A Noteworthy Nugget

It's a small item, but certainly blogworthy here on my official blog of record: This past summer, my new book, Media Ecology: An Approach to Understanding the Human Condition, was included in an online Fordham News piece entitled New and Noteworthy from Fordham Faculty, featuring six new books.

The byline goes to Janet Sassi, and the item is dated August 9, 2017, with my book in the lead position. A picture of the book cover is included, and if you've read my previous posts, you know that I really love that cover, so let's include it here as well: 

And let's follow with the short piece, based in part on a brief phone interview with me: 

Media Ecology: An Approach to Understanding the Human Condition, by Lance Strate, Ph.D. (Peter Lang, 2017)

In his new book, Strate, professor of communication and media studies, examines how smartphones, apps, and social media shape us as human beings. He expands on an intellectual tradition, one spearheaded by Neil Postman and Marshall McLuhan (who taught at Fordham), that’s about much more than understanding any one particular medium.

“It starts with the understanding that those things we pay attention to, like screens, are not just gadgets,” he said. “We think we can turn them on or off, but when you look at them as part of our environment, we can’t escape them.”

Even people who don’t use social media will be inadvertently affected by it, said Strate, because its use is ubiquitous—much the same as persons who don’t fly and yet must contend with planes continuously flying overhead. “We are living in an environment that is full of these mediations that influence us.”

“We all speak with a language we didn’t create. That influences how we express ourselves and in how we think,” he said.

Oh, and by the way, before the six quick takes, this new and noteworthy item included a picture of four of us, which is also worth sharing here: 

Maybe not my best angle, but we pull no punches here at Blog Time Passing! And don't worry, this won't be the last you hear about my book... 

Media Ecology: Some Details Regarding My New Book

So, if you know me personally, or connect to me via Twitter, Facebook, or the Media Ecology Association's discussion list, this may not be news to you, but it's time to make the announcement here on Blog Time Passing, my official blog of record. And even if you have already got the message, I'll add some extra details that may make it worthwhile sticking around.

So here goes, drum roll and trumpets please: My new book, Media Ecology: An Approach to Understanding the Human Condition (New York: Peter Lang, 2017) is now in print and available for sale through Amazon and many other fine booksellers. Hurray!!!

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And here's the publisher's write-up of the book, a bit of promotional hyperbole there, but still it will give you an idea of what it's about, in case that's not entirely clear:

Media Ecology: An Approach to Understanding the Human Condition provides a long-awaited and much anticipated introduction to media ecology, a field of inquiry defined as the study of media as environments. Lance Strate presents a clear and concise explanation of an intellectual tradition concerned with much more than understanding media, but rather with understanding the conditions that shape us as human beings, drive human history, and determine the prospects for our survival as a species.

Much more than a summary, this book represents a new synthesis that moves the field forward in a manner that is both unique and unprecedented, and simultaneously grounded in an unparalleled grasp of media ecology's intellectual foundations and its relation to other disciplines. Taking as its subject matter "life, the universe, and everything," Strate describes the field as interdisciplinary and communication-centered, provides a detailed explication of McLuhan's famous aphorism, "the medium is the message," and explains that the human condition can only be understood in the context of our biophysical, technological, and symbolic environments.

Strate provides an in-depth examination of media ecology's four key terms: medium, which is defined in much broader terms than in other fields; bias, which refers to tendencies inherent in materials and methods; effects, which are best understood via the Aristotelian notion of formal causality and contemporary systems theory; and environment, which includes the distinctions between the oral, chirographic, typographic, and electronic media environments. A chapter on tools serves as a guide to further media ecological research and scholarship. This book is well suited for graduate and undergraduate courses on communication theory and philosophy.

And you gotta have blurbs, so here are mine (and I really do appreciate them, thank you Julie, Paul, and Josh!):

With characteristic passion and soulfulness, Lance Strate embarks on a metatask: to synthesize thinking about ‘life, the universe and everything’ through the lens of media ecology. In the process, he locates media ecology as the dynamic shift between figure and ground and as the basis for ‘understanding the human condition.’ Writing with an almost disarming ease that belies the complexity of the ideas he communicates, Strate brilliantly and reflexively mediates media ecology itself, bringing clarity to the Kekulé-like conundrums of an immense and increasingly relevant field. Anyone who thoughtfully enters and engages the environment of Strate’s book will be rewarded with moments of profound clarity, connecting ideas typically viewed as disparate or oppositional into patterns of deep understanding about media ecology―and about the process of living.―Julianne H. Newton, Professor of Visual Communication, University of Oregon 

Lance Strate’s synthetic thinking in Media Ecology: An Approach to Understanding the Human Condition opens up media ecology, allowing the reader to see how, as a field of inquiry, it applies to everything from language, media, and philosophy to our very understanding of what it means to be human living in a dynamic environment. Along the way Strate shows how media ecology connects with all the major approaches to communication study.―Paul Soukup, Professor and Chair, Department of Communication, Santa Clara University

Lance Strate asks big questions―and provides a myriad of perceptive answers. This book is at once playful, poetic, and precise. The clear writing about complex ideas is a pleasure to read and offers many gifts of understanding.―Joshua Meyrowitz, University of New Hampshire

And let me tell you about the cover. The publisher asked if I had  any instructions for the graphics designer, and I did have some ideas. One was the color, violet, like the color of the cover of Hannah Arendt's most influential philosophical work, The Human Condition:

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While the color isn't exactly the same, it does evoke Arendt's work, and her understanding of the human condition serves as a foundation for my own media ecological discussion of the conditions of human life, which is another way of saying the environments that shape and are shaped by our species. 

