A dictionary of Marshall McLuhan’s quotations

It turns out then, that my communication theory is Thomistic to the core. It has the further advantage of being able to explain Aquinas and Aristotle in modern terms. We are the content of anything we use, if only because these things are extensions of ourselves. The meaning of the pencil, or the chair I use is the interplay between me and these things. Again, the message of these things is the sum of the changes that result from their social use. Thus, I have added two features to "the medium is the message", namely the content and the meaning. Perhaps Pierre Juneau or somebody at C.R.T.C. would like to have this essay apropos the problem of "Canadian content"? The consequence for the discussion of the problem of Canadian content for the media is drastically simplified by noticing that the user is the content. If Canadians use or watch American programs or drive American cars, it is the Canadians who are the content of these things. The meaning is in the resulting interplay or dialogue between Canadians and these things, but there can be no question that the Canadian user of American things is the content of these things. The meaning and the message are something else. It is unfortunate that the C.R.T.C. ever involved itself in the question of content, especially since it does not understand the nature of media at all, except as hardware. …Since the user as content is not a figure of speech but a basic dynamic and cognitative relationship, I think you will find that it can be pushed all the way as a means of orientation in media, economics and politics. I suggest that it can be the basis for a complete restatement of political and economic realities in the information age of the wired planet.
Letter to J.M Davey, Office of the Prime Minister, March 2, 1971, in Letters of Marshall McLuhan (1987) pp 427-428
Year: 1971
↪ Also at #7242
Compiled by William Kuhns
© 2026, The Estate of Marshall McLuhan