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Critical Analysis of High Muck a Muck: Playing Chinese 

High Muck a Muck: Playing Chinese is a multimedia art project that explores the complex history of Chinese immigration to Canada. Created by artists and writers Fred Wah, Jin Zhang, and Nicola Harwood, the project assimilates traditional Chinese music, visual art, and poetry in a digital format that invites viewers to reflect on themes of cultural identity, race, and belonging. 

The title “High Muck,” derived from Chinook jargon meaning “big shot,” serves as a critique of power and privilege in Canadian society. Through layered storytelling, the project examines how Chinese immigrants have been both marginalized and intimate. It challenges the stereotype of the hardworking immigrant by revealing deeper realities of exclusion, displacement, and cultural loss. 

Featuring hand-painted visuals and eight video poems, the work guides users through personal and historical narratives rooted in the lived background of Chinese Canadians. These stories highlight the struggles faced by immigrants who, in pursuit of a better life, were met with hostility and forced to create their own communities, such as Chinatowns, to survive. 

This project resonates with contemporary issues, as immigration policies remain rigorous and discriminatory. The historical mistreatment of Chinese immigrants, ranging from social rejection to violence, mirrors ongoing injustices faced by many racialized groups today. High Muck a Muck underscores how history continues to echo through modern systems of inequality. 

By parallel art and activism, the project conserves cultural memory and prompts critical reflection on who is allowed to belong and whose stories are valued. It is a touching reminder that the fight for equity and recognition is far from over. 

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High Muck a Muck

What a switch-up from last week! I had such a fun time going through this interactive poem. I appreciated the intro page that told us what to do and how to explore while still giving us the freedom to click around in any order. I will admit the first time I played around with this it was late and I was tired and wasn’t fully grasping the idea. When I took another swing at it the next day, I think it kind of clicked for me. I will say one thing was that I felt rushed reading some of the poems because they often disappeared by my second read through. I was getting kind of frustrated because I couldn’t absorb the poems right away before the faded. Which led me to thinking it was part of the experience. Migrating is an incredible feat with many challenges including language. I am unsure if this was intentional but I felt like perhaps the fading of the poems after a short duration of time with them felt symbolic at one point. I actually loved that I didn’t know what to expect when clicking around. Was I getting a poem? A video? A piece of audio? A poem with images?

One thing I really enjoyed about this was the immersive experience. In this piece, we have poetry, music/audio, and artwork. The colors in the artwork and the style were soothing and beautiful. I started out with Pacific Rim and when I first got to that page, I was brought to a video of various images with phrases like “Made in Japan” “Made in Hong Kong” “Made in Thailand” etc. and the ending was a photo of what appears to be business men at a meeting. As I clicked around this page, it brought me poems about Chinese-Canadian migration and language barriers. When I looked at the list of locations, I see that Pacific Rim is not near the top so I’m not sure if I was supposed to start there but I did. After I realized there was a menu, I went in order down the list. I loved the imagery of the body that the creator used but was surprised that it didn’t continue throughout

Second location was “Canada” which was an arm. I thought we would moving through various parts of the body until I got to “Victoria”. Out of the three sections, I started with, Victoria was my favorite. I loved the audio features of this page. The fragments of audio on this page were helpful in making connections for me. I appreciated the insight of chinatown and what it currently represents in contrast to its past. The “Nelson” section’s music was unsettling to me. The one poem about the cemetery made me feel sad but it also sort of conveyed the experience of migration and feeling misplaced.

Overall, I had a more enjoyable experience navigating this than Twelve Blue but I still am feeling unsure of my understanding of the piece. There were moments I felt like I understood and then moments where I was a little lost. Maybe that was the point though.

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Response to “High Muck a Muck”: Playing Chinese

I think I’m just doomed to experience mental fatigue every time I engage with electronic literature. I’m not used to having chapters and stanzas broken up like this. Of course, I can always go back and re-read, but I find that it’s much easier to forget every time I click off of something. Complaints aside, this work is visually very beautiful. Despite the story being about immigration and there being some themes of forced assimilation, all of the imagery is distinctly Chinese, even down to the way the shops are drawn. There are even videos showing more visuals if you click on the cameraman in the corner of the pages. I think alongside telling a story of a tragic history, each image feels like there’s a distinct aura of homesickness.

