Understanding Media

by Marshall McLuhan

Overview

When Marshall McLuhan first coined the phrases "global village" and "the medium is the message" in 1964, no-one could have predicted today's information-dependent planet. No-one, that is, except for a handful of science fiction writers and Marshall McLuhan. Understanding Media was written twenty years before the PC revolution and thirty years before the rise of the Internet. Yet McLuhan's insights into our engagement with a variety of media led to a complete rethinking of our entire society. He believed that the message of electronic media foretold the end of humanity as it was known. In 1964, this looked like the paranoid babblings of a madman. In our twenty-first century digital world, the madman looks quite sane. Understanding Media: the most important book ever written on communication. Ignore its message at your peril.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780415253970
Publisher:	Taylor & Francis
Publication date:	05/18/2001
Series:	Routledge Classics
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	400
Product dimensions:	5.06(w) x 7.81(h) x (d)

About the Author

Marshall McLuhan (1911-1980) Communications theorist, born in Canada. He is known as the original "high guru" of media culture and appeared in Woody Allen's Annie Hall as himself.

Table of Contents

Part 1: Introduction 1. Medium Is the Message 2. Media Hot and Cold 3. Reversal of the Overheated Medium 4. The Gadget Lover: Narcissus as Narcosis 5. Hybrid Energy: Les Liaisons Dangereuses 6. Media as Translators 7. Challenge and Collapse: The Nemesis of Creativity Part 2: 8. The Spoken Word: Flower or Evil? 9. The Written Word: An Eye for an Ear 10. Roads and Paper Routes 11. Number: Profile of the Crowd 12. Clothing: Our Extended Skin 13. Housing: New Look and New Outlook 14. Money: The Poor Man's Credit Card 15. Clocks: The Scent of Time 16. The Print: How to Dig It 17. Comics: Mad Vestibule to TV 18. The Printed Word: Architect of Nationalism 19. Wheel, Bicycle, and Airplane 20. The Photograph: The Brothel-without-Walls 21. Press: Government by News Leak 22. Motorcar: The Mechanical Bride 23. Ads: Keeping Upset with the Joneses 24. Games: The Extensions of Man 25. Telegraph: The Social Hormone 26. The Typewriter: Into the Age of the Iron Whim 27. The Telephone: Sounding Brass or Tinkling Symbol? 28. The Phonograph: The Toy That Shrank the National Chest 29. Movies: The Reel World 30. Radio: the Tribal Drum 31. Television: The Timid Giant 32. Weapons: War of the Icons 33. Automation: Learning a Living

Editorial Reviews

'He belongs to that small group of radical dreamers and thinkers who are trying to realize and explore the altered conditions of modern existence ... When the growth of post-Einsteinian mythologies is recorded, McLuhan's work will have its distinct place. He stands at the frontier.' - George Steiner, The Times Literary Supplement

'Understanding Media is still the essential read on how the medium is, more and more, the message itself.' - Nicholas Lemann, Sunday Herald

'McLuhan sings of the furthest reaches of electronic culture, when computer technology has replaced language with instant nonverbal communication.' - Wired

From the Publisher