McLuhan’s Maestrom: The Card Game


imageedit_32_6813906662The first kernel of an idea for the final project came as I read Harold Innis’  (1951) Bias of Communication. Innis’ (1951) exhaustive and relentless examination of communication technologies was the moment when an idea for the project started to emerge. Stepwise, slowly,  communications technologies begat other communication modalities. Alluvial clay tablets, papyrus, parchment, the Gutenberg printing press each begat something newer, faster, more sophisticated, more surprising. Each were the stepping stones for the technologies of today. Another quote from McLuhan stuck in my mind, about the “best-trained minds” of cynical marketers focused on “generating heat not light” in human minds (McLuhan, 1995, p. 150). Inspired by ideas, I thought I would take the revelations of Innis and McLuhan and turn them into a learning game that I have entitled, “McLuhan’s Maelstrom: The Card Game.” This a learning game designed to teach young adults the theories of McLuhan and the inter-connectedness of communication technologies. It is my hope this game could be a means for train a spotlight on one of Canada and the world’s leading communication and media theorist, and open his ideas up to new audiences as we near his 107th birthday on July 11, 2018.

Game Rules

Final Game Photos

Game Box

Player Mat

Player Standees and Game Scoring Tiles

Technology Cards

Power Cards

Purchase Cards

Alternate Card Approach

Augmented Reality

Poster

Presentation

Artwork

imageedit_32_6813906662

References

Arnaudo, M. (2017) The Experience of Flow in Hobby Board Games, Analog Game Studies, Retrieved from http://analoggamestudies.org/category/marco-arnaudo/, Nov. 17, 2017

Huizinga, J. (1955). Homo ludens: A study of the play-element in culture Beacon Press.

Innis, H. (1951) The Bias of Communication, Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 33-60

Marler, C. Patolli (2018) “Should you take a gamble on this ancient Aztec board game?”, PairOfDiceParadise.com, Retrieved from http://www.pairofdiceparadise.com/patolli-should-you-take-a-gamble-on-this-ancient-aztec-board-game-a632.php

McLuhan, M. (1995) The Essential McLuhan, Eric McLuhan and Frank Zingrone eds. Concord, Ont. House of Anansi, pp. 21-24

Poe, E. A., Levine, S., & Levine, S. (1976). Short fiction of Edgar Allan Poe Bobbs-Merrill