 Of the seven places that serve as headers, my favorite was “Nelson.” It’s got a familiarity that I understand, from the setting to the acquiescence in the face of racism. The segregation of Chinese people in the cemetery was disgusting but unsurprising. The subject appeared multiple times in this section, with one of the stanzas being about a a non-immigrant who called Chinese people ‘lucky’ for having their own space. Meanwhile the speaker has to explain that no, this is only the result of discrimination. The shops feel like they’re representative of how Americans only cared for the Chinese within the bounds of services they could provide: laundry attendants, restaurants owners, laborers, etc.

There was also the mention of someone who was a Chinese “freemason.” I had to do a bit of background research into that. They were the people who cared about the preservation of their culture in Canada and stressed the importance of community. They’d do things like create newspapers to keep other Chinese people informed and provide essential services to newer immigrants, like healthcare and housing. I never knew that. Everything I learned from the American point of view about Chinese immigration was about how they were exploited. Never anything on their community. 

-SS

student blogs

High Muck a Muck: Playing Chinese

This week’s reading introduced us to a much easier understanding interactive poem (in my opinion). In short, this poem explores the immigration of Chinese settlers on the west side of Canada. I thought it was really interesting that the authors used a body as the whole premise of the poem. For example, the body’s right arm was highlighted with a blue dot that represented all of Canada. But then we have other body parts that represent other cities in Canada. I guess my question would be, “Why a body in the first place?”.

And then I thought to myself, isn’t migration a physical thing? These journeys literally become embodied in peoples lives.

However, it was really illuminating seeing the different works of each other. Every point that was clicked had a different voice and led to a different aspect of an immigrant experience. My favorite part of this piece would have to be the sensory experience itself. The Chinese instruments playing in the background, followed with literal stories being told from real people. Additionally, the deeper meaning behind this interactive poem got me thinking about “having a choice”. Throughout this entire piece, us as readers had a choice on what our next move was, or what we wanted to see next. The authors gave us a choice, unlike the “characters” in the piece who had to move to another country for possibly a better life. They sort of had a choice, but also not really.

Lastly, I was thinking about how this would be such a cool project to work on with my thesis because I am sort of discussing cultural preservation. This interactive poem that keeps cultural memory alive would be such a huge part of my research.

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High Muck a Muck Reflection

For me each experience inside High Muck a Muck reached all my senses, engulfing me with each icon, symbol that I clicked that would trigger a voice, music, movement sometimes fading in and out or present until I decided to move on.  I was engaged throughout the entire time in front of my laptop, one hand on my mouse the other on the keyboard; my instruments of how I interacted waiting and expecting to either hear the music, someone’s voice, or an object moving across my screen. At times these all happened together or in separate that presented a different experience. emotion to the piece. “A lot of small pieces broken from a long stick promises “was one of many lines of poetry that stood out to me and sparked a curiosity in me of similarity. “That anger of not having language itself-never mind the words – was another powerful line to read.

It was smart to offer the option of a video tutorial to learn how to interact by clicking on the icons that represent a particular experience, place, person and the Pak Ah Pu lottery card. The map laid out across the body reminds me of a Chinese medicine map of energy meridians in the body, similar to an experience I had when I got a shiatsu massage. The wall had various posters of our energy levels, circuitry running though our meridians and what affected or interrupted them from having a open flow of freedom. The locations spread across the silhouette lines forming the anatomy of the body or certain extensions made me feel that each experience would be something permanent, personal that happened and all that remains is the story just like a tattoo that the graphics, print reminded me of a represented location or name of a person. This even more so with the arm and the Canadian Pacific Railway interest since I worked on the railroad in the past and could relate. I enjoyed the pleasant sounds from traditional Chinese instruments being played, the tinkling then a commentary interview comes on speaking that I didn’t expect. The pop-up/poem or explanation of text that faded in and out kept me engaged as well waiting to the next poetry or information to show related to the particular icon I clicked on and presented as an addition to the experience a narrated story that made me want to know more about what I was learning about.

The Pacific Rim was filled with electronic noises, tinks, and nautical sounds of the ocean and movement of a petrol cargo ship moving across the screen with small type print Made in China barely visible in the background representing the waves, current and ocean. This for some reason reminded me of the experiences when sitting and watching which I don’t do much the instrumental theme music of a Netflix original movie during introduction to gain your attention while they show brief clips while it is being played.  Words associated with trade such as cheap labor, global while music celebrating an event or I assume strong economy was ironic. The pains of their labors, the ones who don’t have a choice or voice due to economic struggles, insufficient dispersing of wealth, oppression, are for me realties not discussed in public or heard outside of their own surroundings. At least some of the narrative in various parts of this project provides that voice allowing me to realize its effects on the culture of the people there in China throughout history.