As an added bonus, violet also has a connection to New York University, home of the original, late lamented Media Ecology Program founded by Neil Postman and Terry Moran, who were soon joined by Christine Nystrom. While NYU's colors are purple and white, their athletic teams are called the Violets, and according to the Wikipedia entry on the NYU Violets, 

For more than a century, NYU athletes have worn violet and white colors in competition, which is the root of the nickname Violets. In the 1980s, after briefly using a student dressed as a violet for a mascot, the school instead adopted the bobcat as its mascot, from the abbreviation then being used by NYU's Bobst Library computerized catalog.

Additionally, for a period of time, I would join Postman, Nystrom, and others for lunch or a snack at an NYU eatery called The Violet. But I should also note that the way the colors turned out in different shades, the cover also offers a hint of Fordham University's school colors, maroon and white. Again, however, my main goal was to pay homage to Hannah Arendt.

In addition to the color scheme, the use of the three internally tangential circles follows one of the main diagrams included in the book, one depicting the three basic human conditions or media environments (the biophysical as the outer ring, the technological inside of it, and the symbolic as the inner ring; I used internally tangential circles rather than concentric circles because I wanted a point of intersection between the three, rather than having the symbolic fully cut off and separated from the biophysical by being surrounded by the technological, because there is direct interaction between the biophysical and the symbolic).

The way the three circles are arranged is also meant to evoke another book cover, one of the many editions of Marshall McLuhan's Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man, the most commonly cited work in the field of media ecology, and in many ways the work most central to it. The edition in question was one of the old pocketbook-sized paperback editions, with an image of a light bulb done up in Christmas-like colors:

I should note at this juncture that the original title I had in mind for this book was Understanding Media Ecology, and that goes back some two decades. But when I agreed to launch a new media ecology book series with the publisher Peter Lang,  they wanted a name for the series that would distinguish it from the Media Ecology series I had with Hampton Press, and I tossed out a few possibilities including Understanding Media Ecology, and that was the one they wanted to go with. So this book is, in fact, Volume 1 of Peter Lang's Understanding Media Ecology book series (this despite the fact that several books were published in the series prior to mine, a decision I had nothing to do with I hasten to add).

So I gave up my direct allusion to McLuhan's main work, and decided to go with a simpler and more direct title, Media Ecology. As for the subtitle, I use approach because it avoids the visual metaphor of perspective or even theory, as McLuhan and other media ecologists have been critical of the visualism of western culture, favoring acoustic metaphors instead; I also used this term because I wanted to place a certain degree of emphasis on media ecology as a method or way of understanding, a path, or tao if you like, and not just a field or intellectual tradition or set of theories. 

I did retrieve understanding in the subtitle to retain a connection to Understanding Media. And I had it read, An Approach to Understanding the Human Condition, to indicate the connection to Arendt, but also and perhaps more importantly to emphasize the fact that media ecology is about much more than media as the term is commonly understood. Indeed, media ecology is very much about the human condition, about the conditions that we exist within, that influence us, and are in turn influenced by us. Or to invoke Douglas Adams, as I do in the book, it's about life, the universe, and everything.

But back to what I was saying about the graphic design: I also suggested having the circles take up all or most of the front cover, and given their relative lengths, having my name in the innermost and smallest circle, having the book title in the middle circle, and having the rather longish subtitle in the outermost and largest circle. So, that was my input, and I am very, very pleased with the way it turned out. It's rather striking, don't you think?

Now, maybe you'd like to know a little more about the book before going ahead and buying it? To which, I respond, what's the matter, don't you trust me? But sure, I understand, so let's start with the book's own listings:

Does that help a bit? Maybe a little, but I bet a more detailed listing of the contents would be even better. I actually wanted to include a Table of Contents that included the breakdown by sections within each chapter, which I decided to number, following the example of Lewis Mumford in many of his books, but the publisher just went with the one I showed you above. (I have also incorporated the List of Illustrations here, which does appear in the book, and which are numbered according to their requirements, based on chapter number and order within the chapter.) What follows does not include the page numbers, since it was produced with the manuscript, before it went into page layout, but I think it will help provide more of a sense of what's in the book:

