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MARSHALL MCLUHAN: THE MEDIUM IS THE MESSAGE AND MASSAGE

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Theories of Communication ­ MCM 511
VU
LESSON 36
MARSHALL MCLUHAN: THE MEDIUM IS THE MESSAGE AND MASSAGE
During the 1960s a Canadian literary scholar m Marshall McLuhan , gained world-wide prominence as
someone who had a profound understanding of electronic media and its impact on both culture and
society .McLuhan was highly trained in literary criticism but also read widely in communication theory
and history. He based much of his understanding of media's historical role on the work of Harold Innis,
a Canadian political economist.
We should study him for two reasons. One because his work is important to the development of cultural
theory because his work did much to inspire and legitimize macroscopic theories of media, culture and
society in North America. He wrote at a time when the limited effects paradigm had reached the peak of
its popularity among academics, a time when most American communication researchers regarded
macroscopic theory with suspicion if not outright hostility. The second reason for our attention to
McLuhan is that he and his ideas are again in vogue.
His theory is actually a collection of lots of intriguing ideas bound together by some common
assumptions. The most central of these assumptions is that changes in communication technology
inevitably produce profound changes in both culture and social order.
McLuhan had no links to any political or social movements; he seemed ready to accept whatever
changes were dictated by and inherent in communications technology. McLuhan is said to be a
technological determinist. Because he argued that technology inevitably causes specific changes in how
people think, in how society is structured, and he forms of culture that are created, Harold Innis : the
bias of communication. Harold Innis was one of the first scholars to systematically speculate at length
about the possible linkages between communications media and the various forms of social structure
found at certain points in history.
He argued that the early empires of Egypt, Greece, and Rome were based on the elite control for the
written work. He contrasted these empires with earlier social orders dependent on the spoken work.
Innis maintained that before elite discovery of the written word, dialogue was the dominant mode of
public discourse and political authority was much more diffused. Gradually, the written work became
the dominant mode of elite communication, and its power was magnified enormously by the inventing
of new writing materials that is paper that made writhing portable yet enduring. With paper and pen,
small, centrally located elite were able to gain control over and govern vast regions, thus, new
communications media made it possible to create empires. Innis argued that written work-based empires
expanded to the limits imposed by communication technology, thus, expansion did not depend as much
on the skills of military generals as it did on the communication media used to disseminate orders from
the capital city.
Similarly, the structure of later social orders also depended on the media technology available at a
certain point in time. For example, the telephone and telegraph permitted even more effective control
over larger geographic areas thus the development of media technology had gradually given centralized
elites increased power over space and time.
Innis traces the way Canadian elites used various technologies, including the railroad and telegraph, to
extend their control across the continent. As a political economist, he harbored a deep suspicion of
centralized power and believed that newer forms of communication technology would make even
greater centralization inevitable. He referred to this as the inherent bias of communication.
Because of this bias, the people and the resources of outlying regions that he called the periphery are
inevitably exploited to serve the interests of elites at the center.
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Bias of communication
Innis' idea that communication technology makes centralization of power inevitable.
McLuhan: understanding media
Although he borrowed freely from Innis, McLuhan didn't dwell on issues of exploitation or centralized
control. He was fascinated by the implications of Innis' arguments concerning the transformative power
of media technology.
If media could create empires what else could they do?
Was it possible that media could transform our sensory experiences as well as our social order?
After all the acts of reading a book and viewing a movie or television program employ different sensory
organs.
During the 1960s, we were clearly moving from an era grounded in print technology to one based on
electronic media. McLuhan asked if communication technology plays such a critical role in the
emergence of new social orders and new forms of culture, what were the implications of abandoning
print media in favor of electronic media?
He outlined his vision of the changes that were taking place as a result of the spread of radio and
television. He proclaimed that medium is the message (and the Massage). In other words, new forms of
media transform (message) our experience of ourselves and our society and this influence is ultimately
more important than the content that is transmitted in its specific messages. He coined several phrases
and terms that have become part of the common vocabulary we use to talk about media and society.
