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Our society's institutional infrastructures-our democratic political system, economic structures, legal practices, and educational establishment-were all created as intellectual outgrowths of the Enlightenment. All our cultural institutions are based on the intellectual idea that an enlightened citizenry could govern its affairs with reason and responsibility. In the late 20th century, however, we are witnessing the disintegration of much of our cultural heritage. Wood argues that this is due to our evolution into a ^Upost-intellectual society^R-a society characterized by a loss of critical thinking, the substitution of information for knowledge, mediated reality, increasing illiteracy, loss of privacy, specialization, psychological isolation, hyper-urbanization, moral anarchy, and political debilitation. These post-intellectual realities are all triggered by three underlying determinants: the failure of linear growth and expansion to sustain our economic system; the runaway information overload; and technological determinism. Wood presents a new and innovative social theory, challenging readers to analyze all our post-intellectual cultural malaise in terms of these three fundamental determinants.
List of contents
Forward by Neil Postman
Preface
Illustrations
Orientation: The Concept of Post-IntellectualismOur Intellectual Foundations
Emergence of Post-Intellectualism
Four Attributes of Post-Intellectualism
Underlying Determinants of Post-Intellectualism
Personal Consequences of Post-IntellectualismIlliteracy (the brave new mega-mediated world)
The Fishbowl Society (loss of privacy)
Cognitive Chaos (the data daze)
Isolation and Loss of Direction (disoriented we despair)
Social Consequences of Post-IntellectualismHyper-Urbanization (losing our way in the concrete jungle)
Economic Destitution (bankruptcy of fiscal theory)
Environmental Decay (damn the resources, full speed ahead!)
Moral Collapse (sex, lies, violence, and videotape)
Political Consequences of Post-Intellectualism Retribalization (fragmenting the global village)
Democracy and Responsibility (the freedom dilemma)
Democratic Decline (the dream grows dim)
Control and Manipulation (alternatives to anarchy)
Prognosis: Future Directions and ConsiderationsConcerns and Questions
Steps Toward Solutions
Bibliography
Index
About the author
DONALD N. WOOD is Professor of Radio-Television-Film at California State University, Northridge. He is author of Educational Telecommunications (1977), Mass Media and the Individual (1983), Designing the Effective Message (1989), and co-author of Television Productions: Disciplines and Techniques (1978, and Sixth ed. 1995).