Contents

Illustrations

Figure 4.1 The Three Human Conditions/Media Environments
Figure 7.1 A Model of Communication Based on Formal Cause
Figure 8.1 The Ziggurat Model of the Oral Media Environment
Figure 8.2 The Ziggurat Model of the Chirographic Media Environment
Figure 8.3 The Ziggurat Model of the Typographic Media Environment
Figure 8.4 The Ziggurat Model of the Electronic Media Environment
Figure 8.5 The Alternate Ziggurat Model of the Electronic Media Environment
Figure 9.1 Pathways for Media Ecology Scholarship

Preface
 1: A First Word

Chapter 1   An Introduction
 1: Life, the Universe, and Everything
 2: Defining Media Ecology
 3: The Study and the Object of Study
 4: Field of Inquiry, Field of Study

Chapter 2   Intersections
 1: The Field of Communication
 2: Grammar, Linguistics, Semiotics, Aesthetics, Etc.
 3: General Semantics
 4: Information, Cybernetics, and Systems
 5: Media and Society
 6: Medium Theory
 7: Media Studies and Cultural Studies
 8: Human Ecology
 9: Psychology and Biology
10: Science and Technology Studies
11: History and Historiography
12: Futurology
13: Media Education and Media Literacy
14: Philosophy and Theology
15: Formalism and Materialities
16: Humanism
17: Technological Determinism
18: Praxis and Activism

Chapter 3   Understanding Media Ecology
 1: What Is Media Ecology?
 2: The Medium is the Message

Chapter 4   The Human Condition
 1: The Human Medium
 2: Nature and Culture
 3: The Technological Condition
 4: The Symbolic World

Chapter 5   Medium
 1: Understanding Media
 2: Media and Medium (A Note on Usage)
 3: From Printing to Mass Communication
 4: Transportation and Transmission
 5: Mediated Communication, New Media, Social Media
 6: Substance and Sensation
 7: Words
 8. Form
 9: Human Bodies as Media
10: Relationship
11: Technology and Technique
12: Environment and Process
13: Summation

Chapter 6   Bias
 1: The Bias of Communication
 2: The Nature of Bias
 3: The Myth of Neutrality
 4: Design and Function
 5: The Bias of the Medium

Chapter 7    Effects
 1: An Effects Tradition
 2: Impact and Ecology
 3: Some Basics Regarding Science and the Limits of Knowledge
 4: Causality
 5: Formal Cause
 6: Systems and Emergence

Chapter 8   Environment
 1: Me and Not-Me
 2: Ecosystems and Networks
 3: Towards a Media Eco-Logic
 4: Media Environments

Chapter 9   Tools
 1: Context Analysis
 2: Studying Media as Media
 3: Studying the Biases of a Medium
 4: Studying Effects
 5: Studying Environments

Chapter 10   Conclusion
 1: A Last Word

Index

And while I didn't get my author's copies of the book until later, according to Amazon, the book was officially published on the Fourth of July. So I guess you could say it represents an Independence Day of sorts, maybe in some ways for media ecology, certainly for me. What I mean is that, over the years, I have encounter many misunderstandings about media ecology, as well as a number of objections to various aspects of our field, and the book incorporates my responses to those misunderstandings and objections, and hopefully answers them in a way that might put them to rest (probably not, given that it's hard to change people's minds, even in the face of rational argument and evidence, but hope springs eternal). So, along with being a summary and new synthesis intended to move the field forward, it should also serve as a defense against the dark arts that have been aligned against media ecology over the years.

I do feel a certain sense of obligation to my mentors, Neil Postman and Christine Nystrom, and especially to Chris who tried her best to present media ecology as a coherent and organized field, rather than simply a series of probes and percepts. And in that sense, this was a book that I needed to write. I kinda had the feeling that if I died before this book was completed, my shade would not be able to rest easy. Which is also why the book is by no means all that it could be, because I had to limit what I would cover and the amount of time I would put into it, or the book would never have been finished (not to mention that I had word count limits imposed by the publisher, which I significantly exceeded). But with this book, I do believe I have fulfilled the obligation that I felt to Chris and Neil (an obligation that they never placed on me I hasten to add), as well as to my colleagues, students, friend, and fellow travelers, to media ecologists present and future. Whew!

On Being Weary and Wary of ‘Awareness’

Before the month ends, I think I better share my latest op-ed published in the April 28th issue of the Jewish Standard, and posted online on their website hosted by the Times of Israel. The title of the piece is On Being Weary and Wary of ‘Awareness’ and I think I'll let it speak for itself:

April is Autism Awareness Month. As we are close to the end of the month, chances are that you’ve already seen or heard that statement.

So let me ask you: Are you more aware of autism now than you were at the beginning of the month? And what do we mean by this vague thing we call “awareness” anyway?

I looked online and found a “Cause/Awareness Monthly Calendar,” which confirmed my suspicions that almost every month of the year has multiple causes assigned to it. April has six listings, including Parkinson’s Disease Awareness Month and Sexual Assault Awareness Month. If there’s a cause out there that does not emphasize the goal of awareness, I have yet to come across it.

