Remote Control

ISBN-13: 9781623563110 / Angielski / Miękka / 2015 / 184 str.

Caetlin Benson-Allott

Opis

Object Lessons is a series of short, beautifully designed books about the hidden lives of ordinary things. While we all use remote controls, we understand little about their history or their impact on our daily lives. Caetlin Benson-Allot looks back on the remote control's material and cultural history to explain how such an innocuous media accessory has changed the way we occupy our houses, interact with our families, and experience the world. From the first wired radio remotes of the 1920s to infrared universal remotes, from the homemade TV controllers to the Apple Remote, remote controls shape our media devices and how we live with them.Object Lessons is published in partnership with an essay series in the The Atlantic.

Recenzje

The remote control encourages us to take it for granted. It's ubiquitous but easy to misplace. An essential convenience but still an overly complicated nuisance. But in this compelling history, Caetlin Benson-Allott places remote controls at the center of our media universe, demonstrating how profoundly these devices shape contemporary media practices and our everyday lives. You'll never surf the same way again. Jason Mittell, Professor of Film & Media Culture, Middlebury College, USA, and author of Television and American Culture

Spis treści

Introduction: What a Mess!Chapter 1: Changing VolumeChapter 2: Switching ChannelsChapter 3: Comprehensive ControlConclusion: Material LiteracyIndex

O autorze

Caetlin Benson-Allott is Associate Professor of English at Georgetown University. She is the author of Killer Tapes and Shattered Screens: Video Spectatorship from VHS to File Sharing (2013) and of a column on film and new media in Film Quarterly.