Neil Postman Amusing Ourselves To Death Analysis

Neil postman was a jack of all trades, he was an American Author, an educator at New York University, media theorist, and cultural critic. (PressThink 1) In 1985 Neil Postman published a book called Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourage in the Age of show Business. The book provides a look at what happens when politics, journalism, education and even religion become subject to the demands of entertainment. In his book Amusing Ourselves to Death Postman says that the content of a culture is contained in its communication, and that the content of communication is affected by the medium of communication. In other words, Postman is saying that a culture is defined by its connection of people, and the connection of people is afflicted by technology. Sherry Turkle is another author that has written a book called Alone Together published in January 2011. Sherry Turkle is an award winning professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology where she focuses her research on human technology interaction. Alone Together is the results of Turkle’s nearly fifteen year exploration of our lives with technology, she describes new unsettling relationships between friends, family, parents and children, and new instabilities in how we understand privacy and community. There is a third author named Julia Angwin that has developed a book that connects with Postman’s argument. Julia Angwin is an award winning investigative journalist at a news organization called ProPublica. (About)

Journalist, Clive Thompson in his book, “Smarter Than You Think”, specifically in the chapter titled, “Public Thinking”, published on September 12, 2013, addresses the topic of technology and argues that because of the internet, we are doing more writing now than ever. Therefore technology is helping us think publicly in new and improved ways. He supports this claim by asserting that there is an improvement in our writing, which is happening because of the “audience effect”, he then goes on to say that anything we write changes the way we think, and finally he talks about how the internet builds connections, which is essential to the spread of new ideas. Thompson’s purpose is to inform readers about how the internet is a tool being used to advance our society in order to encourage more people to partake in online, public thinking. He adopts a contemplative tone for his audience, the readers of The New York Times, and others interested in the topic of technology. It is my intention in this paper to analyze the author’s subclaims and use of rhetorical strategies.

The use of technology has catalyzed society into an era that is increasingly interconnected yet impersonal at the same time. Despite technology’s endless list of assets, many fail to acknowledge its shortcomings when mentioning what is lost as a result of using it. Although in “Great to Watch” by Maggie Nelson, she is not afraid to share her skepticism of technology, as well as the role it plays in desensitizing individuals on a day-to-day basis. The internet is an invaluable resource to many because it is a public domain for sharing ideas, opinions, and knowledge that any and everyone can have access to. In a sense, it does not restrict what someone may see or do, and this can either be a good thing or a bad thing. The booming use of new media

Technology may not be everything it seems. Although worldwide use of various devices and applications has revolutionized the way we live and our culture in a powerful and helpful way, there are many ramifications to be considered. The consequence to this revolution of culture and way of life is carefully observed and portrayed by M.T. Anderson in his novel Feed. Anderson uses the literary art of satire to create characters that are exaggerated versions of people today to reveal their uncontrollable obsession with technology.

The evolution of technology is constantly occurring in order to be more helpful in society. Therefore, a new gadget comes out within months or a year because of how it’s constantly evolving and how clients always ask for more. Andrew Sullivan wrote an essay in 2005 and talked the once popular iPod. In his essay, “Society Is Dead, We Have Retreated into the iWorld,” Andrew Sullivan uses the rhetorical triangle, visual imagery, and one of the rhetorical appeals, logos, to achieve his purpose of how technology has impacted human interactions.

Postman’s argument that through technology we are “amusing ourselves to death” is also relevant to the age of Internet. With the Internet we have many different sources available to get a lot of information quickly. But, do we truly understand all the information? Postman thinks we take things out of context and do not reason anymore. Also, look how entertaining the Internet can be. YouTube has videos and other media. You can download music and movies. Social media is entertainment as well.