And yet I don’t see much in the way of assessment of this goal. How is awareness measured? Who measures it? How are the results distributed? I believe that awareness actually refers to attention, which is the basic currency of our electronically mediated environment. The primary question is: Is the cause in question getting enough attention from the news media, the entertainment media, and our social media? And secondarily, are the audiences and participants paying enough attention to these messages?

My daughter turned 21 this winter. When she was 2½ years old, she was diagnosed with autism. Looking back some 18 years ago, I know that what we call autism awareness was not very widespread, not even here in northern New Jersey, where there are the largest numbers and the greatest concentration of children with autism in the United States.

Back then, most estimates ranged from 1 in 1,000 to 1 in 500 children with autism nationwide. Increased awareness coincided with increased incidence, and now the estimates range between 1 in 45 and 1 in 68. And given the higher numbers in our region, this means that chances are you know someone with autism, or someone with a family member who has autism.

As the numbers grew, autism advocates began to call it an epidemic. Specifically, they referred to the epidemic of childhood autism. And it was an epidemic that affected families from all walks of life, from every income bracket and socioeconomic status, as well as every race, ethnicity, and religion.

A major turning point in autism awareness came when a grandson of Bob Wright was diagnosed with autism. Wright was the CEO of NBC at the time, and he and his wife, the late Suzanne Wright, founded Autism Speaks in 2005. Through his influence, autism suddenly received much more attention in the news and entertainment media than it ever had before.

It is worth asking ourselves why social problems only receive attention when the rich, the famous, and the powerful are touched by them, when the problem is experienced by someone close to a media professional or politician. Of course we are grateful when someone with a public platform finally speaks out. But why do awareness and attention have to depend on a contemporary variation on noblesse oblige?

And again, what is “awareness” all about? It is certainly a far cry from understanding.

I recently spoke with a friend and colleague whose son, about 10 years older than my daughter, also has autism. And we talked about the fact that our children will never really grow up, be able to live independently, have their own place, hold a normal job, marry, or raise children. About how much they depend on us and continue to depend on us. And about how uncertain their future is as we grow older, grow less and less able to care for them, and eventually will become unable to provide them with a home and necessary supervision.

We talked about what will happen to them when we’re gone.

It is so very hard for us to watch the parents of typical children celebrate the usual rites of passage and talk with mixed feelings about becoming empty nesters, knowing that fate has something else in store for us. Our special needs children require so much more of their parents than typical children as they’re growing up, and their special needs do not magically disappear when they become adults. The pressure never lets up, and it never goes away.

Awareness? Feh! Let’s face it, if you don’t live it, you just don’t understand, just can’t understand, not really. Not fully. So forgive me if I find all this talk about awareness to be awfully shallow, promoting the illusion that something real is happening merely by calling attention to causes on our news, entertainment, and social media.

I remember when Ronald Reagan was elected president, budgets were cut, policies were changed, and all of a sudden we saw schizophrenic individuals who previously had been institutionalized winding up on the streets, homeless and helpless, unable to take care of themselves. It was a shonda, a national disgrace.

Now think this through with me. For the past two decades, we’ve been made aware that there is an epidemic of childhood autism, with numbers steadily increasing. And be aware that there is no cure for autism. So now, be aware that we are facing an epidemic of adults with autism. And let me ask you, are you aware of what is being done to deal with this ticking social time bomb?

Nothing.

Local school districts are required to provide people with autism with an appropriate education until they age out after their 21st birthdays. After that, services are limited, if any exist at all. And for all but the most severe and violent individuals, we parents will try our best to take care of our children for as long as we are physically and psychically able.

How much longer do you think that will be?

We could have begun to prepare for the problem when Barack Obama was elected president. He had the right outlook. But the economy had just crashed under George W. Bush, Obama understandably was preoccupied with recovery from recession and with affordable healthcare, and he was faced with an obstructionist Congress for most of his tenure. Now that we have a Republican president, House and Senate, our government is back to cutting social services, so I doubt we can expect any proactive measures in the near future.

No, in all probability nothing will happen until the time when the parents of adults with autism no longer are able to provide them with a home, and the streets again are flooded with homeless people helpless to take care of themselves. When that happens, in the not too distant future, awareness will become more than a matter of news reports, feel-good films and TV programs, and social media memes. Awareness will become a face-to- face reality, an embarrassment, a source of guilt for the more enlightened, a source of fear for others. And only then will the public demand action, and public officials respond in kind. That’s what happened with the schizophrenics on the streets back in the 1980s.

So what does awareness mean to you? I guess it means that you’re aware that it’s Autism Awareness Month. I guess that amounts to awareness of awareness. And maybe, maybe, if you’re really made aware, that can lead to being informed. Maybe.My guess is that how well informed you are about autism depends on how close you are to an actual person with autism. And even then, after all, being informed is a far cry from actual action.