He suggested the term Global village to refer to the new form of social organization that would
inevitably emerge as instantaneous, electronic media tied the entire world into one great social,
political and cultural system.
Unlike Innis, McLuhan didn't bother to concern himself with questions about control over this village or
whether village members world be exploited, to him these questions didn't matter, he was more
concerned with microscopic issues, with the impact of media on our senses. He proclaimed media to be
the extensions of man and argued that media quite literally extend sight, hearing, and touch through time
and space. Electronic media would open up new vistas for average people and enable us to be
everywhere, instantaneously.
But was this an egalitarian and democratic vision?
What would ordinary people do when their senses were extended in this way?
Would they succumb to information overload? Would they be stimulated to greater participation in
politics?
Would they flee into the virtual worlds that were opened up to them by their extend senses?
In a series of books, he tossed out cryptic and frequently contradictory ideas that addressed such
questions. Occasionally, his ideas were profound (deep, thoughtful) and prophetic, more often they were
arcane (mysterious), mundane,(common) or just confusing.
His observations concerning the global village and the role of electronic media in it continue to be
prophetic. At a time when satellite communication was just being developed, he seemed to foretell the
rise of the cable news network with its ability to seemingly make us eyewitnesses to history as it's made
on the battlefield or at the barricade. At a time when mainframe computers filled entire floors of office
buildings, he seemed to envision a time when personal computers world be everywhere and the internet
would give everyone instant access to immense stores of information. But as one media critic
Meyrowitz noted, to be everywhere is to be nowhere- to have no sense of place, to have access to
information is not the same thing as being able to select and use information effectively. The global
village isn't situated in space or time. Is it possible to adjust to living in such a formless, ambiguous
social structure? Or will the global village merely be a façade used by cynical elites to exploit people?
Among the most popular of McLuhan's ideas was his conception of hot and cool media.
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He argued that during the 1960s the United States was emerging from an era dominated by hot print
media, in the future, the new, cool medium of television would prevail. According to him, the television
is cool because it presents us with vague, shadowy images (remember this was 1960, reception was
often bad, and sets were black and white).
To make sense of these electronic images, people must work hard to fill in missing sensory information;
they must literally participate in creating fully formed images for themselves. He argued that this gets us
involved and so we find the images very compelling and meaningful- this is the secret to the television's
ability to attract vast audiences.
Print on the other hand, is hot. It supplies us with all the information we need to make sense of things. It
does the work for us, offering predigested descriptions of the social world. We can't participate in
creating meaning. So, according to him, hot media are out and cool media are in. He carried this notion
a step further and argued that some forms of content are naturally suited to cool media whereas others
are best communicate by hot media.
His most famous interpretation was that John F Kennedy had a cool image that was ideally suited to
television. Richard Nixon, on the other hand, had a hot image. Thus, in their famous presidential debates
of 1960 the attractiveness of Kennedy's image was greatly enhanced by television while Nixon's hot
image was impaired, this assessment was widely accepted by political consultants and has become an
important basis for selecting candidates and molding their public personae.
Initially his ideas achieved enormous public popularity. He became the darling of the media industries-
their prophet with honor. For a brief period he commanded huge fees as a consultant and seminar leader
for large companies. His ideas were used to rationalize rapid expansion of electronic media with little
concern for their negative consequences. So what if children spend most of their free time in front of
television sets and become functionally illiterate? Reading is doomed anyway, why prolong its demise?
Eventually we will all live in a global village where literacy is an unnecessary as it was in preliterate
tribal villages. He propounded that linear, logical thinking is far too restrictive. If the triumph of
electronic is inevitable why not get on with it? No need for government regulation of media. No need to
complain to about television violence adopt McLuhan's long-term global perspective.
