Contemporary media philosophers
Tristan Miller
A colleague of mine is looking for contemporary philosophers who write on
media, and in particular the new types of media which have arisen in
recent times (Internet, electronic books, software, etc.). Apart from
Marshall McLuhan and Jean Boudrillard, we're having trouble coming up with
any. I was wondering if anyone here knows of any other notable names...?
Regards,
Tristan
--
_
_V.-o Tristan Miller [en,(fr,de,ia)] >< Space is limited
/ |`-' -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= <> In a haiku, so it's hard
(7_\\ http://www.nothingisreal.com/ >< To finish what you
Tim
"Tristan Miller" <psych...@nothingisreal.com> wrote in message
news:1669641.s...@ID-187157.News.Individual.NET...
> Greetings.
>
> A colleague of mine is looking for contemporary philosophers who write on
> media, and in particular the new types of media which have arisen in
> recent times (Internet, electronic books, software, etc.). Apart from
> Marshall McLuhan and Jean Boudrillard, we're having trouble coming up with
> any. I was wondering if anyone here knows of any other notable names...?
>
Noam Chomsky and Jacques Ellul.
JXStern
<psych...@nothingisreal.com> wrote:
>A colleague of mine is looking for contemporary philosophers who write on
>media, and in particular the new types of media which have arisen in
>recent times (Internet, electronic books, software, etc.). Apart from
>Marshall McLuhan and Jean Boudrillard, we're having trouble coming up with
>any. I was wondering if anyone here knows of any other notable names...?
The Metaphysics of Virtual Reality
Michael H. Heim
http://search.barnesandnoble.com/textbooks/booksearch/isbnInquiry.asp?isbn=0195092589
... and see the other books recommended on the page displayed. I know
I've seen a couple of other books by litcrit types regarding the web,
that would probably qualify, can't cite names or titles.
Virtual Realities and Their Discontents
by Robert Markley
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0801852269/qid=1093531572
Half of the pomo stuff written rants about movies and books and
whatnot, Michel Foucault to Camille Paglia.
J.
Robert Cohen
slanted right:
brett bozzell
lichter (not sure of slant)
cal thomas
michael medved
slanted left:
jeff cohen of f.a.i.r.
alex cockburn of the nation ("beat the devil")
village voice's michael tomaskey etal
tom shales
david brock (formerly was slanted right)
jeff greenfield (was brilliant on sunday morning on cbs)
nat hentoff (outspoken, generally not categorizable, village voice)
john leonard (sunday morning cbs)
there are so many others from the right and from the left whom critize &
comment upon the media as much more than mere sterile utilitarian conveyance
my favorite still is understanding media by marshall mcluhan
isn't jacques ellul is more about "technology" than solely media ?
JXStern
by Sherry Turkle
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0684833484/qid=1093532270/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_1/103-7257949-4515864?v=glance&s=books
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0684833484/qid=1093532270
Yes, this is one I recall, it was semi-hot in its time.
And Heim has a newer book (didn't see it on the B&N list!?!)
Virtual Realism
by Michael Heim
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0195138740/ref=qid=1093531572
Also
Being Digital
by Nicholas Negroponte
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0679762906/qid=1093532563
btw, I don't vouch for the contents of any of these.
J.
Immortalist
"Tristan Miller" <psych...@nothingisreal.com> wrote in message
news:1669641.s...@ID-187157.News.Individual.NET...
>
> A colleague of mine is looking for contemporary philosophers who write on
> media, and in particular the new types of media which have arisen in
> recent times (Internet, electronic books, software, etc.). Apart from
> Marshall McLuhan and Jean Boudrillard, we're having trouble coming up with
> any. I was wondering if anyone here knows of any other notable names...?
>
> Regards,
> Tristan
>
I think that media theory is almost through it's devastating "identity crisis"
and soon we will take off from where the left wing sociologists left off.
Media is now an essential part of many peoples everyday life. Media reflects and
creates the social and cultural world we live in. Marshall McLuhan recognised
this in 1967 when he argued that our senses are transformed by the mediums by
which we communicate. Meyrowitz writing much later harnessed the theories of
McLuhan to produce one of the first studies to not just state that the media has
effected our sense of time and space, but to actually reveal how it does this.
Meyrowitz argument is that 'the evolution of media has decreased the significance
of physical presence in the experience of people and events'.
http://media.ankara.edu.tr/~erdogan/globmit.html
-----------------------------------
Just as the wheel is an extension of the leg, and radio is an extension of the
voice, so too, is the camera an extension of the eye, the computer an extension
of the brain, and wiring, circuits, and the internet an extension of the nervous
system.