So please forgive me for being weary and wary of awareness. But please be aware of what’s coming down the pike, and when it happens, be aware that you were warned about it. And be aware that it was a failure of understanding, compassion, and foresight, and above all political will, that caused the problem.

That is the kind of awareness that we need to get across right now, in this month of April.

Can You Hear Me Now?

Following up on my last post, here's another one of my op-eds from the Jewish Standard, this one published on September 2nd, just as the new school year was beginning:

As I begin my 33rd year in higher education, I can’t help but notice that my students are getting younger and younger every year—while I myself haven’t changed a bit.

Now, if you’re thinking that maybe I’ve gotten things mixed up a bit, that maybe it only seems that way from my point of view, I invoke in my defense Albert Einstein’s theory of relativity. But rather than continue to argue the point, let me share another observation with you:

Cell phones have caused my students’ bladders to shrink. I know, I know, it may be hard to see the connection, but the correlation is quite clear. It used to be that students could sit through a class of approximately an hour and fifteen minutes without a problem, and it was rare that someone would need to get up in the middle of class to go to the restroom. It would happen, of course—we all are human, after all—but not very often.

But somehow, increasingly in recent years, students have needed to go more and more often. And this coincides with the fact that, just like the rest of us, they have come to carry their mobile devices with them at all times, including to class.

Many of them try to hide their cell phones, keeping them on their laps, which is why I think the devices are having a physiological effect. I do try to point out, by the way, that this maybe isn’t the best place to put your cell phone, at least not if you plan on having children some day. I point out that mobile devices do generate electromagnetic radiation, and that we really don’t know for sure how that affects the body. Do you really want to take the chance?

Of course, I know that the sudden rise in students excusing themselves during class is not due to the effects of cellular signals on their bodies, but rather to the effects of text messages on their minds. The magnetic pull of our mobile devices is altogether extraordinary, and affects all of us, young and old. There even is a new word to describe the compulsion, FOMO—Fear Of Missing Out. The fear is nothing new, but never before has it been so intense and unrelenting.

And while our smartphones may be the cause of it all, it has nothing to do with the fact that they are telephones. Remember the days when everyone had a distinctive ringtone, often a few seconds of a favorite song? When every day we saw ads that urged us to buy special ringtones from a selection of thousands? Remember how we spent a considerable amount of time deciding which one to set as the mark of our own individual identity?

Funny how those days have come and gone. And the upside is that there are fewer instances when cellphones ring at inopportune times because their users forgot to put them on silent (or turn them off, something almost no one does anymore). They don’t interrupt services, or a theatrical performance, or a class, very much any more.

The ringing was more intrusive, but at least we all were embarrassed when it happened, and often enough would not answer it. Texts and status updates are nowhere near as obtrusive as ringing phones, but for that reason they are so much harder to ignore. The desire—for most of us the need—to check the new message, and to respond to it immediately, is all but overwhelming.

And you may think that no one sees the light from your phone shining in the darkened movie theater, but we do. That’s why theaters now ask their patrons to turn them off.

And you may think that no one sees you reading your messages or even responding to them during services, but we do. Back in the day, when a New York team was in the World Series and a game was being played during Rosh Hashanah or Yom Kippur, there might be a congregant who came to services with a transistor radio and earpiece. But he (inevitably it was a he) would step outside the sanctuary or shul to get the update. He wouldn’t listen to the game in the pews, and everyone understood that this was a singular exception.

And my students may think that their professors don’t see what they’re doing, but we do. We can see that they’re looking down and tap tap tapping on something with their fingers. Or for the ones with laptops, we can tell when their eyes are glued to the screen, and they’re furiously typing away far and beyond what might be warranted by taking notes in class.

So why do they get up and leave during class? Perhaps it is out of a sense that they’re doing something inappropriate for class, but Sherry Turkle offers a different explanation in her insightful book, Reclaiming Conversation: The Power of Talk in a Digital Age. They are seeking solitude so that they can focus on crafting a response without being distracted by the class. They see it as editing and creating the best possible version of themselves.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Turkle is rightly concerned about the negative effects of our smartphones on all of us—and especially on the young. That we forget or never learn how to deal with boredom, how to let our minds wander, how to daydream, and how to interact with others in a meaningful way. Messaging means never having to apologize, not really, not in a way that forces you to recognize the effect you have had on others, to see it in their faces. Messaging means you never have to stumble through awkward silences, difficult exchanges, never have to go the effort of really relating to someone else. Conversation among friends, family members, and co-workers is becoming a lost art.

Texting is safe, unless of course we’re driving. Think about how much concern there was about talking on cellphones and driving, and how much worse it is to be texting or looking at updates on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram! Emotionally, texting is safe, and face-to-face interaction is risky. But without risk, there is no growth. And dialogue is the best way to achieve what Martin Buber called I-You relationships, relating to other people as people, as opposed to the I-It relationships, relating to others as objects.

