McLuhan:
Media greatly affect other things,
The
Historical Evolution
of the Media
September 22, 2022
Marshall McLuhan (1960)
- Provides a clear story on how
media evolved and define
technology determinism.
- McLuhan's theory, which
pioneered the use of 'medium' as
an object of study and placed
'form' ahead of 'content,'
- McLuhan believes that various
technologies causes social
change and “no aspect of culture
is untouched by communication
technology”.
He divided all human history into four
periods- a tribal age, literate age, print age
and an electronic age.  Marshall
McLuhan (1911-1980), Canadian
professor of literature and culture,
developed a theory of media and human
development claiming that "the medium is
the message."
Technology determinism - is a theory
that believes technology is a steering
factor in how a society develops its
structure and values.
Technology - brought a multitude
complex in political, economic, and
social changes.
Communication between families and
friends separated by geographical
hindrances is made easier and faster.
Paying bills and other banking
transactions are now made online.
Media are critical forces or compelling
influences that shape how an individual
think, feel, and act and how societies
organize themselves and operate.
resulting too many changes in the lives
of it users.
McLuhan subdivided the history
into five ages.
a. Tribal Age
b. Age of Literacy
c. Print Age
d. Electronic Age
e. New Media or Information age
A. Tribal Age (acoustic era)
- Characterized by the prevalence
of oral communication.
- The tribal age characterized oral
culture with a balance of multiple
human senses used
simultaneously, and the majority
of essential information was
communicated instantly through
the voice.
- Without human-made media
technologies, there was little
division of labor regarding human
senses
- Prehistoric people relied on face-
to-face interactions, primarily
through their auditory senses (ex.
Hearing/Speech) as a method of
communication.
- “Dominant auditory sense of life”.
- Dependent on speech and word-
of-mouth, who lives in a world of
“acoustic space”.
- An Acoustic Era- In tribal age,
senses were used. It was more
on hearing because it allows
you to be more aware of your
surroundings. You only could
see one direction. You are not
able to notice the other things
that surround you if sense of
sight is more dominant. The
means of communication is
through ears.
- McLuhan said that in this period.
The primary medium was oral
communication. The primitive
man depended on his auditory
senses for receiving information.
 The ear was the key organ.
During this epoch, the primitive
man’s knowledge largely
depended on his ability to
communicate with the tribe.
Another basic characteristic
distinguishing tribal man from his
literate successors was that he
lived in a world of acoustic space,
which gave him a radically
different concept of time-space
relationships. According to
McLuhan, Acoustic space was
space that did not have a center
or margin. It is organic and
integral, perceived through the
simultaneous interplay of all the
senses.
Acoustic space
- Is organic and integral, perceived
through the simultaneous
interplay of all senses, whereas
“rational” or pictorial space is
uniform, sequential and
continuous and creates a closed
world with none of the rich
resonance of the tribal echo land.
Ex. Use of multiple senses
B. Age of Literacy
- This is where human learned how
to read and write. This allows
people to communicate and
share information privately.
- The intensifying and amplifying
the visual function, the phonetic
Alphabet separated the visual
sense from the rich interplay with
other senses that characterized
the tribal society.
- It reduced the roles of other
primary senses of hearing, touch,
taste, and smell (McLuhan,
1969).
- Then, people Out of the sensory
balance and assigned dominance
to the eye, putting sight at the top
of the sensory hierarchy.
- Mcluhan describes the
introduction of phonetics.
- Human beings learned to read
and write (hieroglyphs).
- Members of the tribes from the
previous age were pushed from
their groups, becoming more
visual and rational.
- Use of papyrus to paper
- A Visual Point of View- Sounds
were turned into visible objects
that suddenly eyes became
most apparent and most used
among senses. The means of
communication is through
writing that allows you to
comprehend information longer
than just hearing it. The
phonetic alphabet paved the
way for the people to be freed
from tribal and be an
independent.
- McLuhan said that “phonetic
alphabet fell like a bombshell,
installing sight at the head of the
hierarchy of senses”(ibid).” The
phonetic alphabet is made up of a
few semantically meaningless
letters, which needed the tribe’s
interpretations concepts, could
represents a wide range of
information. The alphabet was a
technological breakthrough, he
said, because primitive man
could explore other lands without
being cut from the flow of
information. Words, he claimed,
created dualist between sight and
sound, rendering the eyes as the
key organ; both writer and reader
could be detached from the text.
C. Print age (industrial age)
- made it possible to reproduce the
same text repeatedly, rendering
visual dependence and private
detachment even more
 widespread as mass-produced
books further allowed the masses