Each and everyday around the world there are new advances in technology attempting to make life more simple. In the article by Nicholas Carr, “Is Google Making Us Stupid?”, Carr explains his beliefs on how the internet is causing mental issues in today's society. Carr starts with his own opinion, he says the Internet is causing him to lose focus quickly. He cannot stay hooked to a book. He writes about his life being surrounded by the internet and how it has created problems, like not being able to stay focused on a reading; but it is interesting how he says the Internet has been a ‘godsend’ in his chosen profession. Carr uses a great deal of rhetorical appeals to try to connect with the audience. He compares the past and the present and how it has altered the

We as a society have gotten so lost in technology that we have lost sight of the real important things and set some of the least important things as priorities. Do not get me wrong, technology is great and we have made some amazing advancements with it; however, the mistake we made was not limiting our use of it enough, causing us to become very dependent on it. Neil Postman, author of Amusing Ourselves to Death makes some very strong arguments about why he believes technology is taking over and causing a lot of harm, a lot of which I do agree with; however, he also makes some very weak points that I completely disagree with.

Nicholas Carr is the author of books concerning technology and culture. One of his most recent bestsellers regarding the topic is his work titled What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains. In the summer of 2008, Carr’s piece, Is Google Making Us Stupid?, was published in The Atlantic Monthly. In this essay, Carr declares that the Internet is altering the way people think (500). Carr writes that the Internet lowers the ability for concentration and consideration (501). He believes the ability to read and understand a lengthy piece of writing has also been practically entirely lost (Carr 501). Carr additionally states that the Internet has severed our capability to interpret text (502).

The only way humans can interact with each other is by communicating. Communicating is getting a message across to someone else, however Neil Postman who wrote Amusing Ourselves to Death points out that there are many different ways this can be done. How content is presented regulates how it comes across and therefore how we react to it. There are many different ways messages can be sent, it could be through speech, gestures, writing, TV, or the newspaper. However, all these forms of communication that people utilize currently haven’t always existed. What our culture is like largely depends on what kind of form communication takes regulating how our brains think about oncoming details. The way the message is sent helps the reader to interpret

Clive Thompson and Neil Postman are authors who discuss specific mediums through writing. Postman writes about the television and newspaper and Thompson writes about the internet age. Both of these authors use the same approach on their respected mediums. In comparison they both have the same piece of writing. Comparing side by side, it reveals a bigger idea that the communication medium always outweigh the cons.

I don’t think the specific knowledge a student needs to succeed in school can be defined. It all depends on what you want to learn, what you find interesting, or simply whatever knowledge you may need to get a degree. In Neil Postman’s book Amusing Ourselves to Death, he devotes a whole chapter to epistemology. Epistemology is the study of knowledge. Do you ever dread going to those long lecture classes or those classes where you strictly read or write?

Among nerds and Trekkies, Neil Postman’s portrayal of the Typographic Mind perhaps sounds very much like the mind of Mr. Spock. Like the Vulcan Mind, the Typographic Mind, utilizes a logical and rational method, it is both detached and objective. Imaginably, the Vulcans were a culture submerged in the printed word. The author paints a picture of the American written word-based culture of the eighteenth and nineteenth century in “The Typographic Mind”. He calls this the Age of Exposition in his fourth chapter of his book, Amusing Ourselves to Death. He portrays the influence on public discourse when based on the written word. It defines the content, the effects on the audience and shapes the spheres of public life in politics, religion, and

In this brief editorial adapted by Eliana Dockterman, "The Digital Parent Trap" portrays the current battle between a child's world with and without technology. As many schools and parents are split between the two decisions, Dockterman finds a way to be the tie breaker through her persuasion and smooth rhetorical devices. Docktermon tries her best to convince the readers that technology is okay in moderation, and builds her argument through word choice. With the formality of her diction and her many reliable sources to persuade the reader, she seems to have everything she needs to get the job done.

Technology has changed so many of the ways in which we live our lives, from the invention of the wheel to the advanced systems we use and take for granted everyday. Technology was once taboo in most house holds while people still clung to the idea that life was built on life experiences. Nicholas Carr stated in, Is Goggle making us stupid? "Back in the fourth century, BCE, Plato complained that writing (then a fairly new technology) was destroying peoples memory, yet he wrote dozens of books. For half a century, television has been accused of rotting our brains and making us fat and lazy, but most people depend on it for info, news and entertainment." Technology has changed our understanding of the way things work and