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Method is the Message

Rethinking McLuhan Through Critical Theory

Paul Grosswiler

McLuhan's theories are re-emerging in post-modern, cultural/critical media and social theory. Drawing on an earlier radicalism, this book looks at the McLuhan legacy and finds a common foundation between Marx's dialectics and McLuhan's communications theory. Paul Grosswiler examines McLuhan's work in the light of Jean Baudrillard, Umberto Eco, James Carey, architect Charles Jencks, and critical historian Donald Lowe.

"...a profoundly intelligent and original fusion of McLuhan and Marx...Grosswiler has read everything and missed nothing...With this book McLuhan's position as an ingenious innovator in critical, cultural and postmodern theory is restored."James W. Carey, CBS Professor of International Journalism, Columbia University

"In this bold departure from conventional neo-Marxist rejections of McLuhan, Grosswiler demonstrates the relevance of McLuhan's work for critical thinking about media and cultural change. The book's provocative thesis that McLuhan and Marx employed similar dialectical methods will certainly ignite controversy on all sides of the political and intellectual spectrum."Liss Jeffrey, Executive Producer, The McLuhan Program in Culture and Technology, University of Toronto

"...makes a compelling argument that McLuhan has a great deal to offer critical communication scholars. This thoughtful book should be read carefully by students of communication everywhere."Robert McChesney, Associate Professor of Journalism and Mass Communication, University of Wisconsin

"Grosswiler has made an important contribution to the ongoing McLuhan renaissance in communications studies, demonstrating McLuhan's relevance for critical theory and cultural studies. McLuhan strikes many media historians as perverse; this book reminds us why he's also so damned interesting. It is must reading for anyone interested in the broad contours of communications history."John Nerone, Professor of Communications, University of Illinois

Table of Contents
Introduction
Chapter 1: Synthesizing McLuhan and Marx; Comparing Methods
Chapter 2: McLuhan's Understanding of Marx; Dismissing Marx and His Method; McLuhan's Extended Comment on Marx
Chapter 3: Marxism's Understanding of McLuhan; Assessing McLuhan's Social Theory; Marxists Cast Out McLuhan; Marxist Art Historian: Another View; A Recent Canadian Perspective
Chapter 4: Understanding Dialectics; References to McLuhan and Dialectics; What is Dialectics?; Marx's Dialectics; Dialectics as a Method; Applying Dialectics in History and Politics; Marx's Dialectics in Postmodernism
Chapter 5: Understanding McLuhans Method; Media as Hybrid Energy; The Four Laws of the Media
Chapter 6: McLuhans Critical Media and Culture Galaxies; Civilization and Its Contents; Dialectic of Visual and Acoustic Arts; Modern Mass Media in the Galaxies
Chapter 7: McLuhan and the Frankfurt School; A Critical Theory Perspective on the Media; Comparing McLuhan and the Frankfurt Theorists; McLuhan and Benjamin; McLuhan, Horkheimer, and Adorno
Chapter 8: McLuhan and Cultural Studies; Rejection of McLuhan Transformed; McLuhan Reappears in Cultural Studies; Saving the Baby from the Bath Water; Canadian Cultural Studies and McLuhan
Chapter 9: McLuhan and Postmodernism; A Natural Affinity; What is Postmodernism?; Postmodernism and Cultural Studies; McLuhan and Cultural Studies Postmodern Themes; McLuhan and Baudrillard
Chapter 10: Reclaiming McLuhan for Critical Theory; Communication Theory Reacts to McLuhan; Paradigm Conflict in Media Research; Reassessing Conflict in the 1990s; Canadian Voices on McLuhan; Dialectics, Cultural Studies, and Postmodernism Today; Reclaiming McLuhan
Bibliography

About the author

Paul Grosswiler is an Associate Professor in the Department of Communication and Journalism at the University of Maine, Orono. He worked for several years as a journalist in Maine and Missouri.

COMMUNICATIONS

250 pages

Paperback ISBN: 1-55164-074-0 $24.99
Hardcover ISBN: 1-55164-075-9 $53.99