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Amusing Ourselves to Death / The Shallows / How to be F*cking Awesome
Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business Originally published in 1985, Neil Postman's groundbreaking polemic about the corrosive effects of television on our politics and public discourse has been hailed as a twenty-first-century book published in the twentieth century. Now, with television joined by more sophisticated electronic media from the Internet to cell phones to DVDs it has taken on even greater significance. Amusing Ourselves to Death is a prophetic look at what happens when politics, journalism, education, and even religion become subject to the demands of entertainment. It is also a blueprint for regaining control of our media, so that they can serve our highest goals.
The Shallows: How the internet is changing the way we think, read and remember In this ground-breaking and compelling book, Nicholas Carr argues that not since Gutenberg invented printing has humanity been exposed to such a mind-altering technology. The Shallows draws on the latest research to show that the Net is literally re-wiring our brains inducing only superficial understanding. As a consequence there are profound changes in the way we live and communicate, remember and socialise - even in our very conception of ourselves.
How To Be F*cking Awesome if you've been looking for a kick up the backside to finally launch that business, start a new project you've been putting off or just become all round awesome, this book is for you. Why do some people have an awesome life, plenty of money, amazing friends and a business to love while others struggle at every step, are constantly broke and can never get out of the daily grind? What enables some people to work hard, play harder and make a difference every day.
The Shallows: How the internet is changing the way we think, read and remember In this ground-breaking and compelling book, Nicholas Carr argues that not since Gutenberg invented printing has humanity been exposed to such a mind-altering technology. The Shallows draws on the latest research to show that the Net is literally re-wiring our brains inducing only superficial understanding. As a consequence there are profound changes in the way we live and communicate, remember and socialise - even in our very conception of ourselves.
How To Be F*cking Awesome if you've been looking for a kick up the backside to finally launch that business, start a new project you've been putting off or just become all round awesome, this book is for you. Why do some people have an awesome life, plenty of money, amazing friends and a business to love while others struggle at every step, are constantly broke and can never get out of the daily grind? What enables some people to work hard, play harder and make a difference every day.
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About the author
Neil Postman
50 books1,005 followersNeil Postman, an important American educator, media theorist and cultural critic was probably best known for his popular 1985 book, Amusing Ourselves to Death. For more than four decades he was associated with New York University, where he created and led the Media Ecology program.
He is the author of more than thirty significant books on education, media criticism, and cultural change including Teaching as a Subversive Activity, The Disappearance of Childhood, Technopoly, and Building a Bridge to the Eighteenth Century.
Amusing Ourselves to Death (1985), a historical narrative which warns of a decline in the ability of our mass communications media to share serious ideas. Since television images replace the written word, Postman argues that television confounds serious issues by demeaning and undermining political discourse and by turning real, complex issues into superficial images, less about ideas and thoughts and more about entertainment. He also argues that television is not an effective way of providing education, as it provides only top-down information transfer, rather than the interaction that he believes is necessary to maximize learning. He refers to the relationship between information and human response as the Information-action ratio.
He is the author of more than thirty significant books on education, media criticism, and cultural change including Teaching as a Subversive Activity, The Disappearance of Childhood, Technopoly, and Building a Bridge to the Eighteenth Century.
Amusing Ourselves to Death (1985), a historical narrative which warns of a decline in the ability of our mass communications media to share serious ideas. Since television images replace the written word, Postman argues that television confounds serious issues by demeaning and undermining political discourse and by turning real, complex issues into superficial images, less about ideas and thoughts and more about entertainment. He also argues that television is not an effective way of providing education, as it provides only top-down information transfer, rather than the interaction that he believes is necessary to maximize learning. He refers to the relationship between information and human response as the Information-action ratio.
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August 10, 2024
I really enjoyed this book. Seeing the progression of how, up until the invention of the telegraph, content actually mattered. We're now stuck in the age of television/web where EVERYTHING is viewed through the lense of entertainment - even the things that really matter.
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