The universe decided to give me the Marshall McLuhan classic "Understanding Media" yesterday. We are starting a blogging workshop in OBA this coming Sunday, starting at 3pm. This is one picture option for the flyer.
I would like to know more about your blogging workshop. I don't know how plugged in to the McLuhan universe you are, but there are a number of resources you might find interesting. First, you should check out the Media Ecology Association at http://www.media-ecology.org/. (BTW IMHO their website could used a design overhaul). Also, I invite you to visit my blog "A Model Media Ecologist" at http://robertkblechman.blogspot.com/ where I discuss current topics in light of the teachings of Marshall McLuhan, Neil Postman and Claude Levi-Strauss.
If you have any particular questions about McLuhan, I'd be happy to share my own knowledge with you or direct you to my betters.
Among his many accomplishments, McLuhan created his "Laws of the Media" which state that the impact of any technology or medium of communication on a culture can be determined by examining four characteristics:
What does it enhance?
What does it obsolesce?
What does it retrieve that was previously lost?
What does it reverse into if pushed to an extreme?
I created a McLuhan Laws of the Media "Tetrad" concerning blogging that you might find interesting:
Blogging enhances “many to many” communication. As a medium, blogging allows me to get my message out to many without the need of access to television, radio, print or film production facilities. Blogging also allows me to receive messages from many sources.
Blogging obsolesces one to one or many to one communications. Telephone chats and television binges are replaced by blogging connections.
Blogging retrieves the habits of 18th letter correspondents or diarists. Though this varies widely, at the minimum blogging requires that we capture and express our thoughts via the keyboard. Some bloggers go much further than that. In the blogosphere, we all become nacent Montaignes.
When pushed to an extreme, blogging reverses into total narcissism. I write only to myself, for myself. I put myself into the blogosphere, and seeing my own image, become entranced.
3 comments:
Hi Leighton,
I would like to know more about your blogging workshop. I don't know how plugged in to the McLuhan universe you are, but there are a number of resources you might find interesting. First, you should check out the Media Ecology Association at http://www.media-ecology.org/. (BTW IMHO their website could used a design overhaul). Also, I invite you to visit my blog "A Model Media Ecologist" at http://robertkblechman.blogspot.com/ where I discuss current topics in light of the teachings of Marshall McLuhan, Neil Postman and Claude Levi-Strauss.
If you have any particular questions about McLuhan, I'd be happy to share my own knowledge with you or direct you to my betters.
Regards,
Bob Blechman
Among his many accomplishments, McLuhan created his "Laws of the Media" which state that the impact of any technology or medium of communication on a culture can be determined by examining four characteristics:
What does it enhance?
What does it obsolesce?
What does it retrieve that was previously lost?
What does it reverse into if pushed to an extreme?
I created a McLuhan Laws of the Media "Tetrad" concerning blogging that you might find interesting:
Blogging enhances “many to many” communication. As a medium, blogging allows me to get my message out to many without the need of access to television, radio, print or film production facilities. Blogging also allows me to receive messages from many sources.
Blogging obsolesces one to one or many to one communications. Telephone chats and television binges are replaced by blogging connections.
Blogging retrieves the habits of 18th letter correspondents or diarists. Though this varies widely, at the minimum blogging requires that we capture and express our thoughts via the keyboard. Some bloggers go much further than that. In the blogosphere, we all become nacent Montaignes.
When pushed to an extreme, blogging reverses into total narcissism. I write only to myself, for myself. I put myself into the blogosphere, and seeing my own image, become entranced.
Great comments, Bob. We'll keep in touch, for sure.
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