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Essay / Research Paper Abstract
This 3 page paper provides an overview of the central views of Marshall McLuhan regarding the mass media and applies them to a modern perspective. Bibliography lists 5 sources.
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3 pages (~225 words per page)
File: MH11_MHMassMediaTh.rtf
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progress as a significant extension of mans own capacity for intellectual and technological development, and as a result, extended technologies would inherently become a part of every aspect of daily
life. Though these predictions have come true, even McLuhan himself could not have predicted the breadth of expansion of technology and the mass media in the current era.
When McLuhan first began to theorize about the impacts of the mass media in 1964, he had know way of predicting the level at
which the mass media and mass consumerism would take over the Western way of life (Gordon, 2004). McLuhan did not simply relate the concept of media to the way
in which we experience news through the press, but instead identified it as a any method of expanding body or mind: "clothing is an extension of skin, housing is
an extension of the bodys heat mechanism. The stirrup, the bicycle, and the car extend the human foot. The computer extends our central nervous system. A medium, or a technology,
can be any extension of the human being" (Gordon, 2004). This theory, then, relates the progression of the mass culture through the medium in which it is developed.
In a number of McLuhans books, including Understanding Media: The Extension of Man and The Global Village, McLuhan considers the nature of mans interactions with the media and technology,
and the elements that have led to mans development of technology as a primary component of his own self-definition. The idea that the technology through which communication travels is
more important than the information itself is one of the most fascinating and troublesome theories put forth in the 20th century. In terms of todays digital multimedia and mass media
...