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Understanding ‘Medium’ in the Context of the Media Ecology Tradition

image of Understanding ‘Medium’ in the Context of the Media Ecology Tradition

It is no accident that Marshall McLuhan begins ([1964] 2003) with a chapter entitled ‘The medium is the message’. His well-known aphorism is the essential key to understanding media, and it is one that packs together many different meanings (Strate 2017). In effect, is a wake-up call, directing us to pay attention to the medium, because we pay attention to the content, but it is the medium that has the greater effect. McLuhan indicates that we can only understand by first understanding . This is more than a matter of stylistic considerations. It is rather than that is the message because each medium is different, and the differences are what make a difference.

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References

  1. Anton, Corey (2017), ‘Media ecological orientations to philosophy and philosophical problems’, Review of Communication, 17:4, pp. 224–239.
  2. Anton, Corey, Logan, Robert K. and Strate, Lance (2017), Taking Up McLuhan’s Cause: Perspectives on Media and Formal Causality, Bristol: Intellect.
  3. Bateson, Gregory (1972), Steps to an Ecology of Mind: Collected Essays in Anthropology, Psychiatry, Evolution, and Epistemology, New York: Bantam Books.
  4. ——— (1979), Mind and Nature: A Necessary Unity, New York: Bantam Books.
  5. Berlo, David K. (1960), The Process of Communication, New York: Holt, Rinehart, & Winston.
  6. Bolter, Jay David and Gromala, Diane (2003), Windows and Mirrors, Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
  7. Bolter, Jay David and Grusin, Richard (1999), Remediation: Understanding New Media, Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
  8. Carpenter, Edmund (1960), ‘The new languages’, in E. Carpenter and M. McLuhan (eds), Explorations in Communication, Boston, MA: Beacon Press, pp. 162–79,
     [Google Scholar]
  9. Constantineau, Wayne and McLuhan, Eric (2010), The Human Equation: The Constant in Human Development from Pre-Literacy to Post-Literacy, Toronto, ON: BPS.
  10. Eisenstein, Sergei (1942), The Film Sense (trans. J. Leyda), New York: Harcourt Brace.
  11. ——— (1949), Film Form (trans. J. Leyda), New York: Harcourt Brace.
  12. Emerson, Ralph Waldo (1883), The Conduct of Life, and Society and Solitude, London: Macmillan and Co.
     [Google Scholar]
  13. Franklin, Benjamin (1997), Autobiography, Poor Richard, and Later Writings (ed. J. A. L. Lemay), New York: Library of America.
  14. Freud, Sigmund (1961), Civilization and Its Discontents (trans. J. Strachey), New York: W. W. Norton.
  15. Frisch, Max (1959), Homo Faber (trans. M. Bulloock), San Diego, CA: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich.
  16. Gibson, James J. (1986), The Ecological Approach to Visual Perception, New York: Psychology Press.
  17. Hall, Edward T. (1959), The Silent Language, Garden City, NY: Doubleday.
  18. ——— (1966), The Hidden Dimension, Garden City, NY: Doubleday.
  19. Hamilton, Alexander, Madison, James and Jay, John ([1788]1999), The Federalist Papers, New York: New American Library.
  20. Havelock, Eric A. (1963), Preface to Plato, Cambridge, MA: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press.
  21. ——— (1986), The Muse Learns to Write: Reflections on Orality and Literacy from Antiquity to the Present, New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.
  22. Heider, Fritz (1959), On Perception, Event Structure, and Psychological Environment: Selected Papers, New York: International Universities Press.
  23. Innis, Harold A. (1951), The Bias of Communication, Toronto, ON: University of Toronto Press.
  24. Johnson, Wendell (1946), People in Quandaries, New York: Harper & Row.
  25. Langer, Susanne K. K. (1957), Philosophy in a New Key, 3rd ed., Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
  26. Lévi-Strauss, Claude (1969), The Raw and the Cooked (trans. J. Weightman and D. Weightman), New York: Harper & Row.
