Hi Reddit,
I’m currently studying for my first media & communications final and I’m having trouble with Marshall McLuhan’s theory about “the medium is the message”. I understand that it’s more about the choice of medium rather than what the message is saying, but in what way? I’ve tried googling and watching videos, but I still don’t quite understand it.
Can anyone help me?
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When I took a communications class in college I ended up with a perfect example in my own life.
Usually when my parents wanted to talk to me and catch up, they’d wait until the evening and then call me on my cell phone.
One day I was in class and I got a text message from my dad saying “Call me when you have a chance. Love you”
Two things stuck out from that in my mind: why did he text me, and why did he say “love you” in the text if he knew I’d see the message and call? Before I even called back I knew that something had happened, probably something bad.
It turned out that my grandpa had passed away that morning.
In that case, I had already known to expect bad news simply by the way the message was sent to me. The “medium” of a text, and it’s timing, was in itself a message about what to expect. If they had waited til the usual time and just called, I would have had no idea something was wrong.
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