“The medium is the message,” wrote Marshall McLuhan in 1964. This rings true today, but was it always the case? What’s more, how can this phrase illuminate the political and ideological forces of a particular time and place?
In Red Tape: Radio and Politics in Czechoslovakia, 1945–1969, Rosamund Johnston explores the impact of media—in this case, radio—on the Czech and Slovak people during the Communist period. Although she is not concerned with McLuhan’s theory of communication, Johnston’s study indeed raises questions about how media shapes collective consciousness and about the relationship between citizens and information propagation.
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