Exploring Space with McLuhan: Insights for the Digital Age (SpringerBriefs in Applied Sciences and Technology)

This book investigates the spatial relations between digital media and society, relying on Marshall McLuhan’s probes into the effects of communication technology.It argues that McLuhan’s ideas may be relevant to understanding how contemporary space, digital media, and society adapt to one another.This aim is pursued in three steps. First, McLuhan’s media theory is discussed with a focus on the effects of media in structuring the conditions of space perception at both the individual and the social levels.The concepts of visual and acoustic space are examined in relation to mechanical and electric media, respectively.Second, McLuhan’s lifelong interest in the city as a learning environment is contrasted with his claim that cities are obsolete vis-à-vis the global village of instant electronic communication.The contradiction is more apparent than real, as McLuhan imagined a future for cities as programmed environments for the sensory training of citizens and actively engaged in discussion