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Marshall McLuhan

Marshall McLuhan Quotes

Philosopher

Marshall McLuhan was a renowned Canadian philosopher, communication theorist, and media theorist whose theories had a profound impact on modern media and communication technologies. His famous 'The Medium is the Message' theory, among others, has influenced the fields of advertising, film, television, and the internet.

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Famous Marshall McLuhan Quotes

“Any loss of identity prompts people to seek reassurance and rediscovery of themselves by testing, and even by violence. Today, the electric revolution, the wired planet, and the information environment involve everybody in everybody to the point of individual extinction.”

People Today Individual Loss Environment Violence Information Identity Planets Revolution Electric Testing Extinction Prompts Reassurance Rediscovery Loss Of Identity

Author:Marshall McLuhan

“Today, the mass audience (the successor to the "public") can be used as a creative, participating force. It is, instead, merely given packages of passive entertainment. Politics offers yesterday's answers to today's questions.”

Today Used Politics Given Force Answers Audience Creative Offers Mass Entertainment Yesterday Passive Packages Participating Successors

Book:The medium is the massage: an inventory of effects

Source: The medium is the massage: an inventory of effects

“Today's child is growing up absurd, because he lives in two worlds, and neither of them inclines him to grow up. Growing up--thatis our new work, and it is total. Mere instruction will not suffice.”

World Children Two Today Grows Education Growing Up Growing Childhood Mere Absurd Instruction Two Worlds Incline New Work

Book:The medium is the massage: an inventory of effects

Source: The medium is the massage: an inventory of effects

“"Work" does not exist in a nonliterate world. The primitive hunter or fisherman did no work, any more than does the poet, painter, or thinker of today. Where the whole man is involved there is no work.”

Men World Doe Whole Today Poet Involved Painter Thinker Primitive Hunters Fisherman

Book:Understanding media: the extensions of man

Source: Understanding media: the extensions of man

“Our Age of Anxiety is, in great part, the result of trying to do today's job with yesterday's tools and yesterday's concepts.”

Trying Age Today Jobs Results Anxiety Concepts Tools Yesterday Birthday 60th Birthday

Author:Marshall McLuhan

“Today the tyrant rules not by club or fist, but disguised as a market researcher, he shepherds his flocks in the ways of utility and comfort.”

Way Hands Today Business Comfort Clubs Deception Tyrants Fists Utility Flocks Shepherds Researchers

Author:Marshall McLuhan

“Today it is not the classroom nor the classics which are the repositories of models of eloquence, but the ad agencies.”

Today Models Agency Ads Classroom Eloquence

Author:Marshall McLuhan

“Great art speaks a language which every intelligent person can understand. The people who call themselves modernists today speak a different language.”

People Persons Art Different Today Speak Language Intelligent Great Art Different Languages Intelligent Person

Author:Marshall McLuhan

“Today we are beginning to notice that the new media are not just mechanical gimmicks for creating worlds of illusion, but new languages with new and unique powers of expression.”

World Today Language Media Expression Creating Unique Illusion Gimmicks New Media Creating Worlds

Author:Marshall McLuhan

“Mysticism is just tomorrow's science dreamed today.”

Today Tomorrow Mysticism

Author:Marshall McLuhan

“Language as the technology of human extension, whose powers of division and separation we know so well, may have been the "Tower of Babel" by which men sought to scale the highest heavens. Today computers hold out the promise of a means of instant tr”

Knows Men Humans Wells May Mean Has Beens Today Language Heaven Technology Promise Computer Highest Separation Scales Instant Division Towers Extensions Babel Tower Of Babel

Author:Marshall McLuhan

“Today's child is bewildered when he enters the 19th century environment that still characterizes the educational establishment where information is scarce but ordered and structured by fragmented, classified patterns subjects, and schedules.”

Children Stills Today Environment Subjects Century Information Patterns Educational Establishment Schedules Scarce 19th Century Bewildered Fragmented

Book:The medium is the massage: an inventory of effects

Source: The medium is the massage: an inventory of effects

“Politics offers yesterday's answers to today's problems.”

Problem Today Answers Offers Yesterday

Author:Marshall McLuhan

“The young today cannot follow narrative but they are alert to drama. They cannot bear description but they love landscape and action.”

Today Action Young Bears Drama Landscape Narrative Description

Book:Letters of Marshall McLuhan

Source: Letters of Marshall McLuhan

About the Author

Born: July 21, 1911
Died: December 31, 1980
Known for: Philosopher
Quotes: 398

Related Topics

Media Men Technology World Art Environment Form People Information Humans Space Electric Mediums Way Patterns Social Age Ifs Today Artist

Popular Topics

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Books & Sources

Understanding media: the extensions of manRelated source material

The medium is the massage: an inventory of effectsRelated source material

Letters of Marshall McLuhanRelated source material

The Gutenberg Galaxy: The Making of Typographic ManRelated source material

Media Research: Technology, Art and CommunicationRelated source material

Counter blast [by] Marshall McLuhanRelated source material

The Gutenberg GalaxyRelated source material

The Medium and the Light: Reflections on Religion and MediaRelated source material

Culture Is Our BusinessRelated source material

The Medium and the Light: Reflections on ReligionRelated source material

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