beyond the immediate level of display, that is that are linked to the opening screen of
the dossier, are presented in a plainer font, and have scroll bars (see figure 4.7). In the
former case the ‘hand-writing’ font is used to visually mark the presence of a human
writer. In this way the content of what is written is visually expressed as a personal
and potentially ‘fictional’ account. In the later case, the plain font does not
foreground the author of the letter or the personal character of a letter. This use of
font, together with the use of scroll bars, serves to position the content of the writing
as a formal and factual account. The contrast in the use of framing and typography
between these two screens indicates the different kinds of work the student is being
asked to engage with. In the first case, the work of imaginative engagement, and in
the second, the work of engagement with the historical ‘fact’.
Images
The opening menu (see figure 4.8) shows the manila files of the dossier files lying on
an embossed blotting board. Through these visual props the reader of the Dossier is
placed in the viewing position of ‘the boss’. That is, the reader is visually
repositioned to the text, or perhaps more accurately ‘into the text’. Each dossier
contains a close-up photograph of the actor(s) who played each character in the 1992
MGM film version of the novel. This visually places all of the characters within a
shared contemporary time frame and genre.
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