  27. McLuhan, Marshall (1964), Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man, New York: McGraw Hill.
  28. ——— (1995), Essential McLuhan (ed. E. McLuhan and F. Zingrone), New York: Basic Books.
  29. ——— ([1964] 2003), Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man, Critical Edition (ed. T. W. Gordon), Corte Madera, CA: Gingko Press.
  30. McLuhan, Marshall and McLuhan, Eric (1988), Laws of Media: The New Science, Toronto: University of Toronto Press.
  31. ——— (2011), Media and Formal Cause, Houston: NeoPoiesis Press.
  32. Meyrowitz, Joshua (1985), No Sense of Place: The Impact of Electronic Media on Social Behavior, New York: Oxford University Press.
  33. Milberry, Kate (2016), ‘Media ecology’, in P. Moy (ed.), Oxford Bibliographies Online (Communication), Oxford: Oxford University Press.
  34. Montagu, Ashley (1958), The Cultured Man, Cleveland, OH: World.
  35. Mumford, Lewis (1934), Technics and Civilization, New York: Harcourt, Brace.
  36. ——— (1961), The City in History, New York: Harcourt, Brace & World.
  37. ——— (1967), The Myth of the Machine: I. Technics and Human Development, New York: Harcourt, Brace & World.
  38. ——— (1970), The Myth of the Machine: II. The Pentagon of Power, New York: Harcourt, Brace.
  39. Ogden, Charles Kay and Richards, Ivor Armstrong (1923), The Meaning of Meaning: A Study of the Influence of Language upon Thought and the Science of Symbolism, New York: Harcourt, Brace.
  40. Ong, Walter J. (1967), The Presence of the Word: Some Prolegomena for Cultural and Religious History, New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.
  41. ——— (1982), Orality and Literacy: The Technologizing of the Word, London: Routledge.
  42. ——— (2002), An Ong Reader: Challenges for Further Inquiry (ed. T. J. Farrell and P. A. Soukup), Cresskill, NJ: Hampton Press.
  43. Paglia, Camille (1990), Sexual Personae: Art and Decadence from Nefertiti to Emily Dickinson, New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.
  44. Peirce, Charles Sanders (1991), Peirce on Signs: Writings on Semiotic, Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press.
  45. Postman, Neil (1970), ‘The reformed English curriculum’, in A. C. Eurich (ed.), High School 1980: The Shape of the Future in American Secondary Education, New York: Pitman, pp. 160–68.
     [Google Scholar]
  46. ——— (1974), ‘Media ecology: General semantics in the Third Millennium’, General Semantics Bulletin, 41–43, pp. 74–78.
     [Google Scholar]
  47. ——— (1976), Crazy Talk, Stupid Talk, New York: Delacorte.
  48. ——— (1985), Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business, New York: Viking.
  49. ——— (2006), ‘Media ecology education’, Explorations in Media Ecology, 5:1, pp. 5–14.
     [Google Scholar]
  50. Sapir, Edward (1921), Language: An Introduction to the Study of Speech, New York: Harcourt, Brace and Company.
  51. Saussure, Ferdinand de (1983), Course in General Linguistics (ed. R. Harris, trans. C. Bally, A. Sechehaye and A. Riedlinger), LaSalle, IL: Open Court.
  52. Shannon, Claude E. and Weaver, Warren (1949), The Mathematical Theory of Communication, Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press.
  53. Strate, Lance (2011), On the Binding Biases of Time and Other Essays on General Semantics and Media Ecology, Fort Worth, TX: Institute of General Semantics.
  54. ——— (2014), Amazing Ourselves to Death: Neil Postman’s Brave New World Revisited, New York: Peter Lang.
  55. ——— (2016), ‘Media ecology’, in K. B. Jensen and R. T. Craig (eds), The International Encyclpedia of Communication Theory and Philosophy, vol. 3, Malden, MA: Wiley Blackwell.——— (2017), Media Ecology: An Approach to Understanding the Human Condition, New York: Peter Lang.
  56. ——— (2020), ‘Ethics and the study of media as environments’, Explorations in Media Ecology, 19:1, pp. 5–22.
  57. Watzlawick, Paul, Bavelas, Janet Beavin and Jackson, Don D. (1967), Pragmatics of Human Communication, New York: Norton.
  58. Whitehead, Alfred North and Russell, Bertrand (1927), Principia Mathematica, 2nd ed., 3 vols., Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

