Understanding Me: Lectures and Interviews

by Herbert Marshall McLuhan, David Staines (Editor), Stephanie Mcluhan (Editor)

Unbuttoned McLuhan! An intimate exploration of Marshall McLuhan’s ideas in his own words

In the last twenty years of his life, Marshall McLuhan published – often in collaboration with others – a series of books that established his reputation as the pre-eminent seer of the modern age. It was McLuhan who made the distinction between “hot” and “cool” media. It was he who observed that “the medium is the message” and who tossed off dozens of other equally memorable phrases from “the global village” and “pattern recognition” to “feedback” and “iconic” imagery.

McLuhan was far more than a pithy-phrase maker, however. He foresaw – at a time when the personal computer was a teckie fantasy – that the world would be brought together by the internet. He foresaw the transformations that would be wrought by digital technology. He understood, before any of his contemporaries, the consequences of the revolution that television and the computer were bringing about. In many ways, we’re still catching up to him.

In Understanding Me , Stephanie McLuhan and David Staines have brought together eighteen previously unpublished lectures and interviews by or involving Marshall McLuhan. They have in common the informality and accessibility of the spoken word. In every case, the text is the transcript taken down from the film, audio, or video tape of the actual encounters – this is not what McLuhan wrote but what he said. The result is a the seer who often is thought of as aloof and obscure is shown to be funny, spontaneous, and easily understood.


From the Hardcover edition.

Genres: Nonfiction, Philosophy, Cultural

344 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2003

Reviews

[William · Rating 4 out of 5]

cold is hot, hot is cold. the medium is the message, the medium is the massage, jimmy carter has charisma because he looks like every other american boy. no wonder a man needs a guide on how to understand mcluhan and his off the wall notions. i think this here book helped. it had mcluhan telling stories at universities and at television studios and he liked to joke and say how villages are not always the nicest of places.

[Lysergius · Rating 3 out of 5]

I missed the "-dia"?

I cannot make up my mind about McLuhan. Sage or Charlatan? I find all this "speed of light" and "accoustic consciousness" a bit meaningless. We are never shown the way in which he arrived at his conclusions. There is no reasoning, just these bald statements. It all seems a bit precious now in the age of social media and the all pervasive internet. I don't believe he truly saw what was coming...

Some of his ideas such as the Cadillac with the stagecoach in the rear-view mirror seem kind of obvious when you think about them, and maybe that is the issue, his insights are profound, it is they way he tosses them around as one liners that makes it hard to take them seriously...

[Ali · Rating 3 out of 5]

The problem with an essay collection is that some will be inevitably good, while others won't suit my interests. This book is no exception. The talks or essays immortalized within are exceedingly readable, but reading them through the lens of now reminds me of the racism, cultural imperialism, problems and more that pervade the text. Still, it is a book worth reading which encapsulates much of the thought and ideas of Marshall McLuhan. I doubt I will ever reread this text, but I did enjoy aspects of reading it for a first time, as frustrated and skeptical as I occasionally was.

[Patrick Hanlon · Rating 3 out of 5]

This sampler is probably not the ideal introduction to McLuhan’s work and insights. As a compilation of lectures and interviews, the repetition of common themes and tropes is not as engaging as a full dive into a single volume of his work, expanded upon and given the advantages of a deep and fully structured argument rather than these briefer pieces which were often pared down for the sake f engaging the audiences he was presenting to.

[Theryn Fleming · Rating 4 out of 5]

Understanding Me is a chronological compilation of Marshall McLuhan lectures and interviews, with some context for each provided by the editors. As it's basically transcripts of oral remarks, it's very readable, and probably a good place to start McLuhan-wise. Funnily enough, one of the interviewers, Tom Snyder, actually says, "it was easier listening to you than it is reading you" (p. 255).

There is a lot of repetition, but rather than that being annoying, it serves to emphasize McLuhan's main themes and ideas. To update his remarks for the 21st century (he died in 1980), just substitute "internet" for "TV."

[Tara Brabazon · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book has some outstanding and rare lectures and conference presentations. For those interested in McLuhan, this is intellectual punctuation for his academic career.