Evoluon of Media Culture in the Context of McLuhan’s Typology: History,
Reality, Prospects
Kirillova NB
*
Federal State Autonomous Educaonal Instuon of Higher Professional Educaon, Lenina Prospeсt, Oce, Ekaterinburg, Russia
*
Corresponding author: Kirillova NB, Federal State Autonomous Educaonal Instuon of Higher Professional Educaon, 51 Lenina Prospeсt,
Oce 41B, Ekaterinburg, 620083, Russia, Tel: 8-800-100-50-44; E-mail: kirillovanatalyaborisovna@mail.ru
Received date: June 13, 2016; Accepted date: June 23, 2016; Published date: June 23, 2016
Copyright: © 2016 Kirillova NB. This is an open-access arcle distributed under the terms of the Creave Commons Aribuon License, which
permits unrestricted use, distribuon, and reproducon in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Citaon: Kirillova NB. Evoluon of Media Cultur e in the Con t e x t of McLuhan’ s T ypology: His t or y , R eality , Pr ospects. Global Media Journal.
2016, 14: 26.
Abstract
The
arcle aims to study the theorecal aspects of the
communicave system’s development dynamics in the
context of H. M. McLuhan’s historical typology. Adopng
the theorecal and comparave analysis methods, the
author shows that media, or communicave, culture has
evolved
signicantly over the years. On the basis of
McLuhan’s cultural typology, the author conducts a
thorough analysis of the historical periods reecng the
evoluon process of media culture (the pre-wring era,
the millennium of phonec wring, the “Gutenberg
Galaxy”, the “Marconi Galaxy”) and provides a theorecal
generalizaon thereof. The arcle is brought to conclusion
with an analysis of the informaon era that can be
dened, taking into consideraon the latest priories, as
the “Internet Galaxy”. Informaon and communicaon
technologies along with the modern media (computer
channels, the Web, mobile communicaons, D-Cinema,
television, photography, mulmedia, etc.) have created a
global media environment, in which various civilizaons
and cultures co-exist. Moreover, at the turn of
Millennium, people live in two worlds at the same me: in
the real world and in virtual reality. Cyberspace has
become a popular living environment and a new
communicaon medium for the humankind. Thus, the
author recapitulates the conceptual foundaons of the
media systems’ evoluon, going from basic means of
communicaon typical of primive cultures to the global
informaon space where the dialogue and polylogue of
cultures and their interacon are thought to be
perspecve ways of communicaon between civilizaons.
Keywords: Communicave culture; McLuhan; Media;
Media culture; Global media space; Internet; Virtual reality;
Informaonal civilizaon; Dialogue and polylogue of cultures;
Screen culture
Introducon
The pernence of the research topic stems from the
growing role of media culture and informaon and
communicaon technologies perceived as factors inuencing
society and the individual psychology, polics, economics and
the state management system. This poses new challenges to
media studies. A great number of researchers – historians,
cultural studies scholars, sociologists, philosophers – have
made aempts to create a theorecal concepon that would
expose the evoluon of the media culture development as a
“system of informaon and communicaon means that
mankind has elaborated in the course of its cultural and
historical development” and as a dialecc unity of tradions
and innovaons in its dynamics [1]. However, the
comprehensive study of media (lat. medium, i.e., means,
mediator), or medialogy, has not yet occupied the place it
deserves within the humanies, for the lack of new research
methods [2].
According to the philosopher M. Mamardashvili, “every
generaon produces culture anew… In case a generaon
performs an act… which pushes history forward, everything
that existed before is equally pushed forward. We determine,
on this basis, to what kind of history we belong, what we are
maintaining, what we inherit, because this specic act
determines connuity” [3].
A key feature of media, or communicave, culture is that
“it includes the ‘communicaon’ between the new era and the
old one, the preservaon and development of the whole…
society perceived a social whole” [4].
In keeping with the typology exposed by H. M. McLuhan, -
(this year, the world community celebrates the 95th
anniversary of the birth of this well-known sociologist and
medialogist), - it is possible to disnguish the following periods
in the history of the media: 1) the pre-wring era in Barbaric
sociees; 2) the era of the alphabet and phonecal wring; 3)
the “Gutenberg Galaxy” and the development of print culture;
4) the “Marconi Galaxy” and the formaon and evoluon of
electronic culture. At the turn of the 21st century, the
Research Article
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“Internet Galaxy” has become a key technology of the
informaon era [5].