In many ways, messaging and especially updates give us neither I-You nor I-It relationships. Instead, they simply reflect back our own selves, mirror images that show only the surface: I-I relationships. And this brings to mind the warning given by Echo to Narcissus: Better watch yourself!

In his recent book, Not in God’s Name: Confronting Religious Violence, Rabbi Jonathan Sacks notes that the Hebrew Bible was meant to be heard, not read, and the stories of family conflict in the Torah, which often take unexpected turns, should be understood in this context, one where you cannot see the text in its entirety, only hear the narrative as it unfolds, step by step.

. . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . .

It may be hard to believe, but reading silently was all but unknown until after the invention of the printing press. And this is so very important, because when we listen, we listen together, as one, but when we read silently, even if we read the same text at the same time, we read as isolated individuals.

Dialogue, discussion, debate, and devotion are communal activities, very much so in the tradition of Judaism. Whether it’s learning, praying, conversing, or simply being, we all need to put our mobile devices down and just listen. Listen to others, listen to the world, listen to ourselves.

After all, that still small voice that Elijah heard was not a text message.

Can you hear me now?

Trump By Design

So, with Election Day almost upon us, I figure I better post this now, before it's too late. And with Halloween just past us, I apologize if this is a bit scary to consider. 

But this past winter I was asked to write a guest blog post for Visible Works Design, a company run by my old friend from Hillcrest High School, Peter Darnell, and to write something about politics, since that was the hot topic at that time. I should add that this wasn't the first time I wrote a piece for them, but more on that another day. 

So this time around, I wrote a short essay called Trump By Design, which was posted over there on March 23rd (you can check it out there by clicking on the link). And maybe it was coincidence, but then again, I think not, that their site was hacked shortly after the post went up. There was just some weird and obscene verbiage added onto the post, I'm not sure what exactly because it was fixed before I knew it happened. So maybe the hacker didn't like my post, but if so, I'm not sure if it was because I was critical of Trump, or because I said I think he's going to win.

Be that as it may, I will point out that I wrote this at a time when it looked like Trump was not going to secure the Republican nomination. All the pundits and broadcast journalists were saying there was a ceiling to his support and that he would never be able to get to the needed totals to be nominated on the first ballot, which was the only way he could win. These were the same folks who laughed at this candidacy summer before last, and refused to take him seriously all last fall.

Well, I guess the joke's on them, isn't it? And us too, unfortunately.

I mean, even if he loses on Tuesday, he will have come awfully close, and the only thing that stopped him was some very idiosyncratic stuff that no one could have predicted, that X-factor. And that's if he loses.

There has been much water under the bridge since I wrote this, but I won't alter or adjust the original post, and you can be the judge of how good my assessment of the situation was, and is.

Trump By Design 

Maybe it was foolish on my part, but I made a bet with a colleague that Donald Trump will win the Republican nomination and defeat Hillary Clinton, becoming our next president. My one stipulation was that if, somehow, Bernie Sanders becomes the Democratic candidate, the bet would be off. And I'll admit that the problem with my bet is the possibility of some X-factor intervening, like a third party run on the conservative side, for example.

But holding aside some unusual or unforeseen occurrence, I feel pretty confident in this prediction. And maybe I'm wrong. Believe me, I hope I'm wrong. But I do think it's been pretty apparent that most of the pundits and politicians have been in complete denial about Trump's candidacy, and incapable of assessing his chances in an objective manner. And so, reports of his political death have been repeatedly and frequently exaggerated. It's practically a ritual by now.

But what is the secret of Trump's popularity? Some say it's his political stance, which represents populism and a new strain of American nationalism, but his critics argue that he has no real policies; others say it's the state of the electorate, that many voters are angry and feel betrayed. I don't want to discount these factors, but they don't actually answer the question of, Why Trump? Why not, say Ted Cruz, Carly Fiorina, Ben Carson, or Rand Paul for that matter? Or, on the Democratic side, why hasn't Bernie Sanders taken the lead over Clinton?

The answer lies in the nature of the media we use for the purposes of political communication, the media through which election campaigns are conducted. When it comes to campaigning via the electronic media, factors that used to matter when print was the dominant medium of communication, and campaigns were conducted by way of words, both spoken and written, no longer carry the same weight. All too often, these factors, factors such as ideas, policies, ideologies, simply put, the content of communication, what might otherwise be referred to as the substance of our messages, make little or no difference in election outcomes, at least outside of local arenas.

Instead what counts would be style, tone, appearance, personality, image. We are in the era of image politics, a point stressed back in 1985 by Neil Postman in his classic study, Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business. It's an argument I followed up on more recently in my book, Amazing Ourselves to Death: Neil Postman's Brave New World Revisited. In our electronic media environment, candidates live by the image, and they die by the image.

