McLuhan’s the Human Sensorium, Pontypool & Gen Z Slang – Grace Murakami

 

 McLuhan’s medium theory of the human sensorium centres around the idea that a medium is any extension of our human sense or faculty. From this theories perspective, a wheel of a car is an extension of the foot, similarly clothing is an extension of the skin. If we are to follow this thinking, then the tele-technologies of our time period of electronic media ecology are then extensions of our sight and hearing.   

 

From this theory a key aspect to remember is that the introduction and development of such media or in this case technology, will alter what McLuhan terms the “ratios” between the senses. In class we noted that these shifts in ratios could lead to distortion. In connection to the anglophone ‘language virus’ from Pontypool, I do believe that it is possible for a language to get distorted in some way, I think of slang or informal phrases younger generations use. These are terms like Fam, Stan, Salty,  Finna, Cap, all of which have no real connection to the word they represent.  In this film it all comes down to the speaker’s understanding of the words, which is what them powerful. The whole point of the film is that words can have no power over individuals if they lack or refuse understanding, which has connections to this ‘slang’.  From this perspective may argue that there is already a ‘language virus’ in the English lexicon, the source of the outbreak of being Gen Z slang! Of course, this ‘virus’ is one that causes no harm to us - other than the occasional outburst  frustration -  but this is only because often older generations do not understand the meaning of the words,  giving them no power.



After a quick search looking for examples,  found this "Gen Z Dictionary" which I thought was funny, but it acts as a testament to just how distorted our language can get!


 

Check it out linked here ... https://elective.collegeboard.org/dont-sleep-gen-z-slang-dictionary 

 


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