1. James Curran has argued that ‘the technological determinist accounts of media development’ is ‘intellectually flawed’ because ‘it views new communications technology’ as the only cause of change and ‘overlooks the ways in which the development and application of this technology was influenced by the wider context of society’. Discuss this view with reference to at least two significant developments in communications technology.

There are very few writers that have a purely technological deterministic view on media development. By this I mean writers who would put technological development as the sole cause of media change. The reluctance to think with this style is because of the reasons outlined by Curran in the title when he says technological determinism:

‘views new communications technology’ as the only cause of change’

‘The wider context of society’ could mean anything from cultural and religious tradition to scientific knowledge to artistic movements. An example discussed by Briggs of cultural tradition being a factor is how in china and japan printing had been practiced for a long time with block printing yet was only ‘appropriate for cultures which used thousands of ideograms rather than an alphabet of 20-30 letters. It was probably for this reason that the Chinese invention of movable type in the eleventh century had few consequences. ‘ (briggs, pg 13. 2009).  A religious tradition that prevented this spread was the fact that the Ottoman Turks thought it as sin to print religious books so the Muslim world acted as another barrier to this spread. (briggs. Pg 14. 2009)
The print revolution took off because of the alignment of various technological, political and cultural factors. Briggs blames the fact that not many normal people in Russia were literate for the prints slow spread. The Tsar Peter the Great found a printing press in 1711 in St Petersburg with the aim of trying to educate the people in military technology (Briggs. Pg14. 2009). Russia had an oral tradition of storytelling where the culture of folklore meant that myths and stories were passed down via word of mouth and not by books. There was also no general need for recording information as the common Russian at this time would of lead a simple almost primitive existence. They’re jobs would have been all agricultural based with profit coming from manual labour. Work was hard on the hands yet not so much the brain so writing down ideas and relaying on information through writing was not necessary.
There would be no need to read contracts or advertisements because they’re not buying products. Finally the class system would have been highly stratified with a large class gap. The people in the high class had the economic and cultural advantage to read. Yet also the people in positions of power would have not wanted the lower class to be educated in reading because it would mean that they could learn, read books and be educated causing them to question and oppose they’re rulers. ‘Samuel Hartlib an east European exile in Britain’ wrote in 1641 the art of printing will so spread the knowledge that the common people knowing their own rights and liberties will not be governed by way of oppression’ (Briggs. Pg 15. 2009). All of these factors fall into the bracket of the wider context of society and can be applied to most illiterate cultures.
I can draw a parallel between this slow spread in Russia in the 1700’s and Europe in the dark ages. Fang writes how ‘scattered points of light shone in scriptoria of monasteries’ (Fang, Pg 23. 1997) they read mostly the bible and it was the monks who were the only ones writing manuscripts, maintaining education of classical stories and religious scripts for an exclusive few situated in the church. It remained this way for a long time and the source of knowledge for the laity in Europe was mostly from word of mouth, from clergyman at church services. (Fang. Pg’s 18 – 19. 1997) This meant that most knowledge to the European clergy was through Christian readings and its messages were taken religiously.
For many in the Middle Ages of Europe Christian ideology ensued meaning that other forms of knowledge was thought of as redundant particularly if it wasn’t coming verbally from a priest. Curran writes how it was more popular than newspapers are today, yet they were also compulsory and if you didn’t attend you would be frowned upon:

‘the proportion of the adult population in Europe regularly attending mass during the central Middle Ages was almost certainly higher than the proportion of adults in Europe now regularly reading a newspaper.’ (Curran. Pg 55. 2010)

Technological determinists such as Deibert claim that the dawn of print brought this change of thinking along, yet this was not the case with the Chinese. One of the oldest printed texts is the Diamond Sutra which is a Chinese version of the Buddhist scripture. This is dated at 868 (Fang. Pg 26. 2006) roughly 600 years prior to when Gutenberg invented his press around 1450 (Curran. Pg 5. 2010). Despite printing being common in the far east in the Dark Ages of Europe monks still did the job of painstakingly copying manuscripts by hand. Briggs regards the Muslim countries as a barrier to the spread of print as I mentioned before the culture thought it a sin to print religious books. To question technological determinists viewpoint we should start by looking at why China wasn’t rife with change when they used Print. Chinese government has a culture of having a solid and immovable state structure which they strengthened with the use of print. Fang puts the availability of change into context:

‘It is instructive to compare Europe with China… where paper manufacture and printing had been born, but where printing had languished. Monolithic government control must be taken into account. In China… printing was associated with either religious belief or government.’ (Fang. Pg35. 2010)

In Europe however with the alignment of print with many other factors great change did come. The change often relies on who owns the catalyst which in the case of the Chinese was the government. When print happened in Europe it meant that ‘For churchmen, the basic problem was that print allowed readers who had a low position in the social and cultural hierarchy to study religious texts for themselves, rather than relying on what the authorities told them.’ (Pg 15. Briggs. 2009) leading people to question religion further than they had done before.
Many technological determinists such as Deibert claim that ‘the Protestant Reformation and scientific humanism, were favored by the new media environment to the disadvantage of the Roman Catholic Church.’ (Deibert. Pg 69. 1997). The protestant reformation was a reaction to the secular legalistic Church hierarchy which started in 1517 (Deibert. Pg 69. 1997). The papal government was corrupt and many saw the black death as a message from God that he was dissatisfied. The papal government ‘harnessed the interests’(Curran) of different power groups to gather power. With a ‘selective interpretation of the bible’ with ‘papal and ecclesiastical propaganda’. Previous to the advent of the printing press, the church was good at preventing bad messages about them from spreading. (Pg’s 70-71. Deibert. 1997) There was family corruption, sexual vice and incest, corruption and criminality from people like Leo X and the Borgias. The protestant reformers wanted to combat papal corruption and most importantly spread the message that the word of God should be taken directly from the scriptures not from the word of the clergyman’s mouth. This circumstantially would be another thing that the printing press would combat. The reformers, starting with Martin Luther nailing a pamphlet with his proposed guidelines for the reformation, would spread pamphlets to advertise their ideology and the printing press offered a way that this could be done cheaply and on a large scale:

‘Printing permitted the mass production of small, cheap pamphlets that favoured the Reformer's strategic interest both in rapid dissemination of propaganda, in the form of cheap placards and posters, and the concealment of heretical printed works from authorities by both producers and consumers.’ (pg 71. Deibert. 1997)

Another thing that the church had been doing was it produced many scriptures exclusively in Latin. Now with the conjunction of the protestant reformations policy of vernacular scriptures and the rise of the printing press the scriptures were printed out in the language of the people not just in Latin. It was from this policy that lead the laity to grasp an interest in reading and henceforth a greater increase in printed material. I believe that this is proof that only with the alignment of this vernacular policy and the printing press could the printing press and the protestant reformation could really take off. Deibert quotes Anderson:

‘Anderson affirms that the reformers were "always fundamentally on the offensive, precisely because [theyl knew how to make use of the expanding vernacular print-market being created by capitalism, while the Counter-Reformation defended the citadel of Latin.’(Deibert. Pg 73. 1997)

Deibert argues a technologically determinist case of the printing press being a catalyst to the protestant reformation. He says how before printing the Catholic Church found it easy to stop heresies spreading they’re cause because it was the Church who utilized and controlled the ‘lines of communication’ (Deibert pg69). Ironically the Catholic church was ‘initially enthusiastic about the printing press’ (Deibert pg69). He writes how the first dated printing product from Gutenberg was an indulgence, the ‘very emblem of church corruption in the eyes of the protestant reformation’ (Deibert. Pg69. 19997). Lots of Heresies diminished because they had no means of mass communication naming the Hussite reform as one which ‘withered without the availability of printing’ (Deibert. Pg 74. 1997). The reason for this was that the followers of the heresies who could read would have few doctrines to read because they weren’t widely available to without print.  

For the people who couldn’t read the spread of the heresies word would be restricted to a small area which geographically would of consisted of a small town or village so Deibert would claim that the print expanded the spread to a larger area. I would go so far to say that the protestant reformation was equally a catalyst for the success of the printing press alongside the humanist movement although the two movements opposition against each other should be noted as something which also would have expanded printing. If we think of competing ideologies with printing as both their mediums then the more that their arguments escalate the more the need is for print.

