Talk:Marshall McLuhan/Archive 2

Bob Dobbs influence
Marshall McLuhan's influence on Bob Dobbs is notable. I am trying to get the article restored. See the deletion review log for more info and to add your vote/comments. Thanks. -Eep² 06:56, 2 May 2007 (UTC)

Tetrad etc removed sections
I disagree with removing McL's concepts (like the tetrad) completely from his article and making them separate articles. I have no problem with longer disquisitions in separate articles in principle, but then there must be at least a short explanation in the main article of each item and a pointer in that section to the detailed article. "See also" isn't enough. I don't have time right now to look at how to fix it, but I think it needs to be. And I'm not sure why it was felt that these sections needed to be forked off - I don't think the article is overly long (you have to check "readable prose" - which I will do this evening), and the article flowed well, in my opinion, before the fork-off. So my instinct is to reinstate the removed sections. Tvoz | talk 18:50, 7 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Sorry, Tvoz -- that was me who removed the sections when adding content, in response to the message on the edit page saying, "This page is 52 kilobytes long. It may be appropriate to split this article into smaller, more specific articles. See Wikipedia:Article size." However, if you're convinced that these particular sections belong in the main article, I'm not disagreeable to their being moved back. Let's talk about it, if you like. Cordially; --Smobri 19:29, 7 May 2007 (UTC)
 * I checked - with the tetrad etc sections included it's only about 35K of "readable prose" which means it's not too long. I favor reinstating those sections. See Article size for an explanation of size guidelines - and they are only guidelines.  The tetrad was the most inmportant piece of work Marshall did in his later years and I think it hsould be back in the main article.  The forked off piece could then be expanded with examples, more explanation, etc.  Same would apply to other sections of this article that had been forked off - if they were central to McLuhan's work they should reinstated . We don't have to be concerned at this point about length - the size indication you get at edit includes material that is not counted toward length guidelines. Tvoz | talk 15:44, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

also hot and cool
I also agree with the proposed merger of the stub Hot and cool media back into this article - all material that was there is here where it appropriately belongs. This is McLuhan's concept, closely associated with him. As explained above, the readable prose here is not excessive, so there is no reason for this fork-off. Tvoz | talk 20:40, 15 May 2007 (UTC)
 * The content of "hot and cool media" seems to have disappeared, rather than to have been merged into the McLuhan article. --Smobri 14:12, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
 * No, please take another look - I merged all of the content into this article yesterday before doing the redirect. There is a subsection with the "hot and cool" heading under Understanding Media - I made it a subsection rather than just reincoproating the text  because I think it is important that it be a Table of Contents entry - you can't have an article about McLuhan and not have an easy to find entry on hot and cool -  and UM is the right place for it.  The separate article had no other information in it, so it is now a redirect.  Tvoz | talk 17:25, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
 * I see it there now; don't know how I missed it before! --Smobri 13:31, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * No prob. Tvoz | talk 03:35, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Missouri?
Why is the McL article listed in the Missouri project? He did go to school there, but it was not an important part of his life or achievements? Missouri could do better -- for example, Mark McGwire. Bellagio99 19:01, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Removing memetics category
I am removing the memetics category from this article since you learn no more about the article's contents from the category and v.v. Since so many things may be memes we should try to keep the category closely defined in order to remain useful. Hope you're okay with that. The link to meme would be enough I suggest. Facius 11:46, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Catholic institutions
After 1937, when he converted, he taught only at Catholic institutions - Assumption, Saint Louis, and St Michael's of the University of Toronto where he remained for the rest of his life. St Mike's was his affiliation at the University of Toronto throughout his career there, including while being the head of the Centre. Also there was the year at Fordham, a Jesuit institution. I don't know why that setence was removed, but I reinstated it. Tvoz | talk 01:44, 18 August 2007 (UTC)

Stroke > Death
Could someone with access to a good biography check the dates here? I clearly recall seeing Marshall for Several Years walking around Toronto, silent from his stroke. Yet the current WP article says it was only from 9/79 to 1/80.

Here is the way the stroke > death sequence exists in the current article:


 * "In September 1979 he suffered a stroke, which affected his ability to speak. The University of Toronto's School of Graduate Studies tried to close his research center shortly thereafter, but was deterred by substantial protests.... He died in his sleep on New Year's Eve of 1980."


 * Bellagio99 13:06, 18 August 2007 (UTC)


 * Just saw this. His stroke was in September 1979 and he died December 31, 1980 (New Year's Eve 1980-81) Tvoz | talk 17:39, 10 October 2007 (UTC)

"From Cliché to Archetype" (1970) and beyond
I'm working on a section dealing with McLuhan's book From Cliché to Archetype to add to his theoretical framework, which I think it builds upon.

