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3.74 AVERAGE
3.74 AVERAGE
I don't even know what to rate it. Some really interesting stuff but also......what the fuck, Eskimos are so primitive they can't count on their fingers? Some incredibly garbage "facts" used to support his stuff.
I got all the way through Part 1 at least.
https://www.thenewatlantis.com/publications/why-bother-with-marshall-mcluhan
I got all the way through Part 1 at least.
https://www.thenewatlantis.com/publications/why-bother-with-marshall-mcluhan
Alright, I'll admit this book has some interesting ideas about media and society that are still clever today. Having said that, this is a great example of an intellectual imposture. It has pseudoscience, bad use of history, obscure language, most of the book's points can be summarized with "electricity is changing things a lot", and tons of phrases that sound cool in a cafe, but mean nothing once you think them through. Plus, its scholarship is just awful. There are kids in school making more accurate and responsible use of references than this book.
Conflicted. Loved the analysis of poetry, there were some good thoughts. But a lot of this went right over my head, or was stuff I flat out couldn’t believe (and I’m the most naive reader around). Finished it because I somehow developed an attachment to its unique style. I wouldn’t recommend though—just find a truncated essay of it, and you’ll be good.
challenging
informative
reflective
I had to read this book for a class and as much as I can respect it what McLuhan was saying, I struggled with this book so much because its IMPOSSIBLE to understand lol...I had to read the same thing over and over again in order to get some sense of the meaning. A very challenging read but an interesting message
If Cliff Clavin from Cheers wrote a book, this would be it.
It's hard for me to comment on Understanding Media because I've never read anything quite like it. It's really just a whole bunch of somewhat connected thoughts, observations, and statements. There are many words that McLuhan uses that have a particular definition in the book but are in common usage to mean something else, and he never explains these. That said, once you understand that, once you get a feeling for what McLuhan is doing, Understanding Media is absolutely brilliant. I certainly don't agree with everything he says, but everything he says is at least something to think about. Because of the sort of disconnected way that McLuhan writes, the material is always accessible. I sort of want to own a copy just so I can flip through it randomly and select a paragraph to read once in a while.
challenging
informative
reflective
fast-paced
"If the nineteenth century was the age of the editorial chair, ours is the century of the psychiatrist’s couch."
This was a eerily prophetic and yet tough slog all at once. Getting a dogeared library copy was the best because the relevant quotes were highlighted like crazy.
I walked away inspired by his thinking, but wonder if we'd pay attention to someone like this today talking about the future? Jaron Lanier's books come to mind but he's way more focused.
I walked away inspired by his thinking, but wonder if we'd pay attention to someone like this today talking about the future? Jaron Lanier's books come to mind but he's way more focused.