Persistent Issues

In response to issues swirling in the comments to the previous post:

It's correct that we cannot blame the media for "violence itself." But this isn't really the point. Let's admit straight off that violence has always been a part of human behavior and culture. Does this mean that we should embrace and foster it? Is this the part of ourselves that we want to encourage and develop?

The hostility in the world is not a fixed quantity; it can be increased or diminished by the choices we make--as individuals and as a society.

Furthermore, it's erroneous to think we are either psychopaths or little lambs in some manichean universe. Of course it's true that listening to a particular artist won't flip your personality to something it wasn't. But, as we already admitted, the potential for violence is in people; we can choose to feed it or let it starve.

Violence

To supplement the discussion from last Thursday, here's the Senate Judiciary Committee's report on Children, Violence, and the Media. Also, the Congressional Public Health Summit, which I mentioned in class, issued this Joint Statement in 2000.

In addition--while considering Postman's depiction of the typographic mind--consider this notion. How's your threshold of boredom doing?

The Postman

The quiz is on Tuesday.

As for topics, I'll just say this: Review the chapter headings. If you understand, for example, what Postman means by "The Medium is the Metaphor," then you'll have little trouble explaining on the quiz what Postman means by a phrase like "technology is ideology."

Furthermore, a chapter is titled "Shuffle of to Bethlehem" -- it is about religion. What is Postman's take on televised religion? Asking yourself similar questions about the other chapter titles would be a good way to study for the quiz.

Levels of effects

The problem is not that television presents us with entertaining subject matter but that all subject matter is presented as entertaining, which is another issue altogether [...] Entertainment is the supra-ideology of all discourse on television.

-- Neil Postman

Reflecting further on Postman, it strikes me that many of us are misperceiving the relative effects of electric and print media. Too often we imagine that, since we cannot observe any specific effect caused by electric media within our own, individual behavior, the problems are all overstated.

However, this thinking is deceptive. Just as global warming is not of any concern when judging by a particular day, so too the ways society responds to the presence of electric media will be insignificant as manifest in any one particular person. It is really an effect registered at the level of society, since it alters only the way that culture communicates with and replicates itself.

In climate, if today is one or two degrees warmer than the same day last year, there is no harm whatsoever. But if a decade, or a century, goes up by an average degree, then ecosystems and weather patterns shift, causing great upheaval. So too television and this Internet force out the habitat that sustains our old patterns of thought. When you examine yourself individually for the effects of the diminished literacy, you'll find none. You might even be a reader. But, just as a cold day in January doesn't provide any meaningful data on climate change, the fact that you might read books doesn't mean we don't have problems with literacy.

Business

Two points of business:

First, we need a paid note-taker for this class. If you want to earn money for something you're already doing, talk to me asap. This is a regular payroll position. Please contact me today, someone.

Second, a reminder about your media abstinence exercise: it is due March 4. Here's a description from the syllabus:

To better understand your relationship with electronic media, you will be spending a week without it. This means, as much as possible, avoid: radio, television, the internet (including email), and the like. (If you simply cannot do this, you are a hopeless media junky, and this alone should teach you something.) Take notes along the way. Observe your emotional and physical reactions—you will write about them for grade.

"For grade" here means in a brief paper (the appropriate length is for you to determine). I do not need your notes about the experiment, just the write-up. Go into as much detail as possible and be insightful. Think about the ways in which electronic media have determined your culture, knowledge, and processes of thought.

The Postman Cometh

Please post your comments below.

Here we are now--entertain us

I'm hoping to get some discussion going here about the Postman book. It seems entirely appropriate to do so on a blog, since it's hard to imagine anywhere words are typed that are less typographic. Treat this as an open thread for now. Please post comments, reflections and insights below.

Orwellian Nightmare

I have tonight been unable to find the actual contract, but there are numerous news accounts attesting to its veracity. The rumor that we are sliding into a police state has been around a long time. The end of habeas corpus (which is the most fundamental legal safeguard against arbitrary government abuse) is certainly cause for much concern, as is warrentless wiretapping. And for those of you interested in ironic numerology, find out more about Rex 84.

All I'm saying is that there is good reason for us to keep an eye upon the Orwellian model. Although the Huxleyan will remain our primary focus.

Validations of McLuhan

In the comments for the previous post, someone named "McLuhan Prophecy" brought to our attention this article. Please read it, as it offers some startling neurological validation for McLuhan's concept of extensions. Our tools, it turns out, are not simply metaphorical extensions of our biological selves, but are in fact wired right through us. Here's an excerpt:

The findings "fairly clearly show that monkey tool use involves the incorporation of tools into the body schema, literally as extensions of the body," says Dietrich Stout, an archaeologist specializing in tool use at University College London. Scott Frey, a neuroscientist at the University of Oregon, Eugene, says that in humans, this ability to represent tools in the brain, combined with a capacity for innovation, "was no doubt a fundamental step in the development of technology."