Deibert does not disregard the ‘deteriorating economic and social conditions of central and northern Europe’ (Deibert. Pg 70. 1997) as the cause for a shared feeling of dissatisfaction and need for change. However he highlights that ‘the properties of the printing environment favored the interests of the Protestant Reformation to the disadvantage of the papal hierachy’ (Deibert. Pg 70. 1997). Deibert says how during Martin Luthers life five times as many texts written by him were published than the whole of the Catholic controversialists put together (Deibert. Pg. 70. 1997).
Briggs draws on Elizabeth Einstein idea that print was an ‘unacknowledged revoltion’ (Briggs, pg 18. 2009) because it allowed all different sources of information to be taken equally with the same importance. In a society where the only source of information is from a speaker or a book which is taken religiously like the Bible other sources do not seem as important whereas now that they’re all in similar format they are regarded equally.

‘print standardized and preserved knowledge which had been much more fluid in the age of oral or manuscript circulation.’  (Briggs, pg 18. 2009)

Standardising a story means that if all stories are printed then to a certain extend the quality of each manuscripts information is seen as similar in quality yet with stories coming from different people orally the information’s quality is deemed fit on whether the man who told it is deemed efficient.  I would say that to this extent print has a disadvantage as often the words printed may not be from a good source yet if you havn’t met the person with the source of the information then perhaps you cannot formulate a judgement as well. I would also like to add that with oral tradition much like the idea of Chinese whispers storylines can get distorted and exaggerated and often end up completely different to how they began.

‘In the second place, the critique of authority was encouraged by print, which made incompatible views of the same subject more widely available.’ (Briggs, pg 18. 2009)

By this Briggs argues that now with printed material people will find it easier and have a lot more time to dissect and critique information and print they’re own opinion of it, in a sense promoting a greater freedom of speech. Circumstantially their own opinion may be critiqued which opens up more questions to who is right and who is wrong.

I believe that it was also the conjunction of the Renaissance and humanist thinking in the 14th and 15th centuries with the reformation which sparked change. Irving Fang writes how with the discovery of Greek and Roman manuscripts thinkers began to approach topics with more reasoning and analysis challenging religious philosophy.

As analytical thinking grew in popularity so did the whole method of looking at ideologies subjectively, meticulously looking through ancient religious traditions in order to find faults in them. It was with this thinking alongside the scientific revolutions new finding on cosmology and nature which followed the renaissance which I believe acted as a catalyst for all kinds of change. With the French Revolution the printed medium grew further due to the political change that followed. The French Revolution was a revolt against the class gap and the hatred of the greed of the upper class and it concluded with the growth of the urban bourgeoisie and promises that were now made to them not word but by contract as Deibert explains:

‘The shift from an oral to a print culture was also a shift from the oath to the contract with all the consequences for socio-economic organisation that ensued.” (Deibert. Pg82-3. 1997)

Fang also writes how written knowledge on paper changed the ‘verbal patterns of epic poetry, story and song’ (Fang. Pg 11. 1997) to a culture of information overload through text. This change was not neccesarily better in some cases as it destroyed how people engrossed they’re lives in storytelling and ‘oral culture, enriching their lives and enhancing memory’ (Fang. Pg 20. 1997). Socrates writes in his mythology how ‘thoth, told the Egyptian pharaoh Thamos of Thoth’s invention of writing, Thamos denounced it because students, ‘now that they possessed a means of storing up knowledge without trouble.’ (Fang. Pg 12. 1997)

Now I will discuss how the development of papyrus and paper was of great importance to change. Fang teaches us not to think of forms of communication like a timeline but as mediums that overlap through time hence why papyrus Chinese hemp paper and modern paper which was later used to fuel the renaissance doesn’t follow each other immediately. Fang appreciates the other sources of change in the context of society yet he cannot disregard the immediate point that with the use of papyrus came great change. First the Egyptians created boats out of it allowing them to travel up and down the Nile much easier than before. I’m going the use this fact to reinforce my argument later that the context of a trading society was an equal factor to the spread of knowledge and ultimately change to the use of paper.