References

  1. Anton, Corey (2017), ‘Media ecological orientations to philosophy and philosophical problems’, Review of Communication, 17:4, pp. 224–239.
  2. Anton, Corey, Logan, Robert K. and Strate, Lance (2017), Taking Up McLuhan’s Cause: Perspectives on Media and Formal Causality, Bristol: Intellect.
  3. Bateson, Gregory (1972), Steps to an Ecology of Mind: Collected Essays in Anthropology, Psychiatry, Evolution, and Epistemology, New York: Bantam Books.
  4. ——— (1979), Mind and Nature: A Necessary Unity, New York: Bantam Books.
  5. Berlo, David K. (1960), The Process of Communication, New York: Holt, Rinehart, & Winston.
  6. Bolter, Jay David and Gromala, Diane (2003), Windows and Mirrors, Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
  7. Bolter, Jay David and Grusin, Richard (1999), Remediation: Understanding New Media, Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
  8. Carpenter, Edmund (1960), ‘The new languages’, in E. Carpenter and M. McLuhan (eds), Explorations in Communication, Boston, MA: Beacon Press, pp. 162–79,
     [Google Scholar]
  9. Constantineau, Wayne and McLuhan, Eric (2010), The Human Equation: The Constant in Human Development from Pre-Literacy to Post-Literacy, Toronto, ON: BPS.
  10. Eisenstein, Sergei (1942), The Film Sense (trans. J. Leyda), New York: Harcourt Brace.
  11. ——— (1949), Film Form (trans. J. Leyda), New York: Harcourt Brace.
  12. Emerson, Ralph Waldo (1883), The Conduct of Life, and Society and Solitude, London: Macmillan and Co.
     [Google Scholar]
  13. Franklin, Benjamin (1997), Autobiography, Poor Richard, and Later Writings (ed. J. A. L. Lemay), New York: Library of America.
  14. Freud, Sigmund (1961), Civilization and Its Discontents (trans. J. Strachey), New York: W. W. Norton.
  15. Frisch, Max (1959), Homo Faber (trans. M. Bulloock), San Diego, CA: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich.
  16. Gibson, James J. (1986), The Ecological Approach to Visual Perception, New York: Psychology Press.
  17. Hall, Edward T. (1959), The Silent Language, Garden City, NY: Doubleday.
  18. ——— (1966), The Hidden Dimension, Garden City, NY: Doubleday.
  19. Hamilton, Alexander, Madison, James and Jay, John ([1788]1999), The Federalist Papers, New York: New American Library.
  20. Havelock, Eric A. (1963), Preface to Plato, Cambridge, MA: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press.
  21. ——— (1986), The Muse Learns to Write: Reflections on Orality and Literacy from Antiquity to the Present, New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.
  22. Heider, Fritz (1959), On Perception, Event Structure, and Psychological Environment: Selected Papers, New York: International Universities Press.
  23. Innis, Harold A. (1951), The Bias of Communication, Toronto, ON: University of Toronto Press.
  24. Johnson, Wendell (1946), People in Quandaries, New York: Harper & Row.
  25. Langer, Susanne K. K. (1957), Philosophy in a New Key, 3rd ed., Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
  26. Lévi-Strauss, Claude (1969), The Raw and the Cooked (trans. J. Weightman and D. Weightman), New York: Harper & Row.
  27. McLuhan, Marshall (1964), Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man, New York: McGraw Hill.
  28. ——— (1995), Essential McLuhan (ed. E. McLuhan and F. Zingrone), New York: Basic Books.
  29. ——— ([1964] 2003), Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man, Critical Edition (ed. T. W. Gordon), Corte Madera, CA: Gingko Press.
  30. McLuhan, Marshall and McLuhan, Eric (1988), Laws of Media: The New Science, Toronto: University of Toronto Press.
  31. ——— (2011), Media and Formal Cause, Houston: NeoPoiesis Press.
