A tribute to and a lament for Marshall McLuhan continues. If he had lived Marshall would have been 100 on July 21, 2011. Join me in the countdown to his centennial, and an exploration of more of his observations on the way media work in the electric age in which we live.
So you think you’re creative?
Marshall McLuhan (August 24, 1964, age 53). Education as we know it is obsolete.
Naturally we must experiment with alternatives to book-based, classroom instruction. Here are a few of the questions – which I mentioned to a reporter for the Toronto Star – that I am wrestling with now which may well bring about a breakthrough:
- How well could you learn economics in a rowboat in an alligator-infested swamp?
- Or in a bamboo hut in a tropical forest?
- Or in a triangular-shaped pink room in downtown Toronto?
Me (January, 2011, age 58). Takes your breath away, doesn’t it?
How did he come up with such incredibly odd but brilliant ideas? Here’s one answer:
Cordially, Marshall and Me
Reading:
David Thompson, “How to learn economics in a rowboat,” Toronto Daily Star, August 24, 1964.