It's no secret that Trump has a certain genius for image-making, that is, for marketing and public relations. The Trump brand first became well known during the 1980s, the decade in which Ronald Reagan, former star of movies, radio, and TV, was elected to two terms as president. During the 80s, automobile executive Lee Iacocca made the ability to communicate effectively on television part of the formula for leadership in the business sector, as he saved Chrysler from bankruptcy; there even was talk of Iacocca, who had no experience in politics, as a potential presidential candidate, although nothing ever came of it.

As for Trump, he was far from being the nation's wealthiest or most successful entrepreneur or business executive, or even real estate developer, but his fame at that time had already eclipsed his contemporaries. He made himself into a brand name, and never faded into obscurity, in contrast to another self-promoting rival from the casino industry, Steve Wynn. He was able to maintain a relatively positive image, unlike real estate rival Leona Helmsley, who was reviled by the public, became known as the Queen of Mean, and was ultimately convicted of income tax evasion. He was able to attain high visibility by becoming a television personality, much like Martha Stewart. Stewart, while not despised in the manner of Helmsley, faded from public view after being convicted of insider trading.

Of course, Trump is much more than a real estate developer and business executive. He is a media professional, and television star, having hosted 14 seasons of The Apprentice between 2004 and 2015 (half of which were in the format of The Celebrity Apprentice). Interestingly, one season of a spinoff featuring Martha Stewart aired in 2005. Significantly, with Trump out of the picture due to his presidential run, the next season of the series, scheduled to run later this year, will be hosted by Arnold Schwarzenegger. Like Reagan, Schwarzenegger is a movie star who became the governor of California (and would have been a viable presidential candidate were he not a naturalized citizen). It is not so well known that the Arnold, like the Donald, is also successful in the business of business, but what the program banks on is not simply star power, but the ability to convey an image of leadership.

Schwarzenegger as a stand-in for Trump certainly will help to reinforce Trump's leadership image, but also recall that Trump's role in The Apprentice was to give assignments to the contestants, and then evaluate their performance. His signature line in the series, you're fired!, established him as the person in charge, an individual capable of making firm and often difficult decisions. He played a similar role in an obscure and short-lived spinoff, Donald J. Trump Presents the Ultimate Merger, a dating program. The important point here is that his experience on television reinforced the image he promoted of himself as a successful business executive, and built on that foundation an even more powerful image of himself as a powerful and effective leader. Celebrity is helpful in political campaigns, but ultimately it is not visibility alone, but conveying the right kind of image, and being able to engage in image management, that wins and loses elections.

While Trump's opponents have argued that running for president is not the same thing as starring on a reality television series, the simple truth is that the race for the White House is, in fact, a form of reality TV, televised debates for example having more in common with quiz and game shows than with actual, traditional debates. And this plays to Trump's strengths as a professional on-camera media personality. He knows how to play to the camera, how to speak to the microphone, and how to appeal to the viewers at home. He understands that television is all about attracting audiences, and he knows how to get their attention, how to provide the entertaining content that they're looking for, the kind of content that works well with the inherent bias of television as a medium. As he is not shy about pointing out, he singlehandedly has vastly expanded the viewership of televised debates and news programs that he's appeared on.

Trump is a performer, and so far he has out-performed his Republican opponents on the television screen and in the ballot box alike. Television, as a visual medium, also favors attractive individuals, and whether or not you agree with Trump when he says he's good looking, I think that objectively we can at least say that he's not unattractive. Although he has been subject to some mockery over his hairstyle, and the orange tint of his skin, it is also true that he is tall, and historically the taller candidates tend to win, a fact that does not bode well for Marco Rubio's future chances. Moreover, Trump's features are relatively soft and not distinct, in contrast to Ted Cruz's sharp features. In Marshall McLuhan's terms, he has a low definition appearance, one that is consistent with television being a cool medium.

McLuhan also suggested that what we call charisma amounts to looking a lot like everyone else. As hard as it may be to accept, visually, Trump is actually easy for many Americans to identify with, to see themselves in, to serve as a screen to project themselves onto. His face is very much a face in the crowd (the name of a prescient film on the power of television-based celebrity). And sure, he's rich, but he acts the way most Americans would act if they won the lottery. His nouveau riche manner is instantly relatable, and that has much to do with the early and powerful clash he had with Jeb Bush, the Bush family being old money, elitists types. That's why George H. W. Bush was a one-term president after riding Reagan's coattails to the White House. George W. Bush avoided his father's fate by putting on a Texan persona, Texans being the opposite of New England snobbish types. Jeb didn't have that advantage, and didn't know what hit him as Trump took him apart rather quickly.

Experts who focus on content find much to criticize in Trump's discourse, just as they did with George W. Bush, but if you focus on tone and style, Trump talk exudes unwavering confidence and strength, with a fair amount of humor, and calm. As much as he has been increasingly associated with voter anger, violent crowd behavior, and accusations of bigotry, he rarely looses his cool, keeping his temper even while he is quick with a comeback or put down. By way of contrast, John McCain's image as angry or irritable did not serve him well, especially as the polls showed him losing ground to Obama following the financial downturn in the fall of 2008. As someone who promotes himself as a master at making deals, Trump knows how to make a sale, and knows that the key to selling things is first and foremost to sell yourself.

