Joshua Meyrowitz

Template:WAP assignment Joshua Meyrowitz is a professor of communications at the department of Communication at the University of New Hampshire in Durham. He has published works regarding the effects of mass media, including No Sense of Place: The Impact of Electronic Media on Social Behavior, an analysis of the effects various media technologies have caused, particularly television.

No Sense of Place

In No Sense of Place, which won the 1986 "Best Book on Electronic Media" Award of the National Association of Broadcasters and the Broadcast Education Association, Meyrowitz uses the example of the television to describe how communication technologies have shaped and influenced the social relations we encounter on a daily basis, proposing that television has been responsible for a significant cultural shift towards new and egalitarian social interactions. He argues that television is a "secret exposing" machine that allows individuals to watch others in an unprecedented fashion. According to Meyrowitz, new media like television have removed barriers and increased access to previously restricted information is responsible for the shift in cultural and social barriers between children and adults, men and women, and even humanizing and demystifying the powerful. The book is based on his doctoral dissertation also entitled No Sense of Place, which was completed in 1978 in the Media Ecology doctoral program at New York University; Christine Nystrom was Meyrowitz's thesis adviser, and the other members of his dissertation committee were Henry Perkinson and Neil Postman. In 1982, Postman published The Disappearance of Childhood, which discussed themes similar to one of the case studies in Meyrowitz's dissertation.

Meyrowitz draws upon Erving Goffman's work on social life, in the form of face-to-face interactions, as a kind of multi-stage drama (primarily from Goffman's work The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life) and Marshall McLuhan's work on changes in media of communication (primarily from McLuhan's works The Gutenberg Galaxy: The Making of Typographic Man and Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man). It has been suggested that Meyrowitz was either the first person to combine these theories for analysis, or he was the first to do so in a meaningful way.

Meyrowitz posits his initial theory, that modern electronic media (in this case, primarily in the form of television) have broken barriers that established concepts of place (i.e., cultural understanding of roles, locations, hierarchies, and more). He presents this view throughout the book, examining how it relates to different aspects of social and cultural construction (including the public versus private spheres of life, group identity, authority and hierarchy, etiquette, gender identity and gender roles, and childhood and adulthood).

The book's central contention is that new media like television have removed barriers in a manner unseen with media like print publications (including books and newspapers), radio, telephone, cinema, and other forms of mass media that predate television. Meyrowitz argues that it is the ease of use, ubiquity or nearly universal access to this information, and the blurring of front-stage and back-stage behavior that removes previous barriers of information (p. 53). Meyrowitz uses the example of relative access to books contrasted to access to television content. Further, he argues that books require a greater degree of literacy and varying levels of literacy and comprehension than does television (pp. 73-81). Examples offered include a parent's ability to restrict a child's access to particular types of literature contrasted with a child's easy access to various types of content on television, cultural barriers like guilds and professions that exclude non-members from access to specialized information, and the blending of traditionally private (or back-stage) environments into public (or front-stage) environments as in the case of televised Presidential cabinet meetings.

Reviews and Criticism

A review of abstracts of articles citing "No Sense of Place" shows that the book has been generally well received. Likewise, this indicates a relatively high heuristic value to the academy. The book has been described as being "one of the most insightful books" regarding mass media and as having "staying power" and usefulness as a theory. The heuristic value and "staying power" of the book are attributed to the fact that the book examines the subject from a broad perspective, making it a readily adaptable resource and broadly applicable. Moreover, it is written in a style that can be read and understood by readers both inside and outside of academia.

However, "No Sense of Place" is also criticized as proposing modern media communication as the singular cause of change. These causal connections between the media and social and cultural changes without exploring other possible factors or influences. Lindlof also argues that some of the changes that Meyrowitz describes, e.g., the emergence of a middle stage from the perspective of media and the audience, may not be permanent and that adaptations to use of the media and its interpretations may evolve. This view of technology and the way users of technology may adapt its use and meaning is akin to Social Construction of Technology theory and the Dual Capacity model of communication. Social Construction of Technology theory argues that use of media is influenced by an agent's (both senders and receivers) attitudes and behaviors, their expertise of the medium, and external influences on the agents/users of the medium. In part, Channel Expansion Theory argues that a medium's influence of the user will diminish over time, while that user's proficiency with the medium will increase their agency in its use and understanding, as well as the receiver's perceived social influence.

Others have used "No Sense of Place" to support the notion that one's sense of place or location is "disembedded from local context" ; thus, it is less defined by physical space than by the "electronic landscape" of media. He writes that media like television offer viewers a way of understanding their physical location merely one community of many possible communities in which they exist. These newer electronic media promote the establishment of group identity by "undermining the relationship between the physical location and information access." This is seen as especially true of mobile media (e.g., mobile phones), which allow for the medium to travel with the user, as well as creating the ability to be connected to (or "present" in) more than one place at the same time.

"Mediating Communication: What Happens?"

In the article "Mediating Communication: What Happens?", Meyrowitz explores television as providing a new form of human experience, one which distorts traditional social distinctions by discussing ideas of changed childhood, blended genders, and demystified leaders.

Changed childhood

According to Meyrowitz, television is the "secret-exposing machine", letting children in on the "biggest secret of all, 'the secret of secrecy'". Children become exposed to a variety of images and information, which "dilutes the innocence of childhood and the authority of the adults". Prior to television, parents could be completely aware of what their children were reading, making the censoring of information easier, compared to the lack of control parents have when it comes to television. As children become older the level at which they were able to read increases, allowing children to gradually explore adult issues. Television blurs the boundaries between children and adults because children are now given earlier access to information about those adult issues. Meyrowitz argues that it is for this reason that children appreciate television so much, it is able to "extend their horizons of experience".

Blended genders

Meyrowitz postulates that television has broken down distinctions between the sexes, enabling women to become aware of public realms of sport, war, politics and medicine and conversely for men to become in touch with their emotional, private side. He claims this has led "toward more career-oriented women and more family-oriented men, toward more work-oriented homes and more family-oriented workplaces", in essence a blending of the genders.

Demystified leaders

Meyrowitz states that prior to the saturation of television in society, our political leaders had been treated as a "mystified presence", at a status above the common citizen, as it was easier to control the flow of information that represented who they were and what they did. Although television is a useful tool for our politicians in trying to create this status, it "tends to mute differences between levels of social class". Meyrowitz terms this "a double-edge sword", as over-exposure of a political leader diminishes their power, with their continuous presence making them seem more ordinary and less mystified. This over-exposure is difficult to balance with under-exposure, as without media presence a leader has minimal power over people, yet with exceeding presence they lose power. Because of the immediacy of information to the common citizen about all issues of society, they are now able to closely inspect the image of our leaders, creating a demystification of their presence.

See also

• Broadcasting
• Medium Theory
• Dramaturgical perspective
• Social construction of technology