Summary Of Learning In The Age Of Television By Neil Postman

In the importance of news and entertainment of tv shows seems paramount to Neil Postman in the excerpt Commentary: Learning in the Age of Television. The excerpt focuses on the way our entertainment discourse has devolved. He implicitly argues throughout the book that media – whether oral, written, or televised form - should serve to keep us informed and entertained so that we can take direct action to improve our lives and world. We should be willing to satisfy our self-interest, and we obviously need proper information in order to best gauge which entertainment shows satisfies our self-interest in any situation. His fear is that the discourse inspired by television has created an era of "babysitting" in which we lack any idea of what those

Postan states, “Parents embraced sesame street for several reasons, among them that it assuaged their guild over the fact that they could not or would not restrict their children’s access to television” (1). He explains how parents are lazy and hope for their child to learn just by watching something on television. However he assumes that the shows can teach more than a preschool can such as reading and how to pronounce

Therefore, he is perturbed by the "Now…this", meaning acknowledging the fact that the world as mapped by the speeded-up electronic media has no order or meaning and is not to be taken seriously. News commercials and children shows have, he argues, becomes inane, irrelevant, and filled with decontextualized information. We collect news stories separated from any context, much less any context that directly affects our lives. Instead, these things become merely an impetus for us to develop opinions, which in turn become news themselves. Ultimately these things have lost its power to inform our lives and inspire action, and has instead become a form of entertainment that diverts us rather than informs and inspires us (Postman 99). Young children don't need to be watching unnecessary information that does not correspond to them such as elections or jury duties. Children watching their tv shows like Sesame Street will divert their attention from education and expect to learn everything through the television. This kind of entertainment can corrupt children's futures by making them believe that the outside world can only be seen through the television and not by going outside and seeing things as they happen. Although television does teach some principles of