"The Medium is the Message"

Marshall McLuhan was a communications theorist who coined the phrase "the medium is the message" is his book, Understanding Media. This expression has been the topic of great discussion amongst other communications theorists throughout the years, and for good reason. McLuhan’s message is deceptively complex, as well as easily misinterpreted. According to Mark Federman’s article, aptly titled “What is the Meaning of The Medium is the Message,” McLuhan “meant what he said,” meaning that he had a very clear view on what is meant when he says that the medium is the message.
Here is my take on what I think McLuhan meant by his phrase. McLuhan starts with what he calls “the medium.” While some communications theorists may define a medium as a television set or radio, something through which individuals receive various forms of media, McLuhan significantly broadens the definition. According to Federman, McLuhan tells us that a medium is “any extension of ourselves.” More specifically, a medium is an extension of our body or mind that achieves something that our body and mind cannot complete otherwise. The classic examples mentioned in the article explain how a hammer extends our arms and that the wheel extends our legs and feet. Other examples include glasses that help us read when we would otherwise have difficulty reading, and light bulbs that enable us to see in the dark. More media-centered examples include our cell phones, e-mail service, and even language. The only other qualifier McLuhan places on what a medium is, is that in needs to be something from which a change emerges. While McLuhan’s definition of “the medium” may be broad, it is still specific enough to always apply to how the medium is the message, and still open enough to be timeless.
The message is also another term that must be defined before the phrase can be fully understood. While it is a common reaction to believe that the content or use of the medium is what is meant by the message, this is not true. Again, Federman’s article explains that a message is the change that the medium introduces to our society. The examples given explain how the message of a theatrical production is not the content of the production, but perhaps the change in tourism that the production may encourage, as well as how the message of a newscast is not the stories they broadcast, but how the audience’s attitudes toward crime and weather change.
So now that our terms our defined, we can complete our understanding of what is meant by the phrase, “the medium is the message.” While we tend to look at the content of media as what affects us the most, it is the process through which media reaches us that dictate how we change in society. With this understanding of McLuhan’s words, we are now able to see examples that support his theory. And perhaps the greatest example of what McLuhan meant relates to the idea of technological determinism—the idea that technology determines the patterns and development of our culture and society.
For example, television itself has been condemned for its effects on young children. Activists claim that television promotes laziness, ignorance, and apathy, all based on the time consuming characteristics of television. Regardless of the content of what is on TV, its ease of access and ability to suck viewers in for hours at a time is what has been deemed responsible for things such as childhood obesity and poor school performance. More specifically, a multitude of shows on the air cater to viewers by cramming in as much new and exciting material as possible. Whether it is "Sesame Street," rapidly switching from Elmo’s world to the letter of the day, or "Punk’d," changing the camera angle or filter every few seconds, producers seem to take advantage of every possible way to keep its audience’s attention. While some may say that it is our lowered attention span that has driven producers to make their shows that way, McLuhan would be more inclined to say that it is because of these shows that coddle our attention span that make us much less eager to pay attention to things outside of television.
Still, the effects of the medium as the message and technological determinism are not always negative. As more shows such as Lost and Heroes emerge, a lot of emphasis has been on complicated story lines happening on multiple time lines, most often with subtle character interactions between story/time lines. Even movies such as Memento, a movie in which black and white scenes occurring in chronological order are shuffled between colored scenes occurring in reverse-chronological order, have become more complex in how they share their story. Even the menu for the DVD is arranged as a psychological test containing random images. As a result, a vast majority of society’s minds have been trained to keep track of such complicated plots and story lines.
While McLuhan tries to convince us that it is the mediums that shape who we are individually and as a society, I believe that it is important to understand that it is not just technology that determines our lives. Human nature is a very important thing to for advertisers of commercials, writers for TV and the movies, and other producers who work through mediums to fully comprehend. I think that humanistic desire for knowledge and pleasure are ultimately what drive the producers to develop their creations in the manner that they do.
Producers know that audiences are tired of simple story lines, so they begin to delve into more complex plots and characters. Some of the most enjoyable movies are the ones that don’t mock the audience’s intelligence by ‘dumbing things down.’ And I don’t believe that TV shows that didn’t make every attempt to keep my attention would be nearly as amusing, or commercials that didn’t try to sell me their products would be nearly as convincing. McLuhan himself says in his essay, “Understanding Radio,” that it was the petitions of radio advocates such as amateur operators/hams and their fans that eventually drove to the formation of radio facilities. Also, in the Kennedy-Nixon debate, those who heard it on the radio believed that Nixon won in a landslide, but those who viewed the televised debate were convinced Kennedy looked much more confident and handsome compared to Nixon’s unhealthy awkwardness. Perhaps McLuhan would argue that it was the medium of the television that lost Nixon the election, but I would argue that it was the preparation and make-up that gave Kennedy the upper hand. Basically, mediums are made for people, so it is important to give its creators some credit for how it affects society, and not just the medium itself
When it comes down to it, McLuhan’s phrase, “the medium is the message” is somewhat of a ‘which came first, the chicken or the egg?’ dilemma. We can either say that as producers of mediums may have their content in mind, they cannot predict the ground—which is comprised of the things that we don’t notice immediately yet still change the structure of our affairs—or we can say that producers of mediums develop their creations in the manner that best attempts to keep the audience’s reactions in mind.