“The spoken word was the first technology by which man was able to let go of his environment in order to grasp it in a new way.”

Canadian philosopher

Herbert Marshall McLuhan was a Canadian philosopher and scholar, 1911 to 1980, whose work became central to media theory. Raised in Winnipeg, he studied at the University of Manitoba and the University of Cambridge, then taught English at universities in the United States and Canada before joining the University of Toronto in 1946. He remained there for the rest of his life and became widely known as the father of media studies. His writing and teaching focused on media, communication, and the way new forms of technology shape human thought and social life.