolved.  As I progressed through the creation process, it became clear that I had to develop conventions that we take for granted in traditional text.  While many of my ideas are cultivated and informed by designs currently being used on the World Wide Web, its specific application to scholarly writing is my own.  Once the structure was put into place, my next task was to develop a way of interpreting using "web writing."

Hermeneutics of Web Writing

        What does it mean to interpret experience through a method of web writing?  It is a basic hermeneutic question.  In order to expand the use of hermeneutics to a webbed environment,  it is helpful to get a sense of its etymology.

Hermes is the messenger of the gods, he who brings a word from the realm of the wordless; hermeios brings the word from the Oracle--hermeneueinis primordial interpretation, the bringing into word of what is previously not yet word.  Hermeneutics is the most primitive sense of "to say."  And from this coming to birth of word, language, its derived meanings of explaining as in bringing to understand, and translating, as in making a foreign tongue or meaning familiar to one's own tongue arise....  Hermeneutics had as its task the interpretation of that which was primordial, the coming into being of Word, the event of meaning.  (Ihde, 1999, p. 9).

For Ricoeur as for Heidegger, "Man is language."  But language is enigmatic, often equivocal, and always multidimensional.  This is so for the subject as well, and in this language is "like" the subject.  (Ihde, 1999, p. 21).

Writing, the ancient nonverbal language of texts which posed an ancient hermeneutic problem, is now adumbrated with the equally spatial-temporal reproductions of cinema, television, and tape recorder.  As of yet, there has been no full hermeneutic investigation of this series of embodiments.  These new "texts" call for new types of hermeneutics. (Ihde, 1999, p. 23).

       What is this hermeneutic of web writing?  How does one interpret an experience using web writing?  It is a creative process that involves a matrix of considerations with each piece informed by a different set of literature.  A rich set of theory has been developed around the notions of writing and hypertext  (e.g., Barthes, 1993; Bolter, 1991; Clarseth, 1997; Joyce, 1995; Landow, 1992/1997 and 1994; Synder, 1996) that are tied to the postmodern philosophers Deleuze and Guattari.  The visual dimension of interpretation has been explored for centuries within art and art history.  Graphic artists continue the discussion in terms of presentation of information in the modern venues of advertising (Taylor& Saarenin, 1994).  Human computer interface designers consider and discuss topics such as screen real estate, navigational conventions, iconic conventions, etc. (e.g., Laurel, 1993; Shneiderman, 1998).  Multimedia interaction and design has a history of discussion within the development of educational computer products (e.g., Schwier & Misanchuk, 1993; Nix & Spiro, 1990; Salomon, 1994; etc.).  Since the proliferation of the Web, a rash of popular books are proliferating on effective writing and design using this format (e.g., von Wodtke 1993;  Vaughan, 1996; Kololenko, 1997; etc.).

        My intention is not to give a complete literature review here, but to illustrate the complexity of web writing.  In my dissertation, I began to consider how text, images, animations and sound could be used to interpret the lifeworld experience of students in web based computer conferencing.  How does one use a spatial environment to interpret experience in this new way of "writing?"  I am still discovering the process.

        Text in this environment can be represented differently than the constraints offered by a traditional page.   It can morph and change it shape dynamically.  It can be formed into a web through links to other pieces of text located in another file.  It can represent time in terms of immediacy or past  through screen location or animation.  A sense of page is missing and the screen becomes only a momentary limitation to confine the information.  I can click on a link and immediately be whisked to other text.  Or, I can scroll through an entire text that in printed form could be a hundred pages.  How does one represent text in spatial web writing?  Since screen resolution does not lend itself to reading lengthy pieces, it became important to recast a sense of page into another form.  The initial decision I made was to modularize the text.  To present it in pieces that had integrity in and of themselves, yet fit within a whole in some logical way.  To bring a sense of continuity to the text, I changed a sense of page into a graphic space.  The text is set within a graphic representation that is congruent with the theme.  In addition to recasting the text within a graphic, the texts are connected in a complex matrix or web of inter-relationships determined not only by hyper linking, but also by linking modules through an organic menu structure.  Traditional phenomenological conventions of poetry, etymology and interpretation are restructured into interpreting through a different form enabled by a web format.

        Images change interpretation not only in terms of recasting "page" as described above, but provide depth and movement to the interpretation.  The old adage "a picture is worth a thousand words" captures the power of imagery in interpreting experience.  A web format provides an easy way to incorporate images as background to text, integrated within text, iconic linked navigational conventions, and movement.  Images and animations become metaphors of interpretation as text has been used to interpret our everyday experiences.  Animated images offer a level of expression that captures not only a new sense of space, but also time.  Where several postmodern writers have sought to represent text differently on the page to give graphic representation to multiple voice, animation gives representation of movement and time.  Text and image can change within the same space with animation.  Images in web writing retain their power as visual metaphor, but have the added dimension of movement and inter-connection.

