McLuhan on Media

Paper Summary:

This paper looks at the four major concepts presented by McLuhan-- the idea that the medium is the message, the nature of different messages, different social orders that are linked to their system of communication and how the development of a new technology will lead to a change in each society. The paper analyzes these theories and concludes that technology has a great effect on the social order.

From the Paper:

"The idea that the medium is the message is offered first. McLuhan says that it is characteristic of all media that "the 'content' of any medium is always another medium" (8), meaning that the content of writing is speech, the content of the written word is print, and so on. Media are defined as extensions of man, allowing human senses to reach beyond their normal range. McLuhan finds that "the formative power in the media are the media themselves" (21), and because of this, he finds that technological media are staples or natural resources. Certain staples become for a society a social bond."

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