-the extension of man
By M. McLuhan
In this book McLuhan tries to explore the medium. “Every culture and every age has its favourite model of perception and knowledge that it is inclined to prescribe for everybody and everything. The mark of our time is its revolution against imposed patterns (pp.5).� This book explores how we as humans define ourselves through our technologies and make them an extension of ourselves. McLuhan looks at media in particular as an extension of Man and this book explores some of the main extensions and their social and psychological consequences.
The medium is the message
In our culture we split and divide things as a means of control. It is then a bit of a shock to the system to be reminded that the personal and social consequence of any medium- the extension of us- is a result of another extension; the one that it is presented by. Take for example the electric light. It, according to McLuhan, is a medium without a message unless it is used to spell out a verbal ad or name. This fact means that the “content� of any medium is always another medium. “The content of writing is speech, just as the written word is the content of print, and print is the content of the telegraph� (pp. 8).
‘Hot and Cool’ media
The difference between hot and cold media is determined by how much participation is needed from the user. A cool medium, for example a cartoon, gives very little information. This leaves the reader to fill in the blanks; you need to participate to enjoy the content. On the other hand a photograph is considered a hot medium by McLuhan because of the low participation or completion needed from the reader’s point of view. Because a hot medium allows for less participation it is more difficult to learn from than a cool medium. You learn more from a seminar (cold medium) than from a lecture (hot medium) because the seminar allows for participation. In McLuhan’s opinion, the reason for this is that any intense experience must be “forgotten� or “censored� before the participant can learn from it. The Freudian “censor� is less of a moral function than an indispensable tool of learning. The “censor� protects our system of values. This is best seen in times of new technologies where some people go into a state of psychological “rigor mortis� in order to cool down and then learn the new technology. Introduction of radio detribalized society when it was first introduced while TV retribalized society when it was introduced. According to McLuhan this is because the radio like money, the wheel and writing is a specialised speedup of exchange and information and will serve to fragment tribal structure. On the other hand TV and electricity will restore the structure because of intense involvement.
Bibliograph
McLuhan, M.(1964)Understanding Media: the extension of man. London:Routledge,
Camilla Hestdal 08:58, 29 Oct 2004 (EST)