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Table of Contents:
  1. COMMUNICATION:Nature of communication, Transactional approach, Communication is symbolic:
  2. THEORY, PARADIGM AND MODEL (I):Positivistic Perspective, Critical Perspective
  3. THEORY, PARADIGM AND MODEL (II):Empirical problems, Conceptual problems
  4. FROM COMMUNICATION TO MASS COMMUNICATION MODELS:Channel
  5. NORMATIVE THEORIES:Authoritarian Theory, Libertarian Theory, Limitations
  6. HUTCHINS COMMISSION ON FREEDOM, CHICAGO SCHOOL & BASIC PRINCIPLES OF SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY THEORY
  7. CIVIC JOURNALISM, DEVELOPMENT MEDIA THEORY & DEMOCRATIC PARTICIPANT THEORY
  8. LIMITATIONS OF THE PRESS THEORY:Concentration and monopoly, Commercialism
  9. MCQUAIL’S FOUR KINDS OF THEORIES:Social scientific theory, Critical theory
  10. PROPAGANDA THEORIES:Origin of Propaganda, Engineering of Consent, Behaviorism
  11. PARADIGM SHIFT & TWO STEP FLOW OF INFORMATION
  12. MIDDLE RANGE THEORIES:Background, Functional Analysis Approach, Elite Pluralism
  13. KLAPPER’S PHENOMENSITIC THEORY:Klapper’s Generalizations, Criticism
  14. DIFFUSION OF INNOVATION THEORY:Innovators, Early adopters
  15. CHALLENGING THE DOMINANT PARADIGM:Catharsis Social learning Social cognitive theory
  16. SOCIAL COGNITIVE THEROY:Symbolizing Capacity, MODELLING
  17. MODELING FROM MASS MEDIA:Recent research, Summary, PRIMING EFFECTS
  18. PRIMING EFFECT:Conceptual Roots, Perceived meaning, Percieved justifiability
  19. CULTIVATION OF PERCEPTIONS OF SOCIAL REALITY:History
  20. SYSTEMS THEORIES OF COMMUNICATION PROCESSES:System
  21. EMERGENCE OF CRITICAL & CULTURAL THEORIES OF MASS COMMUNICATION
  22. REVISION:Positivistic perspective, Interpretive Perspective, Inductive approach
  23. CRITICAL THEORIES & ROLE OF MASS COMMUNICATION IN A SOCIETY -THE MEDIATION OF SOCIAL RELATIONS
  24. ROLE OF MASS MEDIA IN SOCIAL ORDER & MARXIST THEORY:Positive View
  25. KEY PRINCIPLES USED IN MARXISM:Materialism, Class Struggle, Superstructure
  26. CONSUMER SOCIETY:Role of mass media in alienation, Summary of Marxism
  27. COMMUNICATION AND CULTURE:Neo Marxism, Characteristics of Culture
  28. HEGEMONY:What exactly is the meaning of "hegemony"?
  29. CULTURE INDUSTRY:Gramscianism on Communications Matters
  30. POLITICAL ECONOMIC THEORY I:Internationalization, Vertical Integration
  31. POLITICAL ECONOMIC THEORY II:Diversification, Instrumental
  32. POLITICAL ECONOMIC THEORY III:Criticism, Power of Advertising
  33. AGENDA SETTING THEORY:A change in thinking, First empirical test
  34. FRAMING & SPIRAL OF SILENCE:Spiral of Silence, Assessing public opinion
  35. SPIRAL OF SILENCE:Fear of isolation, Assessing public opinion, Micro-level
  36. MARSHALL MCLUHAN: THE MEDIUM IS THE MESSAGE AND MASSAGE
  37. KNOWLEDGE GAP THEORY:Criticism on Marshal McLuhan
  38. MEDIA SYSTEM DEPENDENCY THEORY:Media System Dependency Theory
  39. USES AND GRATIFICATIONS THEORY:Methods
  40. RECEPTION THEORY
  41. FRAMING AND FRAME ANALYSIS:Information Processing Theory, Summing up
  42. TRENDS IN MASS COMMUNICATION I:Communication Science, Direct channels
  43. TRENDS IN MASS COMMUNICATION II:Communication Maxims, Emotions
  44. GLOBALIZATION AND MEDIA:Mediated Communication, Post Modernism
  45. REVISION:Microscopic Theories, Mediation of Social Relations