Got a blog tip? Contact us
« Speaking of precocious children | Main | More on watching television »
Leslie Stahl in 1984
Regarding the television discussion, I thought I'd throw out another anecdote: In 1984, CBS ran a piece by Leslie Stahl that included footage of President Reagan visiting people at nursing homes and interacting with the handicapped. The report criticized Reagan and discussed how his funding cuts were actively harming these people. But after it ran, Reagan's campaign called to thank Stahl for the report. She couldn't believe it, but Regan's rep told her something to the effect of "no one listens to the words." And he turned out to be right. A subsequent "CBS study found that less than 25 percent of Stahl’s audience understood her message while most thought that her piece was a positive news story on Ronald Reagan." (source) As Stahl later told an MIT audience:
When the pictures are emotional and powerful and when you are saying something that conflicts with them, the messages aren’t married; the pictures will drown out what you say.
Posted by carrie on 05/07/2005 | Permalink
Comments
I've cited that Leslie Stahl story many times to explain how TV pictures totally outweigh language.
We absolutely NEED to teach Media Literacy in schools starting in the lowest grades. We need to catch kids no later than ten years old. That's about the age when kids start to develop a cynicism about adults and their motivations which is why Mad magazine has always been popular with kids that age.
Posted by: Bob Pagani | May 8, 2005 5:38:25 AM
FYI - this Leslie Stahl anecdote is well-covered & reproduced in Bill Moyer's 1989 PBS documentary "Illusions of News" - and I would argue (against Carrie's post) that Moyers's piece is a perfect example of how TV can convey some complex & sophisticated arguments better than print. Just because every medium has limitations and strengths doesn't mean we need to place them on a totalizing hierarchy (as does Postman).
Posted by: jason | May 9, 2005 10:13:16 AM
So you think McLuhan was all wrong, huh? The medium isn't the message?
Posted by: Carrie McLaren | May 10, 2005 11:33:19 AM
The medium is a message, but not the message. We ignore the norms, biases, and limitations of medium at our own peril (Leslie Stahl's lesson), but it is equally perilous to assume that content & form is meaningless in the face of an all-determining technology. If the medium is the message, then all blogs are equally democratic (or restrictive), all magazines are equally noxious in erasing hierarchies between content, etc. If the medium is the message, why should us creators of messages even bother? We should all become engineers & coders to create new media.
Posted by: jason | May 10, 2005 12:00:31 PM
I certainly agree with you that content and form aren't meaningless, and so would McLuhan and Postman! Your interpretation of the medium is the message is really a perversion of it. A straw argument.
Posted by: Carrie McLaren | May 10, 2005 1:33:06 PM
OK - if you're not invoking strong technological determinism (which I think Postman does in fact assume), what did you mean by invoking McLuhan to rebut my point that TV can offer complex argumentation despite some perceived medium limits?
And if you want to use hardcore McLuhan as a defense of your position, how do you account for his celebration of TV as a much more active & participatory (and cognitively engaging) than "hot" media like print & film?
Posted by: jason | May 10, 2005 2:01:06 PM