Many Dimensions: The Extensions of Marshall McLuhan October 23 - 25, 1998 , 30th
Anniversary. Program will host a scholarly conference entitled Many Dimensions:
The Extensions of Marshall McLuhan. Contemporary scholars from multiple
disciplines will present their research on media, technology and culture in the
"global village".
In addition to Derrick de Kerckhove,
Liss Jeffrey, Eric McLuhan, Frank Zingrone,
Robert Logan, Bruce Powe, and Bob Hanke,
Jody Berland, David Crowley, Stephen Dale,
Paul Grosswiler, Paul Heyer, Ethan Katsh,
Paul Levinson, Robert Logan, Robert Luke,
Philip Marchand, Janine Marchessault,
Jean Mercier, Heather Menzies, Joshua Meyrowitz,
Patrick Roy, Norman Steinhart, and Glenn Willmott.
"Humanistic Intelligence is the Medium; our Everyday Living is the Message."
--Steve Mann
http://wearcam.org/mcluhan-keynote.htm
-------------------------------------
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http://www.popcultures.com/theorist.htm
--------------------------------
Brown, Nicola (2003) 'What do we Learn from Television Quizzes?' [link added
01/05/2003] (203 hits)
Butler, Jeremy G (nd) 'Style and the Camera: Videography and Cinematography'
[link added 13/01/2002] (845 hits)
Butler, Jeremy G (nd) 'Television Glossary' [link added 13/01/1997] (940 hits)
Chandler, Daniel (nd) 'Educational Television Programme Structure And Style:
Notes on Research by Tony Bates' [link added 18/06/2001] (1335 hits)
Chandler, Daniel (1994) 'Grammar' of Television and Film [link added 13/01/2000]
(2946 hits)
Chandler, Daniel (nd) 'The Construction of Reality in TV News Programmes' [link
added 27/07/1998] (3994 hits)
Chandler, Daniel (1997) 'An Introduction to Genre Theory' [link added 11/08/1997]
(6100 hits)
Dellinger, Brett (1995) 'The Structural Constraint of "Concision" as it is Used
in the Discourse Style of American Commercial Broadcasting' [link added
13/01/2001] (1608 hits)
Dlutsky, Konstantin (nd) 'The Role of Television in Political Socialisation'
[link added 13/01/1999] (778 hits)
Docker, John (1987) 'In Defence of Popular TV...' (Continuum) [link added
13/01/1999] (774 hits)
Elfert, Jennifer (2003) 'Is Television Like a Language Which we Read?' [link
added 01/05/2003] (209 hits)
Fiske, John (1987) 'The Popularity of Television' [link added 13/01/1999] (1259
hits)
Goldstein, Jonathan (nd) 'Neil Postman's Criticisms of the Television Medium'
[link added 16/05/2000] (2172 hits)
Kwong, K F (1998) 'American Peacock on Chinese Soil - The Challenge Facing NBC
Asia in Greater China' [link added 27/07/1998] (152 hits)
Macmurraugh-Kavanagh, Madeleine (2003) 'The BBC Wednesday Play series and
Post-War British Drama' (A Research Project) [link added 14/10/1997] (817 hits)
Mason, Virginia (1994) 'What Do We Learn from Television Quizzes?' [link added
07/05/1998] (881 hits)
McKie, David (1989) 'John Fiske's Television Culture : A Review' (Continuum)
[link added 13/01/1999] (896 hits)
Perez-Ortiz, Pablo (2002) 'Television as an Agency of Socialization' [link added
01/05/2003] (204 hits)
Sanes, Ken (nd) 'Film and Television Theory' [link added 27/01/1999] (1430 hits)
Servaes, Jan & Rico Lie (nd) 'Television as a Cultural System' [link added
13/01/2001] (956 hits)
Various (nd) 'Articles on Television (Listing at Popcultures.com)' [link added
15/04/2000] (1511 hits)
Various (nd) 'Film and Television Studies Papers' [link added 13/01/2001] (1511
hits)
Walden, Justine (1994) 'The Political Aesthetic: Nation and Narrativity on the
Starship Enterprise' (CinemaSpace) [link added 13/01/1999] (483 hits)
Whittaker, Ron (2004) 'Television Production: A Comprehensive On-line Cybertext
in Studio and Field Production' [link added 28/10/1998] (544 hits)
Wright, Kristin & Julio Vigil (1995) 'Exposing Northern Exposure: An Exercise in
Creating Themes' (The Qualitative Report) [link added 13/01/1999] (477 hits)
http://www.aber.ac.uk/media/sections/tv10.php
--------------------------------
media 'effects' - the idea that people will simply copy things they've seen in
the media. For material on more subtle media influences see the role models and
identity sections.
