The phonetic alphabet gave man “an eye for an ear” (I still have two…of both, thank you.) which made us visual beings. “Vision” is “rational” and “uniform” and so forth, that found its apotheosis in Renaissance introduction of the” detached observer.” This had been decidedly ungroovy stuff. But then media in the form of television granted the potential to return us to that most groovy “primordial feeling” with desirable “tribal emotions.” This is evidenced by the fact that “as soon as information is acquired, it is very rapidly replaced by newer information” via electric circuitry and we can, instead of laying blame, regain that tribal empathetic affinity for the instigator of “hideous events.” However, this new multi-sense offering is made to do the dirty bidding of old, visual methodologies promulgated by nasty 19th-centuryesque bureaucrats, thus the youth (ie, my parents) are prevented from a “total involvement” that denounces goals in favor of R-O-L-E-S, thus leading to the dropout and teach-in.

With all of this, “Television completes the cycle of the human sensorium” (never mind that no TV I’ve ever come across offers olfactory interaction. Don’t even ask about taste) that necessitates “participation and involvement in depth of the whole being.”

That’s all great and certainly seems, as many have pointed out, to foreshadow the arrival of the internet (or is internet an abomination of the “completion” offered by 60s TV?). Certainly we are all “affected” by media throughout the globe (first use of the now-cliché “Global Village”?), and if this was really the first exposition of the medium (rather than just an aphoristic, graphically provocative pamphlet) then I’m certainly impressed. Admittedly I haven’t read other McLuhan offerings, nor do I have a degree in Ethnomethodological Sociology. Perhaps I’ll go for one of those as it couldn’t possibly have lower earning potential than being an architect, but until I do I’ll go immerse myself in a televised Ford F150 commercial occasionally interrupted by the reality of actress wanna-be “professionals” trying to toss fish bones into a bucket for immunity.

And, I am hoping that my fellow citizens have indeed lost their “eyes” as I started reading this in the children’s section of my local library, turned a page while talking with my son, only to discover that I’m exposing some floating topless woman centerfold on pp 38-9! ( )

In one of the most interestingly presented books I have seen, socio-cultural theorist, Marshall McLuhan, and graphics designer and artist, Quentin Fiore, present The Medium is the Massage, a book that, while written in the 1960s, has more direct application to our contemporary times than it did during its inception. Taking its cue from the saying, "the medium is the message" and altering it to fit their own message, McLuhan and Fiore present the argument of how the electronic media is slowly lulling us into not realizing the dramatic changes and new perspectives this technology is creating. Their 'writing style', if it can be called such, is a provocative, visually-impacting array of photographs, unique texts, quotes, humorous cartoons, and other images to give the reader a better understanding of the ideas being presented. While there is a slight danger of their message being lost in its unorthodox presentation, (two pages, for example, are printed with the text upside-down), their argument is solid and restated in unique ways throughout. The book is revolutionary in the way it shows how electric technology is continually changing our government, our families, our jobs, and our social relationships. While the evidence and the way it is presented does reveal its origination in the earlier part of this technological movement, the words nonetheless show its relevance to our time period. ( )

Utterly essential to understanding not only the television age, but also the age we inhabit now, of social networking via digital technology and all the other good stuff going on around us. The work is utterly contemporary, very fresh, speaks to the now. Particularly powerful insights on education (and for educators). Read it! ( )

The title plays off McLuhan's motto, which became a 1960s buzz phrase: "The medium is the message." This book uses graphic design, as much as text, to reinforce McLuhan's ideas.

http://www.marshallmcluhan.com/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mcluhan ( )