Blog Post 5 & 6

1. “Schizophrenia may be a necessary consequence of literacy”

I believe this entry in  Gutenberg Galaxy, highlights the idea that due to literacy we have created people with a split personality. But in this creation the two personalities thrive off of one another. Sound and word, coexisting to create the ultimate hell. “By the intellect and along another by the passions, with the imagination to conceive heaven and the wilful self-assertion that creates hell.” A hell in which there are two realities. One that is heard and one that is read. These two realities are divided by phonetics and grammatical constructs that decide which personality takes higher precedence within the individual or community.

2. “Typographic logic created THE OUTSIDER, the alienated man, as the type of integral, that is intuitive and IRRATIONAL, man.”

This entry is an outcry to the epidemic of visual conformity. Man has long aimed to be different but with the Typographic logic of concision and clarity they alienate anyone who is not homogenized. This likeness casts those who do not conform to be pariahs. Although, women were the last to be transformed by the civilized man, she has now taken over the ambush and leads the way into creating absurd visual propaganda for other woman to follow. Appearances, conformity and respectability are all key words when understanding the new electric media age.

3. “The Technology and the Society”

Williams tells us in an elaborate, detailed, document how much society has changed technology and the influences on it that we have. The example of the television is justification of that statement. The television was an invention that resulted from scientific and technical research. We would however change this technology into a facility for entertainment that alters family, culture and even social life.  William goes onto to mention how the television has generated a man that functions on a character of the television; broadcasting. An epidemic as he describes it because as the years pass the fundamentals of this technology is lost and replaced with the character that is now so deeply established. The television was an outlet for educational purposes and now is used to facilitate the new social constructs of this time and age.

4. “What is the Meaning of the Medium in the Message”

Federman addressed the thoughts that McLuhan had on the medium and the message. Two concepts that are misunderstood, intertwined, or taken to mean the less or more. The message is simply what is learned and not what it told. What we take away from a play being an emotion or change in attitude is the message. The medium on the other hand is an extension of ourselves like ” a hammer to the arm”. The medium of language extends our thoughts from our minds. It is in the explanation that the audience comes to learn that the medium is the message. Meaning the creation of our thoughts through the medium of our language created a message of change. The creation correlated to the causation. This explanation goes on to explain that the importance of knowing the medium in the message is understanding the circumstances of a new message and the effects of the new medium.

5. The connection

These four readings connect through their coinciding theme of the effect language has on society or so it may seem at first glance. I think there is an even bigger picture and that picture paints the idea that we invent these technologies such as, writing, and languages with the hope that they will influence us but in turn we influence them and alter their meaning and intended purposes. We use them for the destruction of our cultures, families, and societal values.  And in a strange turn of events they then become the dictators and we are enslaved to the alterations we have made to them.

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One Response to Blog Post 5 & 6

  1. 1. What are the larger implications of schizophrenic as a consequence of literacy?
    2. Literacy creates the alien, the nonhuman human. This is what I was getting at in class the other day, remember? When we were talking “uncivilized people” and monsters such as Jeffrey Dahmer.
    3. I would like to see your connection elaborated more.
    For what you have here, though, without class discussing, pretty awesome thinking.

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