  32. Meyrowitz, Joshua (1985), No Sense of Place: The Impact of Electronic Media on Social Behavior, New York: Oxford University Press.
  33. Milberry, Kate (2016), ‘Media ecology’, in P. Moy (ed.), Oxford Bibliographies Online (Communication), Oxford: Oxford University Press.
  34. Montagu, Ashley (1958), The Cultured Man, Cleveland, OH: World.
  35. Mumford, Lewis (1934), Technics and Civilization, New York: Harcourt, Brace.
  36. ——— (1961), The City in History, New York: Harcourt, Brace & World.
  37. ——— (1967), The Myth of the Machine: I. Technics and Human Development, New York: Harcourt, Brace & World.
  38. ——— (1970), The Myth of the Machine: II. The Pentagon of Power, New York: Harcourt, Brace.
  39. Ogden, Charles Kay and Richards, Ivor Armstrong (1923), The Meaning of Meaning: A Study of the Influence of Language upon Thought and the Science of Symbolism, New York: Harcourt, Brace.
  40. Ong, Walter J. (1967), The Presence of the Word: Some Prolegomena for Cultural and Religious History, New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.
  41. ——— (1982), Orality and Literacy: The Technologizing of the Word, London: Routledge.
  42. ——— (2002), An Ong Reader: Challenges for Further Inquiry (ed. T. J. Farrell and P. A. Soukup), Cresskill, NJ: Hampton Press.
  43. Paglia, Camille (1990), Sexual Personae: Art and Decadence from Nefertiti to Emily Dickinson, New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.
  44. Peirce, Charles Sanders (1991), Peirce on Signs: Writings on Semiotic, Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press.
  45. Postman, Neil (1970), ‘The reformed English curriculum’, in A. C. Eurich (ed.), High School 1980: The Shape of the Future in American Secondary Education, New York: Pitman, pp. 160–68.
     [Google Scholar]
  46. ——— (1974), ‘Media ecology: General semantics in the Third Millennium’, General Semantics Bulletin, 41–43, pp. 74–78.
     [Google Scholar]
  47. ——— (1976), Crazy Talk, Stupid Talk, New York: Delacorte.
  48. ——— (1985), Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business, New York: Viking.
  49. ——— (2006), ‘Media ecology education’, Explorations in Media Ecology, 5:1, pp. 5–14.
     [Google Scholar]
  50. Sapir, Edward (1921), Language: An Introduction to the Study of Speech, New York: Harcourt, Brace and Company.
  51. Saussure, Ferdinand de (1983), Course in General Linguistics (ed. R. Harris, trans. C. Bally, A. Sechehaye and A. Riedlinger), LaSalle, IL: Open Court.
  52. Shannon, Claude E. and Weaver, Warren (1949), The Mathematical Theory of Communication, Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press.
  53. Strate, Lance (2011), On the Binding Biases of Time and Other Essays on General Semantics and Media Ecology, Fort Worth, TX: Institute of General Semantics.
  54. ——— (2014), Amazing Ourselves to Death: Neil Postman’s Brave New World Revisited, New York: Peter Lang.
  55. ——— (2016), ‘Media ecology’, in K. B. Jensen and R. T. Craig (eds), The International Encyclpedia of Communication Theory and Philosophy, vol. 3, Malden, MA: Wiley Blackwell.——— (2017), Media Ecology: An Approach to Understanding the Human Condition, New York: Peter Lang.
  56. ——— (2020), ‘Ethics and the study of media as environments’, Explorations in Media Ecology, 19:1, pp. 5–22.
  57. Watzlawick, Paul, Bavelas, Janet Beavin and Jackson, Don D. (1967), Pragmatics of Human Communication, New York: Norton.
  58. Whitehead, Alfred North and Russell, Bertrand (1927), Principia Mathematica, 2nd ed., 3 vols., Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

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