Society has a miraculous way of mimicking the humans that live within it. Marshall McLuhan covers some of the fundamentals ways media has shaped humans within the present day. His concept on the extension of human body in relation to technology can be a framework for understanding social networking sites such as Facebook that can be seen as representing the human anatomy through its eyes, brain and mouth as well as the way society uses it. Therefore, Facebook can be understood as a duplicate of one’s social body.
Facebook was invited by Mark Zuckerburg alongside other Harvard students in 2004 in order to connect people around the campus, acting much like a dating site. Currently, this network has over 1 billion users on it monthly (Toseeb and Inkster, 2015) and has evolved into much more than anyone could have imagined, much
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The mouth on the human body is the universal sign for communication and language. Unfortunately, as technology continues to advance, communication is starting to be taking over by the human hands. In the past the only way to communicate with someone was through face to face communication or the land line of peoples’ home phones. Facebook as made communication quick and silent for the most part. The home page on Facebook is designed to showcase all of your “friends” posts, updates and likes. Giving the users quick access to stay in touch with a large number of people without having to actually contact them. The chat feature on Facebook is another way people communicate now. McLuhan made it clear that as technology improves, social involvement will decrease.(1964) Facebook gives its users the ability to mute group conversations in order to still be part of the conversation but not get notifications. This concept shows the lack of consideration people have towards the importance of reading and listening in respect to communication in the current