Scrolls were made by gluing sheets of papyrus together and could be rolled up for transport and storage. The medium of papyrus as a means of communication worked in tandem with the change in the way Egypt was run from a monarchic structure to a more equal society as Fang says:

‘We can appreciate without difficulty what happened in Egypt with a shift of writing from priestly control to its widespread use. Egypt under the pharaohs around 2000 B.C. underwent a transformation from absolute monarchy to a more egalitarian system of organization that coincided with a shift to papyrus as a medium of communication.’ (Fang. Pg 5. 1997)

With the light and easy form of writing more people began to write, brainstorm and form individual ideas. The government which relied on centralised control weakened because officials discovered that they could communicate with each other directly rather than through the pharaohs meaning that Egypt ‘underwent a transformation from absolute monarchy to a more egalitarian system of organisation’ (Fang. Pg 5. 1997).

Fang writes how unlike with the use of clay as a medium of writing papyrus could be transported further distances. The Sumerians who used clay would be ‘limited in area and would be concerned with religion and morality, which changed little’ (Fang. Pg 5. 1997) whereas the Romans use of papyrus encouraged to creation of the large empire where they would be more ‘concerned with changing values, such as those of law, administration, and politics’ (Fang. Pg 5. 1997). Fang would argue that the use of clay restricted the transport of their ideas because it wasn’t lightweight however my argument is that infrastructure, economy and trading plays a very big part also. The Romans had the advantage of a strong trading structure across they’re empire given by the relationship they built with the people they invaded and very importantly their straight and long roads.

Their good infrastructure and economy would have been a factor fuelling the cost of the paper manufacture and transport. If we were to twist my argument on its head and see the transportation of paper with a technological determinist viewpoint then we would be unwise not appreciate the technology that the Roman’s developed to create the long and straight roads. Via Munita roads were constructed using rectangular blocks of stone which would have needed advanced cutting machinery to form. They were also made with polygonal blocks of lava which would have needed special technology at the time to mine.

Through increased trading in the 5^th Century Greece a book market existed consisting of Greek lyric poetry, scientific and philosophical scholars work throughout the Mediterranean world which reached the most isolated places. This knowledge explosion was attributed to papyrus and technological determinists would argue that it was this that solely brought about an information revolution. I would argue that it was the Persian wars which also brought about the great spread of knowledge and literature explosion with poetic works praising Athenian such as Persians of Aeschylus and a dithyramb of Pindar coming from this time and spreading across the realm with popularity. Wars and trading helped the transport of paper from China to the West. Paper was originally invented in ancient china during the Han Dynasty in 220AD and spread to west via the silk road just as the Chinese bureaucratic state was expanding. Some claim that the Arabs learned the skill of paper making from the Chinese after the Battle of Talas river in 751 and it was with this paper that they progressed to make advancements in Science and Maths.

In conclusion I agree with what Curran says about the technological determinist point of view. They overlook ‘the ways in which the development and application of this technology was influenced by the wider context of society’. Briggs highlights two examples with print saying how even though the printing press was invented in China roughly 600 years prior to the Gutenberg press it didn’t transfer to Europe because of the Muslim countries acting as a barrier to the west. Fang adds that even when China had it this early on they didn’t make too many changes in society because it was mainly reserved to the government and people of religious authority showing that its often not the dawn of technology which causes change but who controls it.

He backs this point by giving the example of how when print came to Europe it would make a change to the political climate yet only when people of low position in social hierarchy could study religious texts for themselves. Briggs is keen also to mention that print remained not to spread in Russia because the populace were illiterate due to the highly stratified class system, small size of community and finally traditions of oral story-telling. I understand Deiberts claim that the printing press was a catalyst for the protestant revolution yet I believe that other movements in conjunction with the protestant revolution were equally catalysts for print. I see how paper was a great catalyst for change yet only with wars, great empires and good infrastructure could it travel well.

Bibiliography:

A History of Mass Communication Six Information Revolutions. Irving Fang. Focus press, 1997

Power without responsibility. James Curran and Jean Seaton, 1981

Social History of the Media: From Gutenberg to the Internet, James Curran, 2010

Deibert, R. Parchment, printing, and hypermedia : communication in world order transformation New York, Columbia University Press (1997).