Trump is a made-for-television candidate, but let’s not overlook his use of other media. Obama demonstrated the power of social media in 2008, and Trump has proven to be quite adept at using Twitter, understanding that what counts is how often you tweet, how fast you get your tweets out there, how well you can get across a point in no more than 140 characters, and once again, how entertaining your messages can be. Again, critics call him out for misspelling, and in doing so they break one of the unspoken taboos of online messaging. Trump also knows quite well the power of retweets, which not only flatter the person retweeted and allow for engagement with and direct encouragement of his followers, but also allows him to send messages that he doesn't have to take responsibility for, as they are not his own. This is a lesson learned from journalists, who maintain their image of objectivity and factuality by using quotes from others, rather than making their own statements. If I say the moon is made of green cheese, and the news media quote me saying so, then what they have printed is true, it is true that I said that the moon is made of green cheese, and it doesn't matter that the content of my statement is actually false.

If Trump's televisual image is cool in McLuhan's terms, his use of this type of social media is what McLuhan called hot, that is, intense and provocative, in keeping with the hotter nature of text. The two complement each other, heating things up via social media, cooling them down via television, and the telephone, which he also uses quite effectively when he calls in to TV news programs.

So far, he has been able to convey a sense of genuine authenticity through his direct, seemingly off the cuff comments, which come across as not filtered through the typical kind of diplomacy and political double talk of other candidates, neither politically correct nor drawing on weasel words to avoid making clear and direct statements. McLuhan observed back in the early days of television that the electronic medium favors real life, and reality TV is just the latest manifestation of this bias, one that is shared by social media. It is worth recalling that reality programming is actually created by a host of unseen production people, running cameras, lighting, microphones, interviewing, etc., and then edited to create a narrative, and that social media can also be used in a deliberate and planned manner to create a semblance of spontaneity.

Trump makes almost all of his opponents appear phony by way of contrast. This will certainly be the case if and when he goes up against Clinton; Sanders, whose messages have been remarkably consistent, would give him more trouble on this score, as he also has conveyed a strong sense of authenticity. Trump differs, though, in being quite inconsistent, but his bouncing from topic to topic, from hot text to cool video, and even from one position to another, has managed to keep his opponents, and the journalists covering him, very much off balance, while keeping his audience entertained, and his followers stimulated and energized.

Reagan was known as the Teflon President, because no matter how many times he said things that turned out to be false, or otherwise displayed his ignorance on his topic or misspoke in some way, nothing would stick to him, that is, nothing affected his popularity. Trump is very much reminiscent of Reagan, and has that same Teflon quality about him. Not slick, just non-stick. Indeed, much of the negative response to Trump strongly mirrors the criticisms of Reagan, which is why I believe Trump will wind up in the White House as well. As for the criticisms of Trump's public speaking, characterized by a kind of stream of consciousness nonlinearity, they pale in comparison to what was said about George W. Bush's lack of fluency and malapropisms, what became known as his Bushisms. I would also note that W., our first MBA president, also tooted his business background. Trump's similarities to our last two two-term Republican presidents lead to me to think that Trump has much better than even odds for being elected for one term, at least.

Trump will be our first designer president, our first brand name Commander-in-Chief. Whether he could defeat a Democratic opponent like Bill Clinton or Barack Obama is hard to say, but Hillary Clinton is another story. Simply put, she does not come across all that well on television, and whatever social media competency her staff enjoys is not enough to compensate. Her strong negatives will to a large extent cancel out those of Trump. We would do well to remember how Gore lost the presidency in 2000. And sure, he won the popular vote, but with the economy booming under Bill Clinton, and the country safe and secure in the period between the end of the Cold War and the new reality that would emerge after 9/11, Gore should have won in a landslide, rather than make it so close that his opponent could claim victory by the margin of a handful of hanging chads. Gore lost because his image, his appearance and personality, did not work well as content for the electronic media. Hillary Clinton has a similar kind of awkward quality to her, and and having tied herself so closely to President Obama, will have a harder time overcoming her inherent limitations, and will be especially vulnerable should anything go wrong domestically, especially with the economy, or in regards to our foreign affairs. Also having a public identity intimately tied to her husband is a two-edged sword.

Win or lose, the race for the Republican nomination has turned into a referendum on Trump. Assuming he gets the nod, the general election will be as well. The presidency will be his to win or lose. As it stands right now, I think the odds are in his favor. And maybe I'm wrong. And there certainly are many other factors that can intervene between now and November. But if you understand the contemporary American media environment, you have to take Trump very, very seriously. And you have to understand that every aspect of American society has been and continues to be radically mutated by our new modes of communication.