The Printing Press: Technology that Changed the World Forever - Brian Russel

The Printing Press: Technology that Changed the World Forever

Brian Russel

Much of humanity today enjoys a great number of technological wonders including: email, the personal computer, the Internet, household appliances of every sort imaginable, the automobile, railroads, radio, aviation, satellite technology, cellular phones, video conferencing, television, digital cameras, magnetic resonance imaging, laser surgery, and countless other technologies that impact us on a daily basis. Each of the aforementioned technologies relies on an earlier technology that I argue has had the most significant impact on the world and our civilization: Johannes Gutenberg's development of the printing press in the mid-15th Century. As John Man suggests in his book Gutenberg: How One Man Remade the World with Words, "Gutenberg's invention made the soil from which sprang modern history, science, popular literature, the emergence of the nation-state, so much of everything by which we define modernity" (2). And, Paul Gray notes, "We can hardly imagine a world without an abundance of printed matter, and thus we take for granted an invention that produced astonishing consequences" (158).

A December 2000 article in Reading Today points out, "Gutenberg did not, as many believe, invent movable type. That had been invented in China in the 11th century" (41). However, the article continues, "...there is little question that, like many great technological revolutionaries, Gutenberg took a number of extant technologies, refined or invented others, and used them in a new and unquestionably superior way" (41). According to Man, the key to Gutenberg's success was the invention of a hand-held mould and the perfection of a technique to bind type into a consistent and accurate form, thus creating the ability to mass-produce high quality books. (126-132)

Movable type had been utilized, in one form or another, since at least 1045 A.D. by China's Pi Sheng. (Koscielniak, 6) And, scribes had been painstakingly creating books by hand one at a time since the invention of the written word. But, not until the development of the printing press was the information contained within books made available to a large population. Gray notes, "Affordable books made literacy a crucial skill and an unprecedented means of social advancement to those who acquired it. Established hierarchies began to crumble. Books were the world's first mass-produced items. But most important of all, printing proved to be the greatest extension of human consciousness ever created" (159).

It is nearly impossible to imagine today's technological advancements without the existence of readily accessible printed material. How much of what we learn, starting from very early in our childhoods, is learned with the aid of the written word? From bedtime stories to the daily newspaper to textbooks to manuals that accompany the latest appliance or computer or mp3 player we've purchased, we learn about our world and our technology through the printed word. Letters, notes, instant messages, text messages, blogs, and email all are iterations of what was first mechanized through the development of the printing press. Indeed, a generic term for media has long been the "press," named so for the invention that Gutenberg developed.

One of the most remarkable things about the printing press was the speed with which it altered our world. Man observes, "Suddenly, in a historical eye-blink, scribes were redundant. One year, it took a month or two to produce a single copy of a book; the next you could have 500 copies in a week" (2). Neil Postman is quoted in Reading Today on the same subject, noting:

Forty