This whole article so far, like many expositions on McLuhan to date, tends to put emphasis his 60's period, and do not go far, if at all; into his later 70's works. It is like an untamed wilderness, and it doesn't really help that most of those, are in fact, out of print. No doubt this phenomenon is connected to his decline in notoriety (which is controversial in itself, probably worth an entire section to add to his biography later) after the 60's ended, but he still continued to expand his theoretical framework, even during his rough later years.

One day, I'm also even hoping to add a section on McLuhan's last book before his death, Take Today: The Executive as Dropout (1972).

I have access to both books, however. I will cite them justly.

So bearing that in mind, I just wanted to know, is there going to be a notability dispute for a certain section of a body of work by a person of Wikipedia-approved notability, simply because they suffered a decline in notoriety in their later years or otherwise?

--Monsquaz 15:49, 10 October 2007 (UTC)


 * I would strenuously argue in favor of inclusion of material about his later work. Take Today is a great book, as was City as Classroom (which actually was after Take Today) and the article will benefit from a look at them. Tvoz | talk 17:44, 10 October 2007 (UTC)
 * There, just added it. I look forward to the fine-tuning required, particularly when it comes to discussing the "doubleness" or hendiadys-dialogue between cliché and archetype. That is still kicking my ass. Mind you; I'm still actually reading the book, myself. --Monsquaz 21:32, 15 October 2007 (UTC)

The can of worms regarding McLuhan's notability
I'd very much like to probe deeper on some things I was mentioning in my question about adding details about McLuhan's later works to the article.

McLuhan said himself, "only puny secrets need protection. Big discoveries are protected by public incredulity."

I think what that means is a lot more heinous or unusual things can occur at smaller scales, but what more is that the total environment/"big picture" that causes those sorts of thing to happen, remains unbelieved by larger scales of people.

Now, there is a huge can of worms regarding this article, and McLuhan himself, that relates to this probe. Like I said before in my previous thread, McLuhan continued to build upon his body of work after the 60s. But how many people other than some very enthusiastic readers of his work, or tighter-knit McLuhan scholars could have known about anything like the "global theater," which was supposed to take priority over the global village?

There is an often undiscussed convention that he suffered a decline in notoriety after the 1960s ended. Up to that point, he was controversial anyway, and was known to write privately about some of the "punier secrets" that might have caused his public decline.

However, demonstrated at least with what I added so far about From Cliché to Archetype, I think there is more to his body of work than what was popular in the 60s (and more recently, thanks to Wired's revival), even though most of his writings other than the 'big five' (Mechanical Bride, Gutenberg Galaxy, Understanding Media, The Medium is the Massage, and War and Peace in the Global Village) are out-of-print and largely considered somewhat to be rehashes of those.

That "public incredulity" he talked about seems to keep heavy work on this article from moving forward.

So, is McLuhan really notable enough for Wikipedia? Why?

If he is, as he currently seems to be, we should not fail to mention that we should also be working on more than just chronicling the concepts he discussed. Is Wikipedia and its style rules even equipped to adequately offer more than a fragmented view of this man and his ideas, without the process blowing up into a flame war about whether he was 'legitimate,' or a "honkie bullshitter"?

"Today, the multimedia have, as noted, demobilized consciousness. We speak of a lie as "credibility gap." "Truth" becomes trust, not Cartesian certainty."

I'd like to hear some other peoples' ideas/probes. Unless, of course, this subject is better suited for a research paper than a Wikipedia talk page (I'm sure it could work well either way, though).

--Monsquaz 21:22, 31 October 2007 (UTC)


 * With all respect, I think this is a subject for a research paper. The talk page is to discuss improvements to the article, not to do what is clearly original research.  There's not even a single worm, let alone a can, regarding McLuhan's notability and whether there should be an article about him. He's one of the most famous scholars of the twentieth century, had a tremendous impact on the popular culture during his lifetime and since his death, and whether or not his fame was evenly distributed throughout his life, his notability is clear.   Tvoz | talk 00:32, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
 * No problem. I do see I am getting in over my head in the wrong place with this subject. It just seems a debate over McLuhan's notability/"legitimacy" (hey, am I getting any closer with the hendiadys?) comes up every now and then in the resonant interval, you know? I was probing with that. I will keep in mind what you said, though. --Monsquaz 14:33, 1 November 2007 (UTC)

List to prose
Please turn the following lists into prose and add it back into the article, preferably merged into relevant sections. &mdash;Viriditas | Talk 12:06, 5 November 2007 (UTC)


 * In 1987, Oxford University Press published the 550-page Letters of Marshall McLuhan. Two biographies have been published -one by Philip Marchand in 1989 and the other by W. Terrence Gordon in 1997. His work has been discussed in numerous other books (see Biographical Works below).


