Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-q99xh Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-23T00:16:51.027Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Bias of Communication*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 November 2014

H. A. Innis
H. A. Innis*
Affiliation:
The University of Toronto
Get access

Extract

The appearance of a wide range of cultural phenomena at different periods in the history of western civilization has been described by Professor A. L. Kroeber in Configurations of Cultural Growth (Berkeley, 1946). He makes suggestive comments at various points to explain the relative strength or weakness of cultural elements but refrains from extended discussion. I do not propose to do more than add a footnote to these comments and in this to discuss the possible significance of communication to the rise and decline of cultural traits. A medium of communication has an important influence on the dissemination of knowledge over space and over time and it becomes necessary to study its characteristics in order to appraise its influence in its cultural setting. According to its characteristics it may be better suited to the dissemination of knowledge over time than over space, particularly if the medium is heavy and durable and not suited to transportation; or to the dissemination of knowledge over space than over time, particularly if the medium is light and easily transported. The relative emphasis on time or space will imply a bias of significance to the culture in which it is imbedded.

Immediately we venture on this inquiry we are compelled to recognize the bias of the period in which we work. An interest in the bias of other civilizations may in itself suggest a bias of our own. Our knowledge of other civilizations depends in large part on the character of the media used by each civilization in so far as it is capable of being preserved or of being made accessible by discovery as in the case of the results of archaeological expeditions. Writing on clay and on stone has been preserved more effectively than that on papyrus. Since durable commodities emphasize time and continuity, studies of civilization such as Toynbee's tend to have a bias toward religion and to show a neglect of problems of space, notably administration and law. The bias of modern civilization incidental to the newspaper and the radio will presume a perspective in consideration of civilizations dominated by other media. We can do little more than urge that we must be continually alert to the implications of this bias and perhaps hope that consideration of the implications of other media to various civilizations may enable us to see more clearly the bias of our own. In any case we will become a little more humble as to the characteristics of our civilization.

Type
Articles
Information
Canadian Journal of Economics and Political Science/Revue canadienne de economiques et science politique , Volume 15 , Issue 4 , November 1949 , pp. 457 - 476
Copyright
Copyright © Canadian Political Science Association 1949

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

*

A paper presented at the University of Michigan on April 18, 1949.

References

1 Childe, V. G., What Happened in History (New York, 1946), p. 150.Google Scholar

2 See Driver, G. R., Semitic Writing from Pictograph to Alphabet (London, 1948), p. 59.Google Scholar

3 Smith, J. M. P., The Origin and History of Hebrew Law (Chicago, 1931), p. 55.Google Scholar

4 Harrison, J. E., Prolegomena to the Study of Greek Religion (Cambridge, 1908), p. 568.Google Scholar

5 Nietzsche, F., The Birth of Tragedy from the Spirit of Music (Edinburgh, 1923), pp. 120–7.Google Scholar

6 Ferguson, W. S., The Treasures of Athena (Cambridge, 1923), p. 178.Google Scholar

7 “The build of the Roman sentence was but another consequence of Rome's battles which in giving her conquests forced her people as a nation to think administratively” (Spengler).

8 Glover, T. R., The Conflict of Religions in the Early Roman Empire (London, 1932), p. 17.Google Scholar

9 Altheim, Franz, A History of Roman Religion (London, 1938), p. 330.Google Scholar

10 Cornish, Vaughan, The Great Capitals: An Historical Geography (London, 1923), p. 140.Google Scholar

11 Myers, J. L., The Political Ideas of the Greeks (New York, 1927), pp. 308–16.Google Scholar

12 Osterreich, T. K., Possession Demoniacal and Other, among Primitive Races, in Antiquity, the Middle Ages, and Modern Times (London, 1930), p. 160.Google Scholar

13 Farrington, Benjamin, Science and Politics in the Ancient World (London, 1939), p. 46.Google Scholar

14 Lang, P. H., Music in Western Civilization (New York, 1941), p. 46.Google Scholar

15 The minuscule was a descendant of papyrus cursive writing which had been submerged by the vellum uncials after the fourth century. See Kenyon, F. G., The Palaeography of Greek Papyrus (Oxford, 1899), pp. 1124–5.Google Scholar

16 Clodd, Edward, The Story of the Alphabet (New York, 1913), p. 182.Google Scholar

17 Jaeger, Warner, Humanism and Theology (Milwaukee, 1943), p. 24.Google Scholar

18 Diringer, D., The Alphabet (London, n.d.), p. 475.Google Scholar

19 Pollard, A. W., Early Illustrated Books (New York, 1927), pp. 7–8.Google Scholar

20 Cited Trevelyan, G. M., English Social History (London, 1946), p. 124.Google Scholar

21 Jaeger, , Humanism and Theology, p. 14.Google Scholar

22 Trevelyan, , English Social History, p. 58.Google Scholar

23 Plomer, H. R., A Short History of English Printing (New York, 1927), p. 169.Google Scholar

24 Lewis, M. M., Language in Society (London, 1947), p. 38.Google Scholar

25 See Gates, L. G., Three Studies in Literature (New York, 1899), pp. 50 ff.Google Scholar; also Greig, J. A., Francis Jeffery of the Edinburgh Review (Edinburgh, 1948).Google Scholar On the influence of Roman law on Adam Smith see the Right HonourableMacmillan, Lord Two Ways of Thinking (Cambridge, 1934), pp. 28–30.Google Scholar

26 Macdonagh, Michael, The Reporters Gallery (London, n.d.), p. 236.Google Scholar

27 See Aspinall, A., Politics and the Press, 1780-1850 (London, 1949)Google Scholar; and Wickwar, W. H., The Struggle for the Freedom of the Press, 1819-1882 (London, 1928).Google Scholar

28 Neff, Emery, A Revolution in European Poetry, 1600-1900 (New York, 1940), p. 110.Google Scholar

29 Samuelson, James (ed.), The Civilization of Our Day (London, 1896), p. 277.Google Scholar

30 Bradsher, E. L., Mathew Carey, Editor, Author and Publisher: A Study in American Literary Development (New York, 1912), p. 79 Google Scholar; and Tooker, L. F., The Joys and Tribulations of an Editor (New York, 1923), pp. 3–10.Google Scholar

31 Harper, J. H., The House of Harper (New York, 1912), p. 89.Google Scholar

32 Ibid., p. 108.

33 Spender, J. A., The Public Life (London, 1925), p. 48.Google Scholar

34 Spender, Harold, The Fire of Life: A Book of Memoirs (London, n.d.), p. 36.Google Scholar

35 Haldane, Viscount, Selected Addresses and Essays (London, 1928), p. 22.Google Scholar

36 Pemberton, Max, Lord Northcliffe: A Memoir (New York, n.d.), p. 62.Google Scholar

37 Hale, O. J., Publicity and Diplomacy, with Special Reference to England and Germany, 1890-1914 (New York, 1940), p. 209.Google Scholar