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Harold Innis Quotes

Harold Adams Innis was a Canadian professor of political economy at the University of Toronto and the author of seminal works on media, communication theory, and Canadian economic history. Despite his dense and difficult prose, Innis was one of Canada's most original thinkers. He helped develop the staples thesis, which holds that Canada's culture, political history, and economy have been decisively influenced by the exploitation and export of a series of "staples" such as fur, fishing, lumber, wheat, mined metals, and coal. The staple thesis dominated economic history in Canada 1930s–1960s, and continues to be a fundamental part of the Canadian political economy tradition.Innis's writings on communication explore the role of media in shaping the culture and development of civilizations. He argued, for example, that a balance between oral and written forms of communication contributed to the flourishing of Greek civilization in the 5th century BC. He warned, however, that Western civilization is now imperiled by powerful, advertising-driven media obsessed by "present-mindedness" and the "continuous, systematic, ruthless destruction of elements of permanence essential to cultural activity." His intellectual bond with Eric A. Havelock formed the foundations of the Toronto School of communication theory, which provided a source of inspiration for future members of the school: Marshall McLuhan and Edmund Snow Carpenter.Innis laid the basis for scholarship that looked at the social sciences from a distinctly Canadian point of view. As the head of the University of Toronto's political economy department, he worked to build up a cadre of Canadian scholars so that universities would not continue to rely as heavily on British or American-trained professors unfamiliar with Canada's history and culture. He was successful in establishing sources of financing for Canadian scholarly research.As the Cold War grew hotter after 1947, Innis grew increasingly hostile to the United States. He warned repeatedly that Canada was becoming a subservient colony to its much more powerful southern neighbor. "We are indeed fighting for our lives," he warned, pointing especially to the "pernicious influence of American advertising.... We can only survive by taking persistent action at strategic points against American imperialism in all its attractive guises." His views influenced some younger scholars, including Donald Creighton.Innis also tried to defend universities from political and economic pressures. He believed that independent universities, as centres of critical thought, were essential to the survival of Western civilization. His intellectual disciple and university colleague, Marshall McLuhan, lamented Innis's premature death as a disastrous loss for human understanding. McLuhan wrote: "I am pleased to think of my own book The Gutenberg Galaxy as a footnote to the observations of Innis on the subject of the psychic and social consequences, first of writing then of printing." Wikipedia  

✵ 5. November 1894 – 8. November 1952
Harold Innis photo

Works

Harold Innis: 22 quotes5 likes

Famous Harold Innis Quotes

“The mixture of the oral and the written traditions in the writings of Plato enabled him to dominate the history of the West.”

Harold Innis

Minerva's Owl (1947), an address to the Royal Society of Canada, published in The Bias of Communication (1951) p. 10.
The Bias of Communication (1951)

“Innis comments on how the invention of writing and the advancement of military techniques led to the founding of ancient empires: The sword and the pen worked together. Power was increased by concentration in a few hands, specialization of function was enforced, and scribes with leisure to keep and study records contributed to the advancement of knowledge and thought. The written record signed, sealed, and swiftly transmitted was essential to military power and the extension of government. Small communities were written into large states and states were consolidated into empire. The monarchies of Egypt and Persia, the Roman empire and the city states were essentially products of writing.”

Harold Innis book Empire and Communications

2007 edition, p. 30.
Empire and Communications (1950)

“Modern civilization, characterized by an enormous increase in the output of mechanized knowledge with the newspaper, the book, the radio and the cinema, has produced a state of numbness, pleasure and self-complacency perhaps only equalled by laughing-gas. In the words of Oscar Wilde we have sold our birthright for a mess of facts. The demands of the machine are insatiable. The danger of shaking men out of the soporific results of mechanized knowledge is similar to that of attempting to arouse a drunken man or one who has taken an overdose of sleeping tablets. The necessary violent measures will be disliked. We have had university professors threatened with the loss of their positions for less than this.”

Harold Innis

Source: Essays in Canadian Economic History (1956), p. 383 (originally from an essay entitled The Church in Canada first published in 1947).

“The Middle Ages burned its heretics and the modern age threatens them with atom bombs.”

Harold Innis

Industrialism and Cultural Values p. 139.
The Bias of Communication (1951)

“The full impact of printing did not become possible until the adoption of the Bill of Rights in the United States with its guarantee of freedom of the press. A guarantee of freedom of the press in print was intended to further sanctify the printed word and to provide a rigid bulwark for the shelter of vested interests.”

Harold Innis

Industrialism and Cultural Values p. 138.
The Bias of Communication (1951)

“Following the invention of writing, the special form of heightened language, characteristic of the oral tradition and a collective society, gave way to private writing. Records and messages displaced the collective memory. Poetry was written and detached from the collective festival.”

Harold Innis book Empire and Communications

2007 edition, p. 31.
Empire and Communications (1950)

Harold Innis Quotes about communication

“The effect of the discovery of printing was evident in the savage religious wars of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Application of power to communication industries hastened the consolidation of vernaculars, the rise of nationalism, revolution, and new outbreaks of savagery in the twentieth century.”

Harold Innis

Minerva's Owl p. 29.
The Bias of Communication (1951)

“The overwhelming pressure of mechanization evident in the newspaper and the magazine, has led to the creation of vast monopolies of communication. Their entrenched positions involve a continuous, systematic, ruthless destruction of elements of permanence essential to cultural activity.”