McLuhan’s cultural typology is based on the statement,
according to which “the kind of a society is determined, to a
large extent, by the kind of communicaon that dominates this
society, and the human percepon is determined by the speed
with which informaon is transmied” [6].
This research study results in providing a theorecal
foundaon for the evoluon dynamics of media, or
communicave, culture in dierent historical periods.
Methodology
Our methods of studying the
evoluon processes of media
culture in world history involved such important aspects as
connuity and breaches in the civilizaonal and cultural
dynamics, peculiaries of transion periods, paerns and
specics in history, etc. When analyzing these issues, we also
gave special aenon to the interdisciplinary nature of our
research based on synergecs, one of the cornerstones of the
modern scienc percepon of the world. The emergence of
the synergec approach is directly related to the discoveries
made by two natural sciensts, I. Prigogine, a Belgian scienst
and Nobel laureate, and the German laser physicist H. Haken
who, in 1970, gave the name “synergecs” (gr. synergeia, i.e.
joint, coordinated acons) to a new interdisciplinary eld of
study. Prigogine’s theory, developed in his “Order out of
Chaos”, provides a methodological basis and analysis tools for
studying the theorecal foundaons of the evoluon of media
culture within McLuhan’s typology, without which this paper
would not have been possible [7].
Akhiezer also made a valuable contribuon to the
development of the synergec approach in the historical and
cultural research studies by linking cultural anthropology with
history and sociology. Last but not least, Y. Lotman examined
the three levels of inuence (conceptual, category and
methodological) that synergecs had on the development of
the humanies and, in line with I. Prigogine, emphasized the
“explosive” nature of cultural evoluon, which provided the
tle for one of his last works [8].
Results
Pre-wring in Barbaric sociees
It should be noted that this is the longest period in human
history, given that the rst creatures of the Homo family
appeared about 4 million years ago and Homo sapiens began
to evolve about 100,000 years ago.
Syncresm (gr. syncres, i.e., connecon), in other words,
undierenaon of forms is the main disncve feature of
primive culture. Absence of wring is another important
feature of this me period, resulng in slow paces of
informaon accumulaon and of cultural and social evoluon.
Work served as the major informaon channel of culture at
the early stages of primive society when verbal
communicaon was limited. The transmission of meaning
relang to work operaons was dealt with in non-verbal form,
without the use of words. Demonstraon and imitaon
(“aping”) were the main means of communicaon and
informaon transmission.
Rituals were non-verbal “texts” of primive culture. Along
with the sign language, drums, cave painngs, ritual acons,
transmied from generaon to generaon, they served as
tradions, and their knowledge dened the level of culture of
a society. The evoluon of language and speech led to the
emergence of a new communicaon channel, that is, oral
verbal communicaon which has a posive impact on thinking
capacies and the development of individual self-conscience.
“A myth (gr. word, speech, legend) lies at the foundaon of
primive culture; myth-making is a way of understanding the
surrounding world.” Present in all spheres of life of primive
people, myth became a unique “communicave system and a
way of being in peace with the world” [9].
Having emerged as a fundamental cultural category in
primive society, myths helped mankind to adapt to the
surrounding world and to start regarding nature as part of
everyday life.
The era of the alphabet and phonec wring
Mesopotamian cuneiform script and Egypan hieroglyphs
that were in use unl the end of the 4th millennium BCE, are
some of the well-known pre-alphabec wring systems.
The rst alphabet appeared in 2000 BCE. Although based on
Egypan hieroglyphs, it was intended for use by Hebrews
working in Egypt.
A new variety of wring appeared in Ancient Greece in early
1st millennium BCE. The Greeks found signs to represent
vowels and modied exisng signs that represented
consonants making them suitable for the Greek language. The
system of the Ancient Greek alphabet was later adopted as a
basis for Lan and Slavic (Cyrillic and Glagolic) alphabets [10].
The emergence of the alphabet and wring is related to the
period of development of ancient culture which retained its
highly mythologized form throughout its existence. Moreover,
it assimilated and elaborated disparate tribal myths, merging
them into one religious and mythological system. In 8th -7th
centuries BCE, Homer’s poems, “The Iliad” and “The Odyssey”,
and Hesiod’s “Theogony” and “Works and Days” gave Greek
mythology its nal shape, providing a foundaon for ancient
world percepon in general.
