Canadian journal of communication | 2019
Flash, Spirit, Plex, Stretch: A Trans-Disciplinary View of the Media Sensorium
Abstract
Background \xa0This article takes a transdisciplinary view of the media sensorium by applying humanities, social science, and engineering perspectives to the relationships among sensory perception, cognition, and how people come to understand their worlds through the senses. Analysis \xa0The goal of this article is to engage with the provocation that the sensorium, a concept that Marshall McLuhan brought to media studies in the 1960s, provides the lens through which we observe that communication is the expression of cognition via the combined potentiality of physiology and technology. “Sensory technologies” are used as analytical vehicles in a technological journey from the Walkman to 21st-century telecommunications.\xa0 Conclusion and implications\xa0 \xa0The reader is given a call to action to use the full spectrum of the sensorium to locate and act on transformative contemporary processes underway. Contexte\xa0\xa0 Cet article adopte une approche transdisciplinaire envers le sensorium mediatique en appliquant des perspectives provenant des sciences humaines, des lettres et de l’ingenierie aux rapports entre la perception sensorielle, la cognition et la maniere dont nous apprehendons notre monde par les sens. Analyse\xa0\xa0 L’article a pour but d’examiner cette idee provocatrice que le sensorium—concept que Marshall McLuhan applique aux medias dans les annees 1960—nous permet d’observer comment la communication, en exploitant un potentiel a la fois physiologique et technologique, parvient a exprimer la pensee. Ainsi, les « technologies sensorielles » servent de vehicules analytiques dans un voyage technologique qui va du Walkman des annees 1970 jusqu’aux telecommunications du present siecle. Conclusions et implications\xa0\xa0 Cet article invite le lecteur a maximiser le potentiel du sensorium afin de reperer les processus transformatifs en cours actuellement et d’agir sur eux .