Harold Innis

Changing Concepts of Time (1952) p. 15.
Changing Concepts of Time (1952)

“We must appraise civilization in relation to its territory and in relation to its duration. The character of the medium of communication tends to create a bias in civilization favourable to an over-emphasis on the time concept or on the space concept and only at rare intervals are the biases offset by the influence of another medium and stability achieved.”

Harold Innis

A Plea for Time (1950), a paper presented at the University of New Brunswick, published in The Bias of Communication (1951) p. 64.
The Bias of Communication (1951)

Harold Innis Quotes

“A change in the type of medium implies a change in the type of appraisal and hence makes it difficult for one civilization to understand another.”

Harold Innis book Empire and Communications

2007 edition, p. 29.
Empire and Communications (1950)
Context: The significance of a basic medium to its civilization is difficult to appraise since the means of appraisal are influenced by the media, and indeed the fact of appraisal appears to be peculiar to certain types of media. A change in the type of medium implies a change in the type of appraisal and hence makes it difficult for one civilization to understand another.

“The present Dominion emerged not in spite of geography but because of it.”

Harold Innis

Conclusion, p. 393.
The Fur Trade in Canada (1930)
Context: Canada emerged as a political entity with boundaries largely determined by the fur trade. These boundaries included a vast north temperate land area extending from the Atlantic to the Pacific and dominated by the Canadian Shield. The present Dominion emerged not in spite of geography but because of it.

“Industrialism implies technology and the cutting of time into precise fragments suited to the needs of the engineer and the accountant.”

Harold Innis

Industrialism and Cultural Values p. 140.
The Bias of Communication (1951)

“The voice of a second-rate person is more impressive than the published opinion of superior ability.”

Harold Innis book Empire and Communications

2007 edition, p. 31.
Empire and Communications (1950)
Context: Graham Wallas has reminded us that writing as compared with speaking involves an impression at the second remove and reading an impression at the third remove. The voice of a second-rate person is more impressive than the published opinion of superior ability.

“The diversity of institutions has made possible the combination of government ownership and private enterprise which has been a further characteristic of Canadian development. Canada has remained fundamentally a product of Europe.”

Harold Innis

Conclusion, p. 401.
The Fur Trade in Canada (1930)

“Writing with a simplified alphabet checked the power of custom of an oral tradition but implied a decline in the power of expression and the creation of grooves which determined the channels of thought of readers and later writers.”

Harold Innis

Minerva's Owl p. 11.
The Bias of Communication (1951)

“The Canadian government has a closer relation to economic activities than most governments. The trade in staples, which characterizes an economically weak country, to the highly industrialized areas of Europe and latterly the United States, and especially the fur trade, has been responsible for various peculiar tendencies in Canadian development. The maintenance of connections with Europe, at first with France and later with Great Britain has been a result. The diversity of institutions which has attended this relationship has made for greater elasticity in organization and far greater tolerance among her peoples.”

Harold Innis

Conclusion, p. 401.
The Fur Trade in Canada (1930)

“We have not yet realized that the Indian and his culture were fundamental to the growth of Canadian institutions.”

Harold Innis

Conclusion (1930) of The Fur Trade in Canada, (1970 edition), p. 392.
The Fur Trade in Canada (1930)

“The concepts of time and space reflect the significance of media to civilization. Media that emphasize time are those that are durable in character, such as parchment, clay, and stone. The heavy materials are suited to the development of architecture and sculpture. Media that emphasize space are apt to be less durable and light in character, such as papyrus and paper. The latter are suited to wide areas in administration and trade. The conquest of Egypt by Rome gave access to supplies of papyrus which became the basis of a large administration empire.”

Harold Innis book Empire and Communications

2007 edition, pp.26-27.
Empire and Communications (1950)

“The history of Canada has been profoundly influenced by the habits of an animal which very fittingly occupies a prominent place on her coat of arms.”

Harold Innis

The Beaver (1930) Part I of The Fur Trade in Canada, (1970 edition), p. 3.
The Fur Trade in Canada (1930)

“Canada came under the sweep of the Industrial Revolution at one stroke whereas the western movement of the United States was a gradual development. There are no transcontinental railroads controlled by one organization in the United States. In Canada transcontinental roads are distinct entities controlled in eastern Canada. Similarly in financial institutions the branch bank system with its headquarters in the east has been typical of Canada but not of the United States. No such tendency toward unity of structure in institutions and toward centralized control as found in Canada can be observed in the United States.”

Harold Innis

Conclusion, p. 401.
The Fur Trade in Canada (1930)

“The discovery of printing in the middle of the fifteenth century implied the beginning of a return to a type of civilization dominated by the eye rather than the ear.”

Harold Innis

Industrialism and Cultural Values (1950), a paper presented at meetings of the American Economic Association in Chicago, published in The Bias of Communication (1951) p. 138.
The Bias of Communication (1951)

“It is suggested that all written works, including this one, have dangerous implications to the vitality of an oral tradition and to the health of a civilization, particularly if they thwart the interest of a people in culture, and following Aristotle, the cathartic effects of culture. "It is written but I say unto you" is a powerful directive to Western civilization.”

Harold Innis book Empire and Communications

From the 2007 Voyageur Classics edition, pp. 19-20.
Empire and Communications (1950)

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