Ancient Greek philosophy and art also emerged from
mythology and made use of its imagery, despite the fact that
philosophical thinking, unlike mythological one, tries to explain
reality by means of raonal, logical reasoning and by drawing
upon abstract noons.
Famous Greek philosophers (Thales of Miletus, Heraclites
and Herodotus, Democritus and Socrates, Plato and Aristotle,
etc.) supported their ideas with facts and logic, not with
myths. For example, Socrates emphasized the role of
knowledge, the study of human soul and moral educaon.
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Teachings of Plato and Aristotle, seen as the apex of Greek
philosophy, brought together ancient representaons of the
world, society and mankind, along with those of truth,
goodness and beauty [1].
Ancient Greek art, closely related to mythology, occupies a
place apart in culture. Architecture, sculpture, (Myron, Phidias,
Polykleitos, Praxiteles), lyric poetry (Anacreon, Sappho), drama
(Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides, Aristophanes), theatre
develop independently from each other.
Roman culture borrowed many ideas and tradions from
Greek culture, and Roman mythology was heavily inuenced
by Greek mythology: Olympic gods were present in it, but
some of them acquired Roman names. Philosophy ecleccally
combined teaching principles of various Greek thinkers.
Scepcism and stoicism (Seneca, Marc Aurelius) became
increasingly widespread.
The art of rhetoric (Gaius Gracchus, Cicero, Julius Caesar),
narrave literature (Apuleius, Lucian, Petronius), poetry
(Catullus, Vergil, Horace, Ovid), history (Livy, Flavius Josephus,
Tacitus, Plutarch), mechanics (Archimedes) and natural
sciences (Pliny the Elder) achieved a high level of development
in Ancient Rome. Major cultural innovaons of Roman
Anquity were directly related to the development of polics
and law.
No discussion of Roman culture would be complete without
menoning media/communicaon culture. Caesar, the
founder of the Roman Empire, general and orator, is also
considered to be the founder of a sort of daily newspaper. It
was not a newspaper in the accepted sense of the word.
Historians may present it as such, but it is but one of the
aempts to modernize ancient noons. Caesar tried to make
public minutes of the discussions and decisions of the Roman
Senate (“Acta senatus”). Inscripons were made on a board,
covered with white plaster, and displayed to the public; this
reminded modern posters. Scribes would also make copies of
these Acta and send them to distant territories. Aer some
me, the original was deposited in the archives [11].
Medieval European culture emerged from the ruins of the
Roman Empire. Riots, wars, degeneracy and economic
dislocaon accompanied the decline of the Roman Empire.
The future of the European culture depended on the outcome
of the struggle between three major forces: the aging Greco-
Roman cultural tradions; the Barbarian spirit, represented by
various peoples living in Roman provinces or invading the
Roman empire from outside; the third, and the most
signicant, force was Chrisanity.
Originang in Judaism, Chrisanity was based on the
tradions established outside the Greco-Roman world.
Teachings of Jesus Christ brought new humanisc values to
society. Chrisanity’s power base was not only in the unity of
faith, but also in the organizaonal unity of the Church and in
its property. These factors allowed Chrisanity to hold a
dominant posion in the European culture, overcoming both
Greco-Roman polytheism and Barbarian paganism.
The Church gradually spread its inuence over all facets of
society. Church rules governed people’s daily roune, liturgical
calendar determined when feast days were to be observed,
church ceremonies accompanied every important event in
human life: birth, marriage, death. Human morals were based
on the Chrisan noons of “virtue” and “sin”. Legal codes
prescribed penales for “crimes against faith”. Religion oen
determined domesc and foreign policies of European states.
Philosophy and science were also strictly controlled.
Quong the Bible connued to be the most reliable source of
knowledge. Literacy was rare in the medieval society, and even
kings did not always know how to read and let alone to write.
Educated people came, as a rule, from the clergy, a sort of
spiritual intelligentzia.
Religion also underpinned the educaon system. Schools
were found mainly at monasteries. The 12th century saw the
emergence of the rst universies in Bologna, Oxford, Paris,
among others, where students could study Theology, but also
Law and Medicine. All classes were taught in Lan, and
mastery of the Lan language was synonymous with literacy.
