New Media, 1740-1915 [Paperback]

"This anthology will make a major contribution to the history of media by providing both new information and new models. In carefully prepared case studies-ranging from the employment of female telegraph operators to the use of sound recording to determine if apes had a language-this volume supplies new ideas about how media shape culture and how cultures shape media."--Tom Gunning, Chair, Committee on Cinema and Media, University of Chicago, and author of *The Cinema of Fritz Lang: Allegories of Vision and Modernity*Please note: Second sentence may be deleted for space reasons. Name of endorser's chair may be omitted, but affiliation should remain as is. Thank you.

"In *Feedback*, David Joselit tackles the 800-pound gorilla of commercial television on both political and artistic grounds. Upsetting common dichotomies between artistic practice and commercial strategies, Joselit avoids either dismissing or embracing the commercial medium, offering a truly passionate critique that plunges into the intricacies of how the electronic image engages us, whether in our living room or a gallery floor. A bold work that seeks to generate argument and thought."--Tom Gunning, Chair, Committee on Cinema and Media, University of Chicago, and author of *The Cinema of Fritz Lang: Allegories of Vision and Modernity*

Reminding us that all media were once new, this book challenges the notion that to study new media is to study exclusively today's new media. Examining a variety of media in their historic contexts, it explores those moments of transition when new media were not yet fully defined and their significance was still in flux. Examples range from familiar devices such as the telephone and phonograph to unfamiliar curiosities such as the physiognotrace and the zograscope. Moving beyond the story of technological innovation, the book considers emergent media as sites of ongoing cultural exchange. It considers how habits and structures of communication can frame a collective sense of public and private and how they inform our apprehensions of the "real." By recovering different (and past) senses of media in transition, New Media, 1740-1915 promises to deepen our historical understanding of all media and thus to sharpen our critical awareness of how they acquire their meaning and power.