Understanding McLuhan/Understanding McLuhan (1996)(Voyager)[Mac-PC].iso/pc/mcluhan.dxr/07099_Field_TCUM T664.txt

Text File | 1996-04-10 | 1KB | 16 lines

“illusions.” On seeing Charlie Chaplin’s The Tramp , the African
audience concluded that Europeans were magicians who could
restore life. They saw a character who survived a mighty blow
on the head without any indication of being hurt. When the
camera shifts, they think they see trees moving, and buildings
growing or shrinking, because they cannot make the literate
assumption that space is continuous and uniform. Nonliterate
people simply don’t get perspective or distancing effects of
light and shade that we assume are innate human equipment.
Literate people think of cause and effect as sequential, as if
one thing pushed another along by physical force. Nonliterate
people register very little interest in this kind of “efficient”
cause and effect, but are fascinated by hidden forms that
produce magical results. Inner, rather than outer, causes
interest the nonliterate and nonvisual cultures. And that is why
the literate West sees the rest of the world as caught in the