Books were wrien by hand and cost a lot.
Troubadour songs, profane lyric poetry, chivalric romances
(“The song of Roland”, “The Nibelungenlied”, “Tristan and
Isolde”, etc.) were popular with the secular nobility that
respected not only religious rituals, but also the chivalric code.
The educated clergy was engaged in theological research,
philosophy and history.
Print culture («The Gutenberg Galaxy»)
The prinng era started in the Renaissance and lasted for
ve centuries (15th – 19th centuries).
The Renaissance phenomenon (14th-16th centuries) lies in
the fact that the classical heritage served as a weapon against
church laws and interdicons. Here, we agree with McLuhan
who maintains that “this was a grandiose cultural revoluon
that lasted two centuries and a half and ended with the
emergence of a new kind of world percepon and a new kind
of culture” [6].
The new world percepon considered man, not God, at the
centre of the universe and the measure of all things. This
world percepon is known as humanism.
Renaissance emerged and manifested itself most obviously
in Italy. The Proto-Renaissance period, regarded as the
forerunner of the Renaissance and traced back to the rst half
of the 14th century, saw Dante’s “Divine Comedy”, Petrarch’s
sonnets, Boccaccio’s “Decameron”, full of popular humour and
free-thinking, Gioo’s painngs featuring realisc and
expressive human gures.
The new cultures ourished during the 15th century.
Schools of painters proliferated in Venice, Milan, Rome and
other Italian cies; the educated youth started interest groups
where they debated the ideas of classical philosophy, moral
problems, current issues of social life. Arsts studied anatomy,
the proporons of the human body and the linear perspecve.
The 15th century (the Quarocento) produced a great number
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of prominent sculptors (Donatello, Verrocchio), architects
(Brunelleschi, Alber), painters (Bocelli, Bellini, Masaccio,
Mantegna) and, of course, the great Leonardo da Vinci. The
period from the end of the 15th century to the mid-16th
century is perceived as the Golden Age of Italian art,
represented mostly by Raphael and Michelangelo. The Late
Renaissance saw Tian, Veronese, Caravaggio and other
remarkable painters. During this me, the ideals of the
Renaissance spread to the rest of Europe and inuenced arsts
in the Netherlands (Jan van Eyck, Hieronymus Bosch, Pieter
Bruegel the Elder, etc.), Germany (Durer, Hans Holbein the
Younger), Spain (El Greco), among others.
The Late Renaissance is characterized by a rapid
development of literature (Cervantes, Rabelais) and the scenic
art, best represented by the great playwrights, such as Lope de
Vega, Calderon, Tirso de Molina in Spain and William
Shakespeare in England.
The works of great thinkers, such as Thomas More in
England, Bodin, Montaigne and Rabelais in France, Machiavelli
in Italy, Erasmus of Roerdam in Holland develop the new
ideas of Renaissance philosophy.
It is worth menoning, however, that this rapid
development of science, literature and drama would have
been impossible without the introducon of prinng to Europe
by Johannes Gutenberg (1399-1468). Thus, “the “interface” of
the Renaissance was the meeng of medieval pluralism and
modern homogeneity and mechanism – a formula for blitz and
metamorphosis” [6].
The fact that the invenon of the prinng press which used
mobile prinng leers is closely related to early technologies
of the phonec alphabet kindled researchers’ interest in
studying the preceding me periods. “With Gutenberg Europe
enters the technological phase of progress, when change itself
becomes the archetypal norm of social life” [6].
The modern period, from the 17th century to the late 19th
century, is a span of historic events, during which the culture
of Western European countries developed to the point of
disnguishing Europe from the rest of the world.
The Age of Reason, or the Enlightenment, (1689-1789) is
central to the prinng era.
The representaves of the Enlightenment stood for the
equality of rights for all people, the Church’s non-interference
into secular life of society, the inviolability of property, the
humanizaon of criminal jusce, the promoon of science and
technology, the freedom of the press, etc. Faith in the power
of mind was at the basis of all the innovave ideas that
emerged in the Age of Reason.
The torchbearers of Enlightenment literature and
philosophy were Voltaire, J.-J. Rousseau, Ch. Montesquieu, D.
