The Medium is the Massage — How Media Shapes the Way We Think

This is NOT an online meeting but an in-person meeting.
Meeting in English.
Reading the book is not required.

During the book discussion the leader of the discussion presents the most interesting parts of the book. The great emphasis is placed on discussion.

Book Description
This week we continue our discussion of The Gutenberg Galaxy, moving from oral and manuscript cultures toward the transformations brought by print and electronic media.

We will also discuss The Medium is the Massage, McLuhan’s short and highly visual collaboration with designer Quentin Fiore. Rather than presenting a conventional argument, the book uses images, typography, fragments of text and visual juxtapositions to demonstrate McLuhan’s central idea: media do not simply carry information — they change how we perceive, think and interact with the world.

Together, the two books provide two different ways of approaching the same question: what happens to human beings when the dominant media environment changes? From oral culture and manuscripts to print, television and the emerging electronic environment, McLuhan asks us to look beyond the content of communication and examine the structure of the medium itself.

Discussion Topics

• What does McLuhan mean when he says that the medium is the message?
• How did the shift from oral culture to manuscript and print culture change human perception and social organization?
• Why does McLuhan pay so much attention to the sensory experience of different media?
• Can a medium change us even when the content we consume remains the same?
• Is The Medium is the Massage actually demonstrating McLuhan’s theory through its visual form?
• What can McLuhan’s ideas tell us about television, smartphones, social media and the Internet?
• Are digital media bringing us back toward something resembling oral culture — or creating something entirely new?
• What does McLuhan help us see about our own media environment that we normally take for granted?