The idea behind the Pak Ah Pu lottery card is brilliant. While interacting with the Chinese lettering characters I enjoyed waiting to see where it brought me to. Being exposed to Hanzi lettering I research it some on my own as it seems to be part of a Logographic system where its difference compared to traditional alphabet letters I am used to using. Each character of Hanzi which is referred to as a logogram contains its own particular sound, shape, and meaning to it. This provided a better understanding of the importance and significance of the Chinese characters being used on the Pak Ah Pu lottery card in relation to the experience and what was being told, shown to you once I clicked on the stained dotted circle on the card. There is so much to take in and experience each time I go back to the screen and click on another symbol. I found that even though I visited a few over and over again I didn’t mind as the experience felt fresh and new each time.

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English 5081*01 Writing Electronic Literature

Hello! World

Welcome to The World of Writing. This is my little corner of cyberspace where I will be writing interesting topics about the world of creative writing, narrative, expository, persuasive, and descriptive writing. Exploring the world around us through articles that may inform you in an impactful way. So, again, welcome to The World of Writing. Get cozy, sit tight, and explore my journey of writing engaging stories, just for you to enjoy. See you soon!

student blogs

High Muck a Muck

Going into High Muck a Muck, I wasn’t sure exactly what I was doing. Though, once I started navigating the website, I sort of understood just from a few clicks in. My first click, along the pathway of the posterior view of the human body, was at topmost blue dot, or the neck. This brought me to a video of an older man which slowly zoomed in until his eye takes up most of the screen. Then, his eye transforms into a baby’s eye, which then zooms out. What I understand from this is that when you are older, the world seems to have come at you already, and you have a chance to reflect on what you have done while you await the end. When the video transforms to the baby’s eye and zooms out, I understood this to be the world is awaiting this new person, and there is so much at their feet already for them to explore. From here, I recognized transformation as a theme as I continued to navigate the website.

Staying with the topic of videos, I found the video containing the strips of “Made in ____” to be very intriguing and also emotional. Strips of tags with “Made in China”, “Made in Japan”, “Made in Indonesia”, and several others make their way across the screen in many ways. First, only a few strips trek from the left side to the right side. Then, these strips make shapes such as stars and circles, leading up to the wave of strips encompassing the whole page. At this point, two ships make their way against the grain of the strips, with one ship floating on top of the strips, and one making its way through the middle. Then, the strips fade into the background. The video ends with an image of people seemingly in an airport, with the window view being the earth. I thought this was a very intentional way of describing immigration, specifically from Asian countries. We constantly see these labels on products we use everyday, yet we never consider the process the product goes through to eventually find its way into our hands. The same idea applies to immigrants: they are constantly moving through a process and its ramifications that a native citizen does not grapple with. There are obstacles that overpower immigrants, and push them back, as the boats may represent. Even when the immigrant arrives in the new place, they still may feel they are othered, and from an otherwise otherworldly place that has soon become unfathomable, as possibly represented by the aerial view of Earth.

Another aspect of the literature I really enjoyed was “Canada”. Moving from the Pacific Rim section into this one, it allows the reader to consider the themes of Pacific Rim, leaving a place of comfortability, in a more urgent manner, as Canada brings in the idea of family. At the far-most right point, the text appears, “Like a family / Are these trees / Abundant, / dense.” By bringing family into the equation, the interactor (I didn’t want to say reader because I didn’t feel like a reader in this moment) can understand the movement across the screen, of the close proximity of the strips, to be members of a family: parts of a whole meant to stay planted together like a hoard of trees.

“Richmond” really brought these aspects together for me. Between the mentioning of immigrating to another country for the sake of family and future generations truly hits home for me as a First Generation American. The imagery of the people, whether it be a man with his children, two people holding tools, or even a plane in the sky, it shows the massively different purposes of people who choose to leave their home country for a perceived better life. As remarked in “Victoria” by the man in the lower left corner smoking, many immigrants must “fake it”, as we commonly know to “fake it till you make it”, to be somewhat successful in a land in which they know nothing of, and continuously have to learn about for the rest of their time there.