to read in privacy and be isolated
from others (Sun & Zhong, 2020).
- Highlighted by the invention of
gutenberg press or movable type.
Books and papers were
produced.
- Johann Gutenberg (1394-1469)
invented the printing technology
that would eventually call the
movable type in the 15th
century.
- He invented the printing press.
- The Bible was one of
Gutenberg’s earliest and most
famous creations.
- This period was characterized by
the further dominance of visual
space and logical thinking.
- Sharing ideas become faster and
acquiring information became
easier.
- Printing Press contributed to the
nationalistic identity of the people.
- Prototype of the Industrial
Revolution- the printing press
made visual dependence
widespread as Johannes
Gutenberg invented movable
printing press. The printing
press made the mass
production of print media
possible. Printing press became
the extension of phonetic
literacy and the era got back on
using the eyes for
comprehension. However, they
are being isolated as they
gained knowledge.
- The machine was started to
developed in this epoch, the
printer. It can be noted that
McLuhan, coming from the West,
ignores the fact that printing
presses were already operating in
China by the eleventh century.
Instead, he dates the prime age
to the invention of the movable
type mechanical printing by
Johannes Gutenberg in the year
1450. For McLuhan, the printing
press was the ultimate extension
of phonetic literacy, maintaining
the predominance of the sense of
sight. It pushed out the medieval
man and paved the way for the
renaissance man, even as a
knowledge- through the written
word- no longer remained in the
hands of the few.
D. Electronic age
- new media technologies have
- been liberating and transforming
humans' sensory systems and
fulfilling their psychological and
social needs at profound levels
(McLuhan, 1969) by enacting
behaviors like multitasking.
- The dominance of media such as
telegraph, radio, film telephone
computer, and television.
- 1830s started an electronic
revolution that diminished the role
of the print media.
- Mcluhan also argued that this
electronic age “retribalized”
people by restoring their sensory
balance.
- Television was the newest form
of media
- a period characterized by the
dominance of the electric media,
such as telegraph, radio, film,
telephone, computer, and
television.
- The Rise of Global Village- The
rise of electronic media where
the printed world lost its
bearings. It became worldwide
tool. Electronic media are
widely used and now relevant
to everyone’s lives. Everyone
could gain knowledge even
without the ability to read and
write. because we can depend
on other senses. The people
became a one tribe again, a
global village.
E. New Media / Information age
 - Technological advancement 1. Affordable personal computers
profound changes in the field of 2. Digitization of information
communication and media. 3. The internet
- Improved the way how people
communicate. The Computer
- Products and services that
provides information or  Was invented in 1940’s, which
entertainment using computer or was several hundred times larger,
the internet. (Cambridge slower, and more expensive than
dictionary) the typical desktop computers
- Digitally produced as interactive, today.
and requires at least a two way  The first computers were very big
communication. that they occupied rooms and
- Products or services that provide were only affordable to the
information or entertainment government and to rich
using computers or the internet. businesses.
- The Information Age began  Today computers come as small
around the 1970s and is still as a smart watch.
going on today. It is also known
as the Computer Age, Digital Digitization of Information
Age, or New Media Age. This era
brought about a time period in  All bits of information (e.g
which people could access pictures, words, and sounds) are
information and knowledge now transformed into codes that
easily. can be easily shared across all
- Online newspapers, forms of media, with the internet.
downloadable music and video,  Almost anyone can access
bloggers, and podcasts are unlimited quantities of
among the most familiar information.
examples of new, or digital,
media. The Internet

The digital age: Rewiring the Global
Village- The more upgraded version of
media wherein it became a necessity
for every one of us. Mobile Phones’
popularity has been immense.
According to McLuhan, people are
now free from isolation. He described
the global village as where "humans
can no longer live in isolation, but
rather will always be connected by
continuous and instantaneous
electronic media."
 All other traditional media, Potter
explains, were channels to deliver
uniform, intact messages from
senders.
 New media changed this
landscape.
 It marked a major turnaround in
communication, transforming the
end users of media from being
mere”receivers” of messages into
“senders” who are also able to
CREATE content themselves.

Dr. James Potter (2008) Hot and Cool Media

He enumerated three (3) key
innovations that led to the development
of this new mass medium:
Print, photos and motion pictures are
HOT – are high definition and require
little work on part of viewer; tend to be

highly visual
COOL – cool media draw a person in, requiring high participation to fill in the blanks.
Television is cool, low-definition.