McLuhan Essay -- Art

McLuhanAuthor and social theorist Tom Wolfe once commented on Canadian professor Marshal McLuhans mantra, the spiritualist is the message saying The refreshful technologiesradically alter the entire way people use their five senses, the way they react to things, and therefore, their entire hots and the entire society. It doesnt matter what the content of a medium like t.v. is 20 hours a day of sadistic cowboys caving in peoples teeth or Pablo Casals droning away on his cello. How is it that violence and the arts ar effective in the same manner? Wouldnt the content be the most important factor in analyzing a television program? To extrapolate Marshall McLuhans theories the reader must not be concerned with the symbolic content of what is being said or the cosmetic interpretation of the echt show but rather, look deeper into the whole infrastructure of the medium itself. McLuhan was prone to thinking up clever analogies and plays on give voices and describing the content of a med ium was no different. He described it as the juicy piece of meat carried by the burglar to distract the watchdog of the mind. We be the content of our media because the way we live life is largely a function of the way we process information. That information is presented and made available by way of a certain medium. In turn, all(prenominal) medium delivers a new message and a new form of human being, whose qualities are suited to it. The same words spoken face to face, printed on paper, or presented on television provide three different messages simply because of the different senses used to perceive it. McLuhan thought primary channels of communication flip-flop the way we look at the world around us. The dominant medium of any age governs people and reconnects modes of relationships with the world based on which sensory force back apparatus is being activated. Dominant epochs spring from the phonetic alphabet, printing press, and the telegraph, which were turning points in s ociety because they changed the way people thought about themselves. To understand how and wherefore people are affected by television, one must first become familiar with McLuhans idea of the electronic age. With the advent of television, the power of the printed word is decreased significantly. Books become made-for-t.v. movies and newspapers come alive with twenty-four hour a day headlines. Marshall McLuh... ...ert themselves into the story. Perhaps this is one piece of an elaborate mosaic of cultural activity that works toward a unified ideological end, whether intentional or not. With cameras and televisions enhancing our eyes, satellite dishes increasing the sensitivity of our ears, and computers and the Internet augmenting the power of our brains, the human body has at long last become fully extended through communication technology. In these respects, McLuhan was on to something. Unfortunately, one could not overlook McLuhans often abandonment of the linearity and pitch that he claimed were the legacy of print technology. His truths were enigmatic and seldom woven into a comprehensive system at times he implied that chosen words are irrelevant while other times he declared the significance of the symbols were a matter of degree. His leaps of faith were a major hindrance to taking him seriously. show up the end, he was accused of selling out by Stuart Hall, fellow media theorist. But, as Kenneth Boulding in McLuhan Hot and Cold stated, It is perhaps typical of very creative minds that they gather very large nails not quite on the head. Maybe we should give Marshal McLuhan another swing.