 * On March 27-28, 1998, Fordham University sponsored a symposium on the Legacy of McLuhan, who had taught at Fordham for one year in the 1960s. In 2005, Hampton Press published papers from the symposium as the book The Legacy of McLuhan, edited by Lance Strate and Edward Wachtel.


 * In 2000, the government of Canada honoured McLuhan with his image on a postage stamp.


 * In 2002 the National Film Board of Canada created a video documentary called McLuhan's Wake. It was directed by Kevin McMahon and narrated by Laurie Anderson with quotes by Eric McLuhan, Neil Postman and others. The video illustrates the tetrad concept and uses Edgar Allan Poe's short story "A Descent into the Maelström" as background context.


 * In 2004, the University of Chicago Press noted that Marshall McLuhan and Walter Ong today "enjoy the status of honorary guru[s] among technophiles."


 * Also in 2004, McLuhan's alma mater, the University of Manitoba, dedicated Marshall McLuhan Hall in his honor.


 * The section of St. Joseph Street running through the University of St. Michael's College in Toronto is co-named "Marshall McLuhan Way".


 * In 2006 the biographical film McLuhan Way: In Search of Truth was created by Masterworks Productions in Toronto. Written, directed and produced by filmmaker, Deiren Masterson. Eric McLuhan provides interviews and the voice of his father, with interviews by his biographer Philip Marchand, colleague Robert Logan, Fr. Robert Madden, and Marshall's youngest son, Michael. Once dubbed the 'guru' of the electric age, McLuhan was also a Catholic convert. The film explores the faith that drove McLuhan as he challenged modern society and his Church to understand the enormous changes happening to them both.


 * Marshall McLuhan Catholic Secondary School in Toronto is named after him.

In popular culture
As a result of the enormous publicity McLuhan received in the early 1960s, references to him began to appear in the popular culture. Some examples:


 * The late-1960s television program Laugh-In featured Goldie Hawn or Henry Gibson reciting a couplet from time to time, "Marshall McLuhan, what are ya doin'?".


 * He is mentioned in the song Broadway Melody of 1974 by progressive rock band Genesis, featured on their 1974 album The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway. The lyrics read: "Marshall McLuhan, casual viewin', head buried in the sand."


 * He is mentioned in the song title Remarks To Mr. McLuhan written by singer-songwriter Mark Heard, featured on his independently released 1980 album Fingerprint.


 * Toward the end of his life, McLuhan made a renowned cameo appearance as himself in Woody Allen's 1977 movie Annie Hall, in which Alvy Singer (Allen's character) presents McLuhan to show up a Columbia professor who was trying to impress his date by discussing McLuhan's work, but getting it all wrong. Singer confronts the pretentious scholar, saying that his statements about McLuhan are wrong.  The professor defends himself by claiming he is an expert in McLuhan's teachings and demands what Singer has in his favor to rebut him.  Singer calmly notes he has Marshall McLuhan himself and he immediately reaches out of the camera frame to pull in the media scholar who corrects the professor and scornfully declares, "You know nothing of my work: you mean my whole fallacy is wrong. How you ever got to teach a course in anything is totally amazing." Singer comments on the ludicrously convenient situation by breaking the fourth wall with the classic line, "Oh, if life were only like this!" Woody captured an important aspect of McLuhan's personality in this line; according to some of his biographers, McLuhan was fond of telling his students and others that they simply did not understand him, no matter how much of his work they had studied.


 * The band Radio Free Vestibule have a song titled "The Ballad of Marshall McLuhan", which is in country-western style and features McLuhan as the hero who rides into town to bring order. The verses feature him interjecting into arguments about media and culture.


 * In the film The Doors, Jim Morrison, played by Val Kilmer, is seen reading "Understanding Media."


 * In the 1975 novel by Edward Abbey, The Monkey Wrench Gang, Doc, after viewing a commercial for Exxon Mobile, becomes enraged kicking in the television screen and declaring, "Thus I refute McLuhan."

Allusions to McLuhan and his ideas continue, years after his death:


 * David Cronenberg, a former student of McLuhan, lampoons his teacher in the 1983 film Videodrome. McLuhan's character, "Professor Brian O'Blivion", issued such memorable quotes as: "the television screen has become the retina of the mind's eye", "I refuse to appear on television, except on television" and "television is reality and reality is less than television."