Diderot in France, J. Locke in England, G. E. Lessing, J. V. von
Goethe, F. Schiller in Germany, T. Payne, B. Franklin, T.
Jeerson in the United Stated, M. Lomonosov, N. Novikov, A.
Radischev, A. Sumarokov in Russia.
The Industrial Revoluon in England (1689) and the French
Revoluon (1789) proved that scienc and cultural ideas
were the driving force of social development. The
Enlightenment also produced a new kind of people, the
intellectuals, men of science and culture, who came from
dierent social backgrounds, but mostly from the ers état.
Another important class, the bourgeoisie, emerged during
the Enlightenment. Its role in the intellectual history of Europe
was twofold: on one hand, the bourgeoisie promoted culture
by patronizing energec and enterprising people of all social
backgrounds, on the other hand, the bourgeoisie, being the
money-lending class, forced its own ulitarian objecves and
ideals on society. This resulted in the emergence of a new
culture, the mass culture, oen called “vile”, vulgar”,
“bourgeois”. Thus, three types of culture came to dominate
during the Modern Period: the high, or elite, culture, created
by the nobility; popular culture (the folklore); and the mass
culture, formed by the new emerging class, the bourgeoisie, at
a me of major social transformaons [1].
Mulnaonalism and mullingualism are also typical
features of culture during the Modern Period. Medieval Lan’s
hold was broken by the growing importance of local languages,
which enriched the European culture with popular tradions
and heritage and, at the same me, made achievements of
learned culture accessible to peoples of Europe. This period
saw the rise of naonal cultures, featuring the painters
Rubens, Rembrandt, Velazquez, Poussin, the playwrights
Corneille, Racine, Moliere, the composer Gluck, the founder of
the new pedagogics John Amos Comenius, to menon just a
few. The work of these men of genius of the 17th century is
naonal, but, at the same me, it is part of Europe’s cultural
heritage, as a whole. Naonal art and literatures emerged in
European countries, reecng two major arsc styles of the
European art of the period, the baroque and the classicism.
“Contact and interacon of cultures are regarded as some of
the crucial factors behind cultural progress” [1].
As far as “mass culture” is concerned, including the print
media (journals, magazines), it should be noted that, no
maer how much its importance can be quesoned, it was the
print media that helped put into life the main ideas of the
Enlightenment, contribung to social transformaons and
shaping the new worldview.
In relaon to this, it is worth menoning the example of
Russia that “opened up a window onto Europe” in the 17th
and 18th centuries, following the reforms of Peter the Great.
The rst newspaper in Russia, “Vedomos, was printed in
1702, the total number of copies being 2,500. Thus, transion
from manuscript to print lasted in Russia almost one century
and a half (the rst Russian printed book was produced in Ivan
Fyodorov’ prinng shop in 1564). This said, during the reign of
Peter the Great, ocial informaon spread to the masses,
taking priority over popular informaon and folklore.
Cultural history has shown that the aim of the rst printed
publicaons in Russia was to solve specic polical tasks. Peter
I felt it necessary to inform certain audiences in Russia and at
European courts about the success of his reforms and military
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victories; it is not mere chance that, by 1703, “Vedomos” had
a circulaon of four thousand [12].
The edion of “Vedomos” gradually became a project of
state signicance. In 1728, ownership of the paper was
transferred to the Imperial Academy of Sciences, which
renamed it “Sankt-Peterburgskie Vedomos” (Saint Petersburg
News); the newspaper changed it name again only in 1917.
In Russia, as disnct from Western European countries, the
state held a total monopoly on the press. It was not unl the
reign of Elizaveta Petrovna that A. Sumarokov, a Russian poet,
playwright and social acvist, started to publish
“Trudolubivaya Pchela” (Hard-working Bee), the rst
independent monthly magazine in Russia. Following “Pchela”,
other independent magazines appeared in Russia in the 1760s
and 1770s.
