4016 Fall07 Questions and Discussion 9
From Studyplace
This week's class question:
What is the important difference between Innis' account of history and McLuhan?
This week's respondent: Ruthie
Contents |
[edit] 30-second summary of Carey’s article (mostly) in his own words
Professor Carey sees analyzing the work of McLuhan and Innis as vital for mass communication studies because their work introduces the idea of communication technologies as being central to the development of Western Civilization. In other words, “It is a theory that anchors social change in the transformations in the media of communication on which this civilation has been progressively dependent” [2].
“Both Innis and McLuhan agree that historically the things on which words were written down count more than the words themselves; that is, the medium is the message. Starting from this proposition, they engage in quite different kinds of intellectual bookkeeping, however, and are seized by quite different kinds of implications.” [31]
Carey explains that McLuhan has taken one of Innis’s minor points – about sensory perceptions - and made it his focal point [30]. He summarizes their differences as follows:
“Both McLuhan and Innis assume the centrality of communication technology; where they differ is in the principal kinds of effects they see deriving from this technology. Whereas Innis sees communication technology principally affecting social organization and culture, McLuhan sees its principal effect on sensory organization and thought. McLuhan has much to say about perception and thought but little to say about institutions; Innis says much about institutions and little about perception and thought.” [32]
We might add that Deibert, following the same model, assumes the centrality of communication technology, but focuses on its effects on world order.
After analyzing their arguments in depth, Carey ultimately finds Innis more convincing, arguing that McLuhan’s claims often support Innis’s argument about communication technologies’ effects on social organization better than they do his own argument about sensory perception. Carey claims that, simply put, “the most visible effects of communications technology are on social organization and not on sensory organization.” [63]
[edit] Key Concepts
In class we will attempt to define and understand the following concepts, and to discuss whether or not they are applicable in the age of hypermedia:
The medium is the message
Time-bias vs. Space-bias
Monopoly of Knowledge, Authority, Stability
Extensions of Man
Detribalization/Retribalization of Man
Communion and Communication
[edit] Discussion Questions
1. Compare McLuhan and Innis’s argument’s with regard to the transition from oral tradition to writing. Is this different from Havelock’s argument? Who has it right?
2. Choose a specific electronic medium; how does Innis’s argument play out with regards to that medium? How does McLuhan’s argument play out?
3. According to McLuhan, the media train our perceptions of everything. What implications does this have for education?
4. Carey is skeptical of what he sees as McLuhan’s utopian view of the potential of electronic media to reunite men and combat individual alienation, noting that Innis warned against this. From what you know of McLuhan, is this a fair assessment of his position? Who’s vision of the age of electronic media seems most accurate?
[edit] Fun
Carey talks a lot about McLuhan’s celebrity status. For evidence of this, one need look no farther than Youtube – he’s all over it. Here’s a link to his cameo in Woody Allen’s 1977 film, Annie Hall:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OpIYz8tfGjY
And here’s a link to a really terrific interview with McLuhan in, ahem, Playboy (March 1969), where he explains many of his ideas in a much more succinct, intelligible way than he ever did in any of his writing. Be warned, it is long:
