Stručni rad
Clash of generations and McLuhan’s philosophy of media in Clockwork Orange
Tvrtko Balić
Sažetak
The aim of this paper is to clarify the philosophy of the media as it can be read
in the work of Marshall McLuhan using the example of Anthony Burgess’s book A Clockwork Orange, which was also brilliantly adapted by Stanley Kubrick. McLuhan sees the modern world as a world built by the technology of the printing press. The mechanical press shapes the perception of the world, which itself becomes mechanical in accordance with the thesis “the medium is the message” according to which the form of the medium shapes the content (so in the example of the press the mechanical technology enables replicability which then shapes the content which shapes the perception of the world as a collection of neatly shaped parts working together), but electronic media bring something new and awake something from the past. Specifically, they bring an audible dimension into the media space and by changing the ratio between the senses create a perception of the world that has some similarities with the
premodern one. For McLuhan, a man who can be called postmodern is a man who returns to the ear and the tribe, and the return of tribal and primitive mentality is exactly what A Clockwork Orange depicts with its fictional subculture of young hooligans in the future. Electronic media and the press exist simultaneously fighting for domination and according to McLuhan this struggle can explain social conflicts. These social conflicts are the main theme of A Clockwork Orange. Since A Clockwork Orange depicts problems that exist in reality, the analysis of the novel and the film can prove useful if the causes of conflict and social change are sought. Media theory can find these causes
and enable us to understand them, although it does not necessarily offer solutions to the problems we face.
Ključne riječi
A Clockwork Orange; culture; McLuhan; media; technology
Hrčak ID:
333895
URI
Datum izdavanja:
31.12.2024.
Posjeta: 577 *