The whole problem with the media effects research is that it takes place in that
depressing corner of 'communications' research which places more value on a
veneer of 'scientific' method than it does on actually saying anything.
http://www.theory.org.uk/ctr-eff.htm
Theodor Adorno (1903-69) argued that capitalism fed people with the products of a
'culture industry' - the opposite of 'true' art - to keep them passively
satisfied and politically apathetic.
Adorno saw that capitalism had not become more precarious or close to collapse,
as Marx had predicted. Instead, it had seemingly become more entrenched. Where
Marx had focussed on economics, Adorno placed emphasis on the role of culture in
securing the status quo.
Popular culture was identified as the reason for people's passive satisfaction
and lack of interest in overthrowing the capitalist system.
Adorno suggested that culture industries churn out a debased mass of
unsophisticated, sentimental products which have replaced the more 'difficult'
and critical art forms which might lead people to actually question social life.
False needs are cultivated in people by the culture industries. These are needs
which can be both created and satisfied by the capitalist system, and which
replace people's 'true' needs - freedom, full expression of human potential and
creativity, genuine creative happiness.
Commodity fetishism (promoted by the marketing, advertising and media industries)
means that social relations and cultural experiences are objectified in terms of
money. We are delighted by something because of how much it cost.
Popular media and music products are characterised by standardisation (they are
basically formulaic and similar) and pseudo-individualisation (incidental
differences make them seem distinctive, but they're not).
Products of the culture industry may be emotional or apparently moving, but
Adorno sees this as cathartic - we might seek some comfort in a sad film or song,
have a bit of a cry, and then feel restored again.
Boiled down to its most obvious modern-day application, the argument would be
that television leads people away from talking to each other or questioning the
oppression in their lives. Instead they get up and go to work (if they are
employed), come home and switch on TV, absorb TV's nonsense until bedtime, and
then the daily cycle starts again.
http://www.theory.org.uk/ctr-ador.htm
--------------------------------
http://foner.www.media.mit.edu/people/foner/Essays/Media-Theory-and-the-Net/
Joshua Meyrowitz in No Sense of Place shows how
television and other electronic media create new social situations that are
no longer shaped by where we are or who is "with" us. Situational Geography
can alter the content of out communication and it's style. things normally
hidden in every day social life are revealed when observed through the lense
of any electronic media....
Starting with the phone, electronic media have made porous boundaries of
sea, state and home. Joshua Meyrowitz claims that the media, especially TV,
has changed American daily life at home, blending community and privacy,
subservience and authority, male and female, childhood and adulthood,
leisure and work, etc.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
"When distinct social situations are combined, once appropriate behavior may
become inappropriate. When a particular private situation becomes more
public by being merged into other situations, behavior style must adapt and
change. A combination of situations changes the patterns of role behavior
and
alters the texture of social reality..." an example of media distortion and
behavior in context
"...many private forums - especially television - have led to the
overlapping of many social spheres that were once distinct..."
"electronic media go one step further: They lead to a nearly total
dissociation of physical place and social "place". Communication and travel
were once synonymous. Our country's communication channels
were once roads, waterways and railroads."
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Placelessness and the media. According to Joshua Meyrowitz's No Sense of
Place, another kind of Space Age placelessness has likewise resulted from
the impact of electronic media on social behavior. Radio, television,
telephone, and computer are in the process of destroying traditional and
unique environments, Meyrowitz's impressive study shows, radically altering
the tacit "situational geography" (6) that has long governed normal
behavior. (As an epigraph to his book, Meyrowitz quotes, appropriately,
Marshall McLuhan's observation that "nothing can be further from the spirit
of the new technology than 'a place for everything and everything in its
place.'")
"It is extremely rare," Meyrowitz writes, "for there to be a sudden
widespread change in walls, doors, the layout of a city, or in other
architectural and geographical structures. But the change in situations and
behaviors that occurs when doors are opened or closed and when walls are
constructed or removed is paralleled in our time by the flick of a
microphone switch, the turning on of a television set, or the answering of a
telephone" (39-40). (Nieuwenhuis' New Bablyon, Meyrowitz's analysis would
suggest, is already being forged not with bricks and mortar but via new
channels of communication.)
Once how we behaved depended largely on where we were and who we were with.
