Television: Technology And Cultural Form
Condition: SECONDHAND
This is a secondhand book. The jacket image is a photograph of the exact copy we have in stock. This image shows the condition of this book. Further condition remarks are below.
Condition remarks:
Book: Good
Jacket: No dust jacket
Pages: Good
Condition remarks: Condition as shown in image
Few texts have so fundamentally reshaped how we think about a dominant cultural medium as Raymond Williams' Television: Technology and Cultural Form. Published originally in 1974, this landmark work of media theory argues that television is not a neutral technological invention but a product of specific social and cultural intentions — dismantling the myth of technology as an autonomous, self-generating force. Williams introduces his now-celebrated concept of flow, describing how television's continuous, seamless stream of programming represents an entirely new cultural form that blurs the boundaries between individual programmes and conditions audiences in profound, largely invisible ways. Williams writes with a rare combination of scholarly rigour and accessible prose, drawing on his background as one of Britain's foremost cultural critics to situate television within broader histories of capitalism, mass communication, and social control. His analysis remains startlingly prescient in an era of streaming services and algorithmic content delivery, inviting the reader to question who controls the medium, who benefits, and whose culture is ultimately being broadcast. For anyone seeking to understand the relationship between technology and society, this essential text poses questions that have only grown more urgent with time.
Author: Raymond Williams
Format: Paperback
Genre: Society & culture
Condition remarks:
Book: Good
Jacket: No dust jacket
Pages: Good
Condition remarks: Condition as shown in image
Few texts have so fundamentally reshaped how we think about a dominant cultural medium as Raymond Williams' Television: Technology and Cultural Form. Published originally in 1974, this landmark work of media theory argues that television is not a neutral technological invention but a product of specific social and cultural intentions — dismantling the myth of technology as an autonomous, self-generating force. Williams introduces his now-celebrated concept of flow, describing how television's continuous, seamless stream of programming represents an entirely new cultural form that blurs the boundaries between individual programmes and conditions audiences in profound, largely invisible ways. Williams writes with a rare combination of scholarly rigour and accessible prose, drawing on his background as one of Britain's foremost cultural critics to situate television within broader histories of capitalism, mass communication, and social control. His analysis remains startlingly prescient in an era of streaming services and algorithmic content delivery, inviting the reader to question who controls the medium, who benefits, and whose culture is ultimately being broadcast. For anyone seeking to understand the relationship between technology and society, this essential text poses questions that have only grown more urgent with time.