"Cool" Media Studies: McCloud, McLuhan, and the Popification of the Humanities

Abstract

While the comics medium had affected everyday culture long before television became the epitome of the modern mass medium, it was mainly via Scott McCloud's seminal Understanding Comics that comics studies began to tie in with media studies to better understand the ontology of the comics art form. In particular, McCloud drew on media theorist Marshall McLuhan's (1964) diagnosis of "cool" (in distinction from "hot") media. Notoriously, McLuhan characterized "cool" media—television and comics—as iconic forms of popular art that demand high degrees of audience or reader participation, in contrast to "hot" media such as film. While this conceptualization might seem arcane, it harmonizes with John Fiske's (1987) theory of audience participation in what Fiske has called television's "producerly" textuality. This essay will look at a trend in both television and comics studies under the rubric of "cool" media studies—that is, the triumph of a post-McLuhanian spirit assuming a dual role of academic inquiry and pop culture fandom.