1) Can one treat a blog as a case, chiefly considering the difficulty of delineating the boundaries of the blog?
yes , but one can also choose a set of blogs as a case, or even a post on a blog as a case. The answer here is 'what makes sense to your argument?'
2) Is it feasible to look at 14 blogs, even though I won't be examining every little component? How many would be "enough" for a dissertation?
1, the amount of data you use has no relationship to the dissertation necessarily, what is important is what contributions your dissertation makes.
3) Isn't it rather ambitious of my part to analyze texts, visuals and the content of the webpages which are connected to a given blog post by means of the hyperlinks embedded in that post?
no, it is not ambitious. multimodal discourse analysis has been doing it for years... and hyperlinks are one indicator, the question is 'indicator of what' and 'for whom' and 'why', but hyperlinks aren't the only indicator.
4) If I just looked at one mode of semiosis (e.g., written texts), what would then be the point of looking at these texts online if one does not attend to the words or stretches of text which fulfill the double function of being part of the text and nodal points?
what would the point be in any case? online or offline, texts are always conjoined and disjointed, just because there is not a hyperlink reference does not mean there is not referentiality and other modes of reference. No text is necessarily anything... it is up to you to argue what it is, and why it should be thought of as such.
-- jeremy hunsinger Center for Digital Discourse and Culture Virginia Tech www.tmttlt.com
() ascii ribbon campaign - against html mail /\ - against microsoft attachments http://www.stswiki.org/ sts wiki http://transdisciplinarystudies.tmttlt.com/ Transdisciplinary Studies:the book series I am always doing that which I can not do, in order that I may learn how to do it. -Pablo Picasso