The Empress Catherine II, who eagerly supported the ideals
of the French Enlightenment, took an acve part in the
development of the Russian printed culture. She promoted the
magazine “Vsyakaya vsyachina” (This and That, 1769-1770),
where she published her own wrings; it was on her advice
that the Academy of Sciences started to publish “Sobesednik
lyubiteley rossiyskoy slovesnos” (A Companion to Lovers of
Russian Literature), aiming to ght against protest groups in
society. N. Novikov, one of the major representaves of the
Russian Enlightenment, publisher, editor and polical writer, is
also known as a erce ghter against autocracy in the late 18th
century. Having rented the prinng house of the Moscow
University, he managed to increase the circulaon of the
university newspaper, “Moskovskie Vedomos” (Moscow
News), to four thousand. Novikov created a real publishing
company that served 16 cies and produced, from 1779 to
1792, about 900 books, aimed to educate his compatriots, and
a number of magazines, the most notable of which were
“Truten” (Drone), “Zhivopisets” (Painter) and “Koshelek”
(Wallet).
N. Novikov and A. Radishev, the author of the “Journey from
St. Petersburg to Moscow”, had tragic lives, but their
contribuon to the development of print culture in Russia that
defended human rights and dignity is undeniable. Equally
important to the Russian Enlightenment were the playwrights
A. Sumarokov and D. Fonvizin and the fabulist I. Krylov, who
cricized autocracy and appealed to conscience and jusce in
their literary creaons.
The reign of Alexander I, characterized by liberalizaon of
social life, saw a considerable growth in number of periodical
literature. From 1801 to 1811 alone, 60 new magazines and 9
newspapers were published; periodicals on specic topics
(science, technology, administraon, economy) started to
come out; numerous were publicaons on music, theatre,
pedagogy, literary cricism and even women’s magazines [12].
This means that the audience was segmented according to
readers’ specic interests.
By the end of the 19th century, many print structures in
Europe and Russia were essenally prot-oriented. The yellow
press ourished, print edions grew in number. In the second
half of the 19th century, media culture was developing in the
context of the industrializaon of society directly related to
urbanizaon, technical revoluon, growth of industry [2].
Philosophy is an integral part of the Gutenberg era. I. Kant is
considered to be the founder of classical German philosophy
that had a dominant inuence on European philosophy in the
19th century. J. G. Fichte and W. F. Hegel, the founder of the
dialecc theory, are some of its prominent representaves.
Hegel’s works had a considerable impact on the development
of philosophical thinking and culture. Hegel’s ideas were
reected in historical materialism, rst arculated by K. Marx
and F. Engels, the founders of the theory of class struggle in
society, whose works provide an in-depth analysis of
capitalism and dene the perspecves of social, scienc and
technic progress.
Several more schools of thought appeared in the 19th
century in opposion to Hegelian idealisc philosophy and
Marxism, in parcular, posivism (A. Comte) and philosophy of
life (F. Nietzsche, O. Spengler).
In the 19th century literature, Romancism was replaced by
Realism with its own percepons of the world, society and
mankind. “Realism was understood in a broad sense as truth
of life, conveyed through specic means of art” [2]. Stendhal,
H. de Balzac, G. Flaubert in France, Ch. Dickens, M. Twain in
England, A. Pushkin, N. Gogol, L. Tolstoy, F. Dostoyevsky, A.
Chekhov, among others, were some of the most prominent
representaves of literary realism.
The late 19th century and the early 20th century are
characterized by new cultural phenomena that went down in
history as “modern”, that is, everything that is new in art; this
gave rise to such noons as “modernism” and
“modernisaon”, which exercised a notable inuence on the
development of world culture in the 20th century. According
to J. Habermas, “modernisaon is understood as a
phenomenon of civilizaonal scope that goes back to the
Middle Ages with its hegemonic Chrisan doctrine pretending
to total dominaon; and to the “modernisc” Age of Reason
with its idea of a prolic union of science, morals and art in
search of logical life organizaon and of happiness for all” [13].
The end of the 19th century is marked, both in Europe and
Russia, by the growing importance of newspapers. Print media
became very diversied: the elite and the middle class read
“The Times”, “New Freie Press”, “Journal des Debats”, Figaro;
the masses preferred yellow press. “Russkoe Slovo” (Russian
Word) and “Novoe Vremya” (New Times) became known as
“news factory” in Russia.
Big tles, page design, combinaon of text and photography
and, especially, adversing were major, if not revoluonary,
visual innovaons in newspapers. In the 1890s, mass prinng
reached a circulaon of more than a million copies, which
radically changed the media environment; most importantly, it
created a new kind of the reading public [1].
Photography, being a new type of media culture and a new
means of communicaon, helped transform and update print
culture.
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