 * During the late 1990s, the Canadian rock band 54-40 initially titled their sixth release for EMI Records Canada "Marshall McLuhan, Casual Viewin", but were forced to change it due to copyright infringement.


 * McLuhan was mentioned in the second season of The Sopranos, in the episode "House Arrest", which aired March 26, 2000. Junior gets a visit in the hospital from Michael McLuhan, a U.S. Marshal.  The nurse asks if his name is really 'Marshal' McLuhan.  Junior wonders what the "joke" is.


 * The first starship to Alpha Centauri in Paul Levinson's 2001 novel, Borrowed Tides, is named the "The Light Through", after one of McLuhan's key concepts; Levinson's podcast show (began 2006) is entitled Light On Light Through.


 * In the third episode of the Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex (the TV series based on the manga Ghost in the Shell) a hacker is responsible for the mass suicide of model GA07_JL cyborgs; he is the son of the Canadian Ambassador, whose name is Marshall McLuhan.


 * In Mtv's show "Daria", in the episode "Jane's Addition" McLuhan's last name appears in the classroom's blackboard when the teacher is describing a multi-media project they must turn in.

Criticism from Raymond Williams
I fail to see how this unsourced, dated criticism from 1974 is either notable or relevant to McLuhan. Perhaps if the criticism addresses McLuhan's actual concepts it would be notable. Deleted content reproduced below. &mdash;Viriditas | Talk 12:14, 5 November 2007 (UTC)
 * McLuhan's work has been criticized by specialists in mass communication. For example, Raymond Williams criticizes his theory of technology. In Television: Technology and Cultural Form (1974) he argues that McLuhan does not give enough attention to the social conditions that produce scientific discovery and technological changes. McLuhan's work also says little about large corporations that own and control mass media.

Fair use rationale for Image:Gutenafbasf.jpg
Image:Gutenafbasf.jpg is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

Please go to the image description page and edit it to include a fair use rationale. Using one of the templates at Fair use rationale guideline is an easy way to insure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy, but remember that you must complete the template. Do not simply insert a blank template on an image page.

If there is other fair use media, consider checking that you have specified the fair use rationale on the other images used on this page. Note that any fair use images lacking such an explanation can be deleted one week after being tagged, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you.

BetacommandBot (talk) 14:38, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:Medeasfhsdl.jpg
Image:Medeasfhsdl.jpg is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

Please go to the image description page and edit it to include a fair use rationale. Using one of the templates at Fair use rationale guideline is an easy way to insure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy, but remember that you must complete the template. Do not simply insert a blank template on an image page.

If there is other fair use media, consider checking that you have specified the fair use rationale on the other images used on this page. Note that any fair use images lacking such an explanation can be deleted one week after being tagged, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you.

BetacommandBot (talk) 20:02, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

middle ages were/was
Could someone acquainted with British English (or the WP MoS) weigh in on whether the Middle Ages would be a single thing? I'd hate to be ethnocentrically insisting on a verb form that is incorrect. --Newsroom hierarchies (talk) 14:54, 14 May 2008 (UTC)


 * 'The Middle Ages' is a collection of years (year is a noun), and as such can be treated as a plural in British English. It is also a single period of time, and as such would be treated as singular in American English but for the fact that it takes the plural form. That's what I glean from this. Regards, Mannafredo (talk) 16:03, 14 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Well, the Middle Ages page treats it as a plural with corresponding verb forms, so maybe you're right. I'm really just curious now as to what the definitive answer is. --Newsroom hierarchies (talk) 16:11, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

The figure is not the medium, or is it?
I recently did some reading in the concept of Figure and Ground in McLuhan's work. I think the wikipedia entry is somehow misleading on this topic because it correlates figure with the medium. Yet, on the page that is referenced to support this we can find a quote of McLuhan stating the following: "…the ground of any technology is both the situation that gives rise to it as well as the whole environment (medium) of services and disservices that the technology brings with it. These are side-effects and impose themselves willy-nilly as a new form of culture" (McLuhan, Laws of Media, p. 475).

Anybody any thoughts on this topic? If nobody raises any objections, I will go ahead and change it accordingly in a couple of days. Bumatic (talk) 07:08, 24 June 2009 (UTC)

Template/influences
As I have expressed to User:Tvoz, this edit was incorrect and should be reverted. Just because the information is incomplete does not mean that the extant informaton should be removed. If Tvoz doesn't like the template, he should discuss it on the template talk page. &mdash; goethean &#2384; 20:56, 7 August 2009 (UTC)

Turn on, tune in, drop out
What about mentioning that he coined this phrase too?  Tu rk ey ph an t 11:59, 9 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Did it, man Straw Cat (talk) 02:51, 16 December 2010 (UTC)