A historical review of the background of the theories and observations of Marshall McLuhan demonstrates that these ideas arose from or were first articulated by several antecedent social scientists. Some of McLuhan's ideas arise directly from the linguistic observations of Benjamin Lee Whorf. Other ideas show signs of having been influenced by…

This essay argues that communication is at the intersection of four social changes that may in their effects add up to a third sociotechnological revolution. The four changes posited are: a historic shift in the character of infrastructures; a new emphasis on visual modes in the coding of images and ideas; a change in the nature of technology,…

Twenty-one critical essays on the ideas and works of Marshall McLuhan are offered in this review. In the course of the essays, McLuhan is characterized alternately as a genius, an extrapolator, and an oracle; a defender of the choice of choicelessness; a generalizer who rearranges, misinterprets, and misreads the facts to support his theses; an…

Research on the relationship of communication to national development is at a standstill because theorists have assumed that effective communication will modernize the attitudes of individuals in underdeveloped nations and will eventually result in changing the political, social, and economic structure of their country. Unfortunately, change is…