[lit-ideas] The Medium is the Massage
- From: Jlsperanza@xxxxxxx
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Tue, 25 Oct 2011 23:05:54 -0400 (EDT)
For those who don't know -- and hey, for those who KNOT *it* too, for
_that_ matter, "The Medium is the Massage: An Inventory of Effects" is a book
co-created by media analyst Marshall McLuhan and graphic designer Quentin
Fiore, and coordinated by Jerome Agel.
This book was published by Bantam books in 1967 and became a bestseller and
had a cult following.
The book itself is 160 pages in length and composed in an experimental,
collage style with text superimposed on visual elements and vice versa.
Some pages are printed backwards and are meant to be read in a mirror (see
mirror writing).
Some are intentionally left blank.
Most contain photographs and images both modern and historic, juxtaposed in
startling ways.
The book was intended to make McLuhan's philosophy of media and
communication, considered by some[who? Geary?] incomprehensible and esoteric,
more
accessible to a wider readership through the use of visual metaphor and
sparse text.[citation needed -- but not by Geary]
The title is a play on McLuhan's oft-quoted cliche,
"The medium is the message".
The book was initiated by Quentin Fiore.
McLuhan adopted the term "massage" (from the French, obviously) to denote
the effect each medium has on the human sensorium, taking inventory of the
"effects" of numerous media in terms of how they "massage" the sensorium.
("I found Sade had said what I _meant_ to say")
According to McLuhan biographer W. Terrence Gordon, "by the time it
appeared in 1967, McLuhan no doubt recognized that his original saying had
become
a cliché and welcomed the opportunity to throw it back on the compost heap
of language to recycle and revitalize it.
"Only, I never realised that the French pronounce "massage" does sound like
"message" -- this can confuse, if not the French."
But the new title is more than McLuhan indulging his insatiable taste for
puns, more than a clever fusion of self-mockery and self-rescue — the
subtitle is 'An Inventory of Effects,' underscoring the lesson compressed into
the original saying." (Gordon, p. 175.)
McEvoy thought it actually was "An inventory of Affects", which he found
otiose ("How can affects, affections, be inventoried, like _that_?")
However, the FAQ section on the website maintained by McLuhan's estate says
that this interpretation is incomplete and makes its own leap of logic as
to why McLuhan left it as is:
"Why is the title of the book The Medium is the Massage and not The Medium
is the Message? Actually, the title was a mistake."
"By mistake, I mean it."
When the book came back from the typesetter's, it had on the cover
'Massage' as it still does.
"The title was supposed to have read "The Medium is the Message" but the
typesetter had made an error. Is that a malaprop, or what?," McLuchan asked
rhetorically.
When McLuhan saw the typo he exclaimed,
'Leave it alone! It's great, and right on target!'
McLuhan prefers massages to _messages_, he told intimately.
Now there are possible four readings for the last word of the title, all of
them accurate:
Message and Mess Age,
Massage and Mass Age.
-- "And others".
Marshall McLuhan argues that technologies — from clothing to the wheel to
the book, and beyond — are the messages themselves, not the content of the
medium.
"We can call them _massages_, rather than _messages_, since they
'communicate' via the body."
In essence, The Medium is the Massage is a graphical and creative
representation of his "medium is the message" thesis seen in Understanding
Media.
By playing on words and utilizing the term "massage," McLuhan is
suggesting that modern audiences have found current media to be soothing,
enjoyable,
and relaxing."
"There is a lot to be said about massaging -- but I won't" -- he disclosed
in a recent interview with "Der Spiegel".
However, the pleasure we find in new media is deceiving, as the changes
between society and technology are incongruent and are perpetuating an Age of
Anxiety.
All media work us over completely. They are so pervasive in their
personal, political, economic, aesthetic, psychological, moral, ethical, and
social
consequences that they leave no part of us untouched, unaffected,
unaltered.
The Medium is the Massage demonstrates how modern media are extensions of
human senses.
"The use of 'sense' is sometimes nonsensical -- as in the work of Thomas of
Aquinas --, but sometimes it ain't," McLuhan joked.
They ground us in physicality, but expand our ability to perceive our world
to an extent that would be impossible without the media.
Media, medium, message, massageS.
These extensions of perception contribute to McLuhan’s theory of the Global
Village, which would bring humanity full circle to an industrial analogue
of tribal mentality.
"By calling it 'village', I'm using a diminutive".
McLuhan described key points of change in how man has viewed the world and
how these views were changed by the adoption of new media.
"The technique of invention was the discovery of the nineteenth [century]",
brought on by the adoption of fixed points of view and perspective by
typography, while "[t]he technique of the suspended judgment is the discovery
of the twentieth century", brought on by the bard abilities of radio, movies
and television."
"And the technique of _massage_ is essentially a French [thing]."
Fiore, at the time a prominent graphic designer and communications
consultant, set about composing the visual illustration of these effects which
were compiled by Jerome Agel.
Near the beginning of the book, Fiore adopted a pattern in which an image
demonstrating a media effect was presented with a textual synopsis on the
facing page. The reader experiences a repeated shifting of analytic registers—
from "reading" typographic print to "scanning" photographic facsimiles—
reinforcing McLuhan's overarching argument in this book: namely, that each
medium produces a different "massage" or "effect" on the human sensorium."
"All massages should be applied on the sensorium," he argued
(conclusively).
An audio recording based on the book was made by Columbia Records in the
late 1960s, produced by John Simon but otherwise keeping the same credits as
the book. The recording consists of a pastiche, for the clavichord, of
statements made by McLuhan interrupted by other speakers, including people
speaking in various phonations and falsettos, discordant sounds and 1960s
incidental music in what could be considered a deliberate attempt to translate
the disconnected images seen on TV into an audio format, resulting in the
prevention of a connected stream of conscious thought.
"It was fun to make it," Renee Fleming commented.
Various audio recording techniques and statements are used to illustrate
the relationship between spoken, literary speech and the characteristics of
electronic audio media. McLuhan biographer Philip Marchand called the
recording "the 1967 equivalent of a McLuhan video."
"I wouldn't be seen dead with a living work of art."
– Old man speaking
"Drop this jiggery-pokery and talk straight turkey."
– Middle aged man speaking[clarification needed -- or not].
Cheers,
Speranza
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