Dominic Smith to Present at McLuhan Centennial Conference
Dominic Smith, lecturer in Philosophy at the University of Dundee, will present a paper on the philosophical implications of Marshall McLuhan's work at Free University of Brussels (Vrije Universiteit Brussel) on 27th October 2011.
Entitled "Understanding the Media of the Message: Making McLuhan’s Assumptions Explicit", Dominic's paper will argue that McLuhan’s work contains many implicit assumptions on how technology and culture ought to relate, and that its contemporary relevance is best demonstrated by bringing these assumptions to light. He calls for a critical reading of McLuhan that uses awareness of his assumptions to assess the capacity of his work for addressing philosophical, psychological and sociological challenges engendered by contemporary digital culture.
The conference, entitled "McLuhan's Philosophy of Media", has been organised to celebrate the centennial of McLuhan's birth. Philosophically, McLuhan was an enigma - his work was hugely popular in the 1960s, but his star was quick to fade in the face of critical attacks on his style and methods. These days, there is something of a McLuhan revival underway, which has its roots in the growth of the Internet from the mid-1990s onwards.
In approaching McLuhan, Dominic is interested in what the tendency to celebrate his work reveals about the kinds of hopes, desires and values we are prone to invest into the idea of the Internet.
Further information about this event is available on the conference website.
Posted: 24 October 2011
del.icio.us
digg
reddit
facebook
stumbleupon