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Moving Through Time

When I first opened Michael Joyce’s Twelve Blue, the words “Follow me” pulled me in. I remember pausing over that phrase, realizing that I wasn’t just being invited to read, but to move, to let myself be carried somewhere unknown.  Those opening words became a promise that I would be taken on a journey, one that might unfold beyond my understanding, and that my navigation, the simple act of clicking, was already shaping the story I would receive.

Reading Twelve Blue felt like drifting in and out of moments, sometimes clear and vivid, sometimes strange and elusive. One thread brought me into September, with a girl in new blue Mary Janes repeating the rhyme, “September’s embers never ending.” The scenery shifted from winter to fall, and I felt as though I were traveling through both time and space. When the link asked, “As if the seasons were whose fault?” I laughed a little inside because, in that moment, it felt like I was the one responsible for where the story carried me. I was no longer just a reader, I was also complicit in the movement of its seasons.

Another passage led me to Samantha, who dreamed of hosting a tea party, her imagination blurring between memory and delirium. She saw the tin cups with blue flowers, the kind passed down from her mother. This part lingered with me. In my own culture, tea is the answer to everything, headaches, stomach aches, even heartbreak. Reading Samantha’s memory, I was struck by how the hypertext asked me to carry my own memories and associations into it. I wasn’t just following links; I was weaving my world into Joyce’s fragments, letting my own history seep into the story.

And then I arrived at a finale that felt more like a chorus than a conclusion: every surface, every silence, every river, every lover, every daughter, every death. A list that seemed to gather everything, objects, bodies, gestures, whispers, into a single woven tapestry. It was overwhelming and beautiful, a reminder that every detail carries a story, that nothing is too small to be part of the whole.

Reflecting on this experience, I think of Jessica Pressman’s ideas about navigation in electronic literature, how moving through hypertext is not just a way to read but a way to produce meaning. That felt true with Twelve Blue. Each click was a choice that opened one thread and closed off another, reminding me of all the paths I wasn’t taking. Sometimes I felt lost, uncertain if I was missing something important, but that disorientation became part of the story itself. The work isn’t meant to be held all at once, it’s meant to be drifted through, to remind us of the patterns that form when fragments come together.

For me, Twelve Blue was less about “understanding” and more about surrendering to the weave. It taught me that navigation is not just about moving through a story, it’s about noticing the ways our choices, our memories, and even our frustrations shape the experience of reading. And maybe that’s what makes electronic literature so powerful: it doesn’t just tell stories, it reminds us that stories live in every thread we choose to follow.

student blogs

A World riting 2025-09-22 15:42:40

Navigating Electronic Literature

This explores how user actions like clicks, movements, or commands influence reader engagement with digital texts. Electronic literature is essential for understanding navigation. Unlike static, linear print materials, digital literature is interactive and evolving, involving interfaces that guide avatars through virtual environments.

Pressman highlights hypertext fiction, where readers navigate nonlinear stories by clicking links to explore different sections. This method introduces new interpretive possibilities and challenges traditional reading habits. For Pressman, navigation goes beyond simple technology, acting as a literary device that reshapes storytelling and comprehension in the digital era. Concepts like reading with colored text, browsing pages via hypertext, and experiencing text changes with a click are innovative. They offer a creative and deliberate way to read and produce content online. Digital media fundamentally changes how we interpret and create reading and writing.

Twelve Blue

In 1966, Michael Joyce developed “Twelve Blue,” a hypertext fiction made up of 269 interconnected parts spread over ninety-eight sections. It functions like a digital mosaic, encouraging readers to explore its complex network of links. The narrative is nonlinear and fragmented, highlighting the impact of cyberspace on memory and perception. Readers move through the story by clicking on links inside the text or on a colorful sidebar, enabling them to switch between segments.

Joyce described it as: “A drowning, a murder, a friendlily, three or four love affairs… twelve interwoven stories and a thousand memories… like the web itself or a year, day, a memory, or a river forms patterns of interlocking, multiple, and recurrent surfaces.” The story features twelve characters, each with complex and mysterious lives. As expected, the increased demand of making decisions and visual processing in hypertext can hinder reading performance.

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Navigating Electronic Lit

Hey Everyone!