        The only way sound that can be included in traditional writing is in a metaphoric or descriptive sense.  Traditional dissertations describe what a participant said by quoting from an interview.  What is lost is the nuance of the voice and what it reveals about the participant's description.  Conversations are often audio recorded and then put into textual transcripts for analysis.  In a web format, the voices can become part of writing.  A transcript can be read while hearing the voice of the student with a mere click of the mouse.    As a reader-writer-discoverer, I am offered an entirely new level to interpret and perceive participants comments.  The sound no longer is imagined, but becomes attached to a real person.  I have a better sense of "who" the person is who has had this experience.  While sound could be added to the dissertation in a variety of ways, I have chosen, as I mentioned in the assumptions, to limit it to student voices.  I want their voice to be the only sound that is heard since it is from their voice that this dissertation arises.

Criteria for Evaluation

        How does one evaluate this type of scholarly writing?  Since the hermeneutic employs a variety of expressions,  what criteria be used?  The faculty on my committee wanted me to establish the criteria from which this type of phenomenological and hermeneutic work can be evaluated.  The development of evaluation criteria includes the criteria developed by van Manen (1990) for phenomenological inquiry particularly as it applies to research relating to pedagogy.  Criteria to evaluate web writing involves content, interactive structure, interface design, hyper linking and multimedia (Stansberry, 1998).  The criteria are still growing and developing like the rhizome the writing is patterned.  What would you decide is important to consider in each of these areas?  My suggestions as they are captured at this point in time for web writing are as follows:

Content

1. The content is accurately represented in the combination of text, multimedia, and hypertext.

1. The reader is free to "chart alternative courses through the wordmass [I] fabricate" (Taylor & Saarinen, 1994, p. 13).
2. The path choice is clear for the user.
3. The interactive structure is used to pace the reader.

1. The interface is visually coherent.
2. The textual and visual elements blend.
3. "The work is riddled with gaps, spaces and openings that invite the reader to write.  White spaces becomes the site of transaction in which the event understanding occurs" (Taylor & Saarinen, 1994, p. 13).
4. The navigational conventions are easy to understand.
5. The reader has a sense of location within the dissertation.
6. The navigational system visually supports the overall dissertation.
7. Each screen follows basic graphic design principles (e.g., color, placement, etc.).

1. The links within the "text" are well placed and connected.
2. The text is presented in the first four levels in manageable chunks and linked to other chunks.

1. The text is expressed as media through the use of font, placement and size.
2. Media is used to express ideas better than they could be expressed in words.
3. Multimedia supports and adds to the understanding of the theme.
4. Multimedia is thoughtfully used to enhance a particular theme.
5. Multimedia is used to add novelty to the representation of the content.

        Criteria assumes that there is a mechanism to receive feedback.  Initially, my proposal was on paper and it was possible to write comments in the margins.  But in a web based environment, I had to devise another method since there are no margins to write comments.  To establish this vital part of the dissertation process, I have linked each element of the dissertation to an online web discussion space in HyperNews.  HyperNews is a web based electronic bulletin board.  Faculty, student participants, and others who have offered to give me feedback are logged into this password protected space and write comments on dissertation elements.  In this space, all who are subscribed by me can see the comments made by others on that particular dissertation element.  A discussion online that applies to the element is possible in this space.

        At the bottom, usually on the left of the dissertation element is a button for HyperNews .  When the button is clicked, it launches a separate browser window in HyperNews directly connected to the dissertation item in view.  The HyperNews window can be minimized and both HyperNews and the dissertation element can be viewed while at the same time providing ease of comment for those participating in the dissertation process.  Faculty participation has been slow to evolve although other interested commentators who have either asked or been invited to comment have started to interact with this part of the dissertation.

        The mix of participants in the collective are crucial for me in the evolution of this new way of writing.  The faculty on my committee are the experts I have chosen to help me work through the process.  In phenomenology, the research participants are partners in the process of writing.  I have subscribed the students in this commentary to give me feedback on my interpretation of their experiences.  Additional readers who are interested or who have expertise have been invited to also participate in the process.  It is through this encounter that I am refining my work.  The comments spur in me additional perspectives of viewing and interpreting.

Conclusion

        Growing a rhizome is a process that in itself has become its own rhizome.  It is a play of relationships that lead from one new creative discovery to the next.  The process described in herstory has informed and enriched the creation of a structure into which I created a hermeneutic of web writing.  Writing a dissertation in this manner has allowed me to "say," to interpret, to understand the experience of learning in a web based conference not only from my own experience in learning in this environment, but the rich experience voiced from a collective.

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