Andrew McLuhan Offers an Enhanced Version of Media Literacy That He Calls ‘Macro Media Literacy’

03May21

Macro Media Literacy

By Andrew McLuhan

Media Literacy, or Critical Media Literacy as it’s sometimes called, is a part of the media studies world which tends to focus on critical evaluation of the content of various media, mainly communications technologies.

Google search results yield the following:

“A commonly cited definition of “media literacy” was created at the 1992 Aspen Media Literacy Leadership Institute: Media Literacy is the ability to access, analyze, evaluate and create media in a variety of forms.” [criticalmediaproject.org]

“the “critical” in critical media literacy: a focus on identity. Critical Media Project builds upon previous media literacy efforts in several ways. Inspired by the writings of scholars like UCLA’s Douglass Kellner and Jeff Share, the emphasis on “critical” media literacy means that we focus more explicitly on analyzing the “politics of representation” in media.” [criticalmediaproject.org]

“Media literacy is the ability to identify different types of media and understand the messages they’re sending.” [commensensemedia.org]

“Media literacy encompasses the practices that allow people to access, critically evaluate, and create or manipulate media.” [Wikipedia]

“Media are powerful forces in the lives of youth. Music, TV, video games, magazines and other media all have a strong influence on how we see the world, an influence that often begins in infancy. To be engaged and critical media consumers, kids need to develop skills and habits of media literacy. These skills include being able to access media on a basic level, to analyze it in a critical way based on certain key concepts, to evaluate it based on that analysis and, finally, to produce media oneself. This process of learning media literacy skills is media education.” [mediasmarts.ca]

In these examples of what we could call conventional media literacy, the focus is on the content, and specifically on the intent of the creators and purveyors of content. It’s mainly focused on building awareness around propaganda, be it political or commercial, and persuasion.

It’s generally directed toward children.

It’s content analysis, and it’s good work. Vital work, even. Certainly in the world we live in today, so over-saturated with ‘content’ of this kind, it is very important that we be critical, that we teach skills to empower people to be aware of the subtleties at play, that the ‘messages’ being directed at you are often designed to manipulate you into buying products or politics.

But — this is not the ‘message’ Marshall McLuhan was talking about when he said, in 1958, that ‘the medium is the message. This is more like saying ‘the message is the message.’ And, really, that’s fine. It’s more than fine — as I already said, conventional media literacy as it’s commonly understood is an important part of the media puzzle. But it’s not the whole puzzle, and it’s focusing on ‘the message’ at the expense, and the benefit, of ‘the medium.’

“For the “content” [‘the message’] of a medium is like the juicy piece of meat carried by the burglar to distract the watchdog of the mind.” [Marshall McLuhan in Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man (London, England: MIT Press,1964; p.18)]

While people are busy making content — even when they’re busy ‘being critical’ of content, technologies are quite busy rearranging our senses, our brains, and our societies. And they do this regardless of ‘the message’ you’re critically or uncritically occupied with.

“What we are considering here, however, are the psychic and social consequences of the designs or patterns as they amplify or accelerate existing processes. For the “message” of any medium is the change of scale or pace or pattern that it introduces into human affairs.” [Marshall McLuhan, Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man, 1964, p.8]

“The meaning and effect of a medium is the sum total of all its impact upon psyche and society.” [Marshall McLuhan, letter to Harry Skornia dated July 6, 1964 in ‘Letters of Marshall McLuhan’, 1987 Oxford University Press.]
……….[snip]……….

I am suggesting that we enlarge what is conventionally considered and taught as media literacy to include both a broader understanding of what constitutes ‘media’ as well as a broader understanding of what their ‘messages’ are to include what happens when you shift attention from the content to the form, from the content creators and purveyors to the effects on the user/receiver beyond intentional persuasion and toward the more profound cognitive, sensory, and societal changes which are generally ‘unintended consequences’ or ‘side effects’ but when added up vastly overpower whatever was intended.

Read the rest of this article at https://tinyurl.com/f5xt5wh6

Andrew McLuhan,
Bloomfield, Prince Edward County, ON, 2021

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