So just a few observations on Twelve Blue by Joyce based on the Navigating Electronic Literature article by Pressman:

  1. This piece has hyperlinks which are the mode of navigation. New windows that open up are called “lexias” as per Pressman’s article “Navigating Electronic Literature”
  2. The reader is “writing” the story as they go along.
  3. Is there a correct order to read this text? For example, did the author have a specific narrative order in mind? Is there a wrong way to read a text such as this?
  4. Does the author know all the possible paths that we can take through a carefully calculated behind the scenes method and therefore can control the narrative order in a subtle way? Such as the links we click offer different bits of the story, but we eventually get the same overall picture each time?

Next are my notes I jotted down regarding Twelve Blue as I was reading it:

I wonder if there is a difference in navigating with a mouse like I did or with your finger like you could on mobile? What would the mobile formatting look like compared to on a computer screen? This is one way electronic literature is different from print based materials is that we can use different devices to view them which may impact how we navigate and interact with the work. Think about playing a game on your phone vs playing it on your computer or video game console.

Not an easter egg per se but if you hover over the hyperlinks on the right hand side, the text that has the address of the link has a number at the end. The first link ends with a 2 and all the other links follow in numerical order. So is the “click here to begin” page #1 and all the other pages go in order from top to bottom? The hyper link text is purposely obscured by the writer, but the links reveal hidden info.

Also the 1st hyperlink at the top has an address that ends in “sl1” and once you click it the address of the links on the next page end is “sl…” with some being “sl5” “sl6” and some even being “sl7_4”. This is definitely something as the author used these address to help themselves stay organized and probably didn’t want the reader to see them? Or did them?

I’m gonna navigate the story by trying to go from “click here to begin page” and then follow the link address on the left to go in numerical order. Are the hyperlinks in the text and not on the right side red herrings? Maybe put there to be little sides quests so you don’t analyze the hyperlinks on the left so much?

Nevermind, can’t navigate the way I wanted. When I open up a new window and go to the “Begin” page now I am hovering over the hyperlinks and the address is some variation of “sl_…” like “sl_2” “sl_3” “sl_4” etc. So maybe randomness is at play? Or just the illusion of randomness.

OMG when I started on the begin page “follow me” in the story was hyperlinked. I closed the page and started again and now it’s not hyperlinked. Glitch or intention?

I think this piece might be less about the narrative of the story and more a meta meditation on how the reader navigates the electronic text. I feel like this could be a psychological experiment. And the content of the narrative is bizarre and strange so it seems like there is more than meets the eye here. What if there isn’t even a central narrative and this text is a bunch of stories put together, but because the reader has to navigate with no map, they are reading different parts of different stories?

I feel a certain discomfort reading this and it’s more pronounced knowing that my navigation is what is moving me through the text. I didn’t write the words in the text, but I can choose what happens next even if it is like stumbling blindly in the dark. About 20 mins in and I just want to get to a few pieces that make sense. I am no longer assuming there is a concrete narrative here which allows me to navigate in the style of “enjoy the journey, not the destination.”

I got back to the “Begin” page. I just realized that I began with that page because it told me to. Is this part of how navigation in an electronic text changes the way we engage with a text? I didn’t have to begin with that page just because it said so. Maybe I lost something important by starting with that page. After many clicks, I made it back to that page and I feel a sense of failure like when you are lost and end up back where you started.

If I didn’t start with that page and didn’t know it was the beginning, would I feel that same sense of failure. So in this case, navigation of the text had a direct effect on my sense of self. Very interesting.

There is so much different information regarding characters, actions, and settings that when I click on a hyperlink and it brings me to a picture, I almost feel a sense of relief. I can look at the picture and get a general understanding of what it is so I feel grounded. It’s kinda like stopping at a bench before going on. I click the hyperlinks in order to navigate to safety (the pictures) when I feel overwhelmed.

It seems the pictures can only be in the intext hyperlinks, but not the left hyperlinks. But the intext hyperlinks can also be more text so I never know if I’ll get a picture or not. This causes a sense of apprehension when clicking the intext links and also a sense of relief when I come to a picture.

Since I am the navigator so when I get to a picture it feels like I accomplished something significant. Putting me in the driver seat makes this text less overwhelming. If I wasn’t able to navigate this text on my own, I don’t think it would be fun or interesting to read.

I think in this case, this text could be seen as showing how navigation is a central feature of electronic literature and the act of navigating the text without fully understanding it is okay because each of us had a different experience navigating the text and how and why we navigated the way we did along with how it made us feel which can be an important topic of discussion and dissection that will remind us to always keep the idea of navigation in mind when interacting with electronic texts.