Public and private places, men and women, superiors and inferiors, children
and adults--all required us to behave in particular ways. But now these
distinctions are becoming blurred. Now "Many Americans may no longer seem to
'know their place' because the traditionally interlocking components of
'place' have been split apart by electronic media. Wherever one is now--at
home, at work, or in a car--one may be in touch and tuned-in" (308).
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Meyrowitz shows how television and other electronic media create new social
situations that are no longer shaped by where we are or who is "with" us.
While other media experts have limited the debate to program content,
Meyrowitz focuses on the ways in which television has rearranged "who knows
what about whom," making it impossible for us to behave with each other in
traditional ways. He shows how television has lifted many of the veils of
secrecy between children and adults, men and women, and politicians and
average citizens. The result is a series of revolutionary changes, including
the blurring of age, gender, and authority distinctions.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
This article will apply a framework of analysis developed by Joshua
Meyrowitz (1985) to explain how media coverage may have affected the
constitution-making process. In No Sense of Place, Meyrowitz argues that the
real power of television comes from its capacity to reach into and expose
behaviour that was once relegated to ``back regions.'' Television creates a
``shared arena'' by allowing viewers access to political and social settings
that were once shielded from public view. Where political leaders were once
distant figures, the mysteries of their power enhanced by their remoteness,
today's politicians are followed by TV cameras and a media entourage which
relentlessly captures and records their controlled messages as well as their
unintended gaffes, their brave words as well as the fear in their eyes.
Moreover television transports viewers to other places. The poor can see how
the wealthy live, Jews and Moslems can watch how Christmas is celebrated,
and Iraqi Generals can watch the U.S. Congress vote on whether or not to go
to war.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Vocabulary and Discussion of Terms
.
Information-systems: set patterns of access to information about others.
Information is used by Meyrowitz in the sense of social information, that
which we know about the behavior and actions of ourselves and others.
Meyrowitz's information is not the information bits and bytes of computers..
.
Electronic media of communication: media in which messages are encoded as
electronic signals, transmitted, and then decoded. The telegraph, telephone,
radio, and television are examples of electronic media. So too are
computers. Meyrowitz argues that these media have unique physical
characteristics that have significant social implications. The nature of
electronic signals allows them to be rapidly transmitted through wire or
air, and the form of the messages often resemble "real" face-to-face
communication. As a result, communication can easily bypass many former
physical barriers to information flow, and "interactions" can take place
without regard to traditionally defined social situations and roles.
.
Evolving electronic communications technologies: In this course we will
extend Meyrowitz's ideas to new technologies. We want to examine the social,
economic and political ramifications of new technology. While technology
does not "cause change," understanding new technology helps understand
change. Technology of the integrated digital electronic network has inherent
properties that distinguish it from the disconnected mix of phonograph
records, letters, books, newspapers, and telephone, computer, and
broadcasting systems (TV and radio) that preceded it.
.
Review of Terms: Three dichotomies: communication vs. expression; discursive
vs. presentational; digital vs. analogic
Expressive/expression: gestures, signs, vocalizations, marks, and movements
produced by the mere presence of a person. But see emoticons.
Communication: use of language or language-like symbols.
Discursive symbols: language
Presentational symbols: pictures
Analogic: The analogy used by Meyrowitz relates to time. Analogic time is
continuous, around the hour of noon, a little before class, after the movie.
Digital: In a time analogy, digital time is precise, as in you should come
to class at 9:15 AM each Monday and Thursday.
.
Personal vs. Impersonal Response: Meyrowitz uses the three dichotomies above
to compare why responses to print media and electronic media are so
different. p. 97
.
"Imprint of" vs. "Report on": "Media acts as a filter that excludes aspects
of 'reality.'" p. 109 What Meyrowitz hopes to do is to explain how each
media acts as a different type of filter.
.
Summary: The media matrix people find themselves in leads to different
patterns of interaction. With newer media, we find ourselves in situations
that might once have only been possible if we were in physical
interaction--in the same room, in the same space. New media begins to
provide information once available only when participants met in the same
place at the same time. If we no longer need to be in a "place" then our
sense of place is being reshaped. In some sense, this also what we mean when
we say that there is a global culture. We no longer need to be located in a
specific culture of time and place.
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The effect of physical place may have been more distinct three generations
ago. But for the past 50 years electronic media have been eroding the
impermeability of our sense of place. Where once the walls of the boardroom,
office, bar, club, and home were open only to those who were physically
present and social roles were determined by physical or socioeconomic place,
now television, modem, and cellular phones have erased some of those
boundaries.
In fact, Joshua Meyrowitz, author of No Sense of Place: The Impact of
Electronic Media on Social Behavior, argues that "Our shared sphere of
interaction is informational rather than physical." He adds, "We bypass many
previous generations' dependence on physical location as a prime determinant
of access to people and information," For example, live coverage on
television ensures that millions who can't afford Bulls' tickets are still
capable of witnessing a spellbinding play by Jordan or sublime concert by
Yanni at the Acropolis in Greece.
Merging and overlapping media have exposed most Americans to places and
perspectives that were once beyond our reach. We have, collectively and
singularly, parent and child, man and woman, few secrets anymore. With no
walls to shield or separate our encounters with varying audiences, we tend
to synthesize our behavior, as our experience has been synthesized, into one
common denominator. Meyrowitz notes, "As telephones, radios, televisions,
and computers increasingly link the home to the outside world, external
behavioral norms begin to merge into internal ones. The living room,
kitchen, and bedroom are being reintegrated into the larger public realm."
We are becoming a visually nomadic people, hunting and gathering
information. For better and for worse, once insurpassable boundaries no
longer exist to the same degree. Without traditional boundaries to define
our own place, it becomes more difficult to nourish a sense of home and
personal space. We must define it, then, in mental, emotional, spiritual,
and physical terms.
Even in these cyber-sensitive days, the most basic indicators of place are
linked to our senses: light, color, the layout of the structure or land and
placement of our belongings, aromas, and plant life all influence us in
vital ways. For that reason, the type of lighting we choose for home and
office, our sense of placement and physical space, and our use of
sense-based aids like aromatherapy are tools we can use to create and define
more nurturing personal spaces.
Pierre-Normand Houle
"Tristan Miller" <psych...@nothingisreal.com> wrote in message news:1669641.s...@ID-187157.News.Individual.NET...
>
> A colleague of mine is looking for contemporary philosophers who write on
> media, and in particular the new types of media which have arisen in
> recent times (Internet, electronic books, software, etc.). Apart from
> Marshall McLuhan and Jean Boudrillard, we're having trouble coming up with
> any. I was wondering if anyone here knows of any other notable names...?
>
> Regards,
> Tristan
Hubert Dreyfus has written _On the Internet_, Routledge, 2001
BretCahill
To get an idea of Nietzsche's standards he
said of Emerson, "we have lost a philosopher."
If Emerson couldn't make the grade, what are
Bill Maher's chances?
Bret Cahill
Tristan Miller psych...@nothingisreal.com in
All conservatism is based on censorship of
economic information.
-- Bret Cahill
ZZBunker
>
> A colleague of mine is looking for contemporary philosophers who write on
> media, and in particular the new types of media which have arisen in
> recent times (Internet, electronic books, software, etc.). Apart from
> Marshall McLuhan and Jean Boudrillard, we're having trouble coming up with
> any. I was wondering if anyone here knows of any other notable names...?
Every political philsopher in the world from China to
Washington, writes about the Internet.
McLuhan wasn't a media philosopher. He was
somebody who knew somebody, who knew somebody,
who was a Piana Player.
Boudrilliard was French. The French are still
having problems understanding Johann Gutenburg,
so he wasn't a media philosopher either.
He was a public organic spoke-person for the
Restraute' de' Libera, on the South Side Of Paris.
>
> Regards,
> Tristan
Immortalist
"ZZBunker" <zzbu...@netscape.net> wrote in message
news:e4a0829b.04083...@posting.google.com...
what Gutenburg wrot Adam Smith described and took from the print capitalists and
created game.
>
>
>
>
>
>
> >
> > Regards,
> > Tristan
Giorgos K
ZZBunker
Adam Smith created nothing. Since he being the astute
Merchantiler that he was, understood well enough
the zero-sum game of economics. And that print
media has nothing really fundamental to do with economics.
Since he told them then, and his ghost still tells
the idiots at the London Times today, that print media
has NOTHING to do with Capitalism. Since the London
Times no more owns London, than Loydds owns London.
It was primarily innovated, not invented, by Gutenburg,
for HISTORIANS, for documentary purposes,
not investment, of investigation, purposes.
Since all Gutenburg really invented, regarding economics,
it what's today called insider-information. He did not
invent Capitol Gains, Capitol Losses, Capitol Improvement,
Birth, Death, Taxes, employment, science, reading,
writing, art, engineering, or American Express Cards.
You can't home without them, since France is still
potentially run by the Communists,
and the Social Maneurving German Green Party.