#mcprobe :: it started here

Being too young to have been exposed to McLuhan in his heyday, my discovery came a number of years ago was kind of like pulling a loose thread on a woolen sweater. Like many, my first exposure was to his most infamous aphorism

the medium is the message

but without notice, it became: the medium is the massage; the medium is the mess-age; the medium is the mass-age; the tedium is the message; and  the tedium is the mass-age. All of a sudden I had my hands full of loose wool and McLuhan was saying "See, it's a unicorn".

Which is one of the most exciting and infuriating things about discovering McLuhan. You start seeing a guy who was well before his time. But at the same time, you've got to work to understand his ideas. And a big part of that is because it wasn't about getting to the answers perse; it's all about the intellectual dance to recognise the patterns of our media saturated world.

who is Marshall McLuhan?

Essentially people have been trying to figure that out (and still argue about it) since he turned up as a pop culture academic (as well as a real one) in the mid 1900s. The best place to start to find out more is at the official Marshall McLuhan site. But you don't need to know a whole lot for the purpose of this post, apart from him being a student and professor of media. He established, and was the director of, the University of Toronto's Centre for Culture and Technology. It existed to study the psychic and social effects, affects, influences, impulses and consequences of media and technologies. The primary way McLuhan carried out this exploration was with intellectual probes.

what is a McLuhan probe?

McLuhan often self referred to his approach as probes. In essence, his aim is not to leave wasn't to demonstrate that he knew something about something, but instead, through probes, introduce an intellectual energy that would excite the continued to exploration and expansion of the idea. Some of his own comments highlight this:

• I don't pretend to know all my stuff. After all, my writing is very difficult.
• I don't necessarily agree with everything I say.
• You don't like those ideas? I got others.

At the same time, this is not to presume that he had nothing to say, as if a probe was just a meaningless pondering.

e.g. here's a McLuhan beauty: "The content or message of any particular medium has about as much importance as the stenciling on the casing of an atomic bomb."

what is #mcprobe?

So I am launching #mcprobe to partner with #mediatheology for when you're more interested in probing thought, discussion, ideas, etc than making a definitive statement that everyone can applaud. A #mcprobe does need to be a statement or perception. As it is in statements and perceptions that a probe draws its strength. But a probe should also be risky as well. a #mcprobe speaks in generalisations and hyperbole and draws at times on the anecdotal, all in an effort to invite others to take a look from an alternate perspective. 

So I will be regularly posting content under the #mcprobe label. This means I won't always understand what I'm trying to say. It means I may not agree with what I'm saying. And, if you don't like that #mcprobe, don't panic and unfollow, because there'll be more to come.

And because a core part of a #mcprobe is to stimulate engagement, I invite you to embrace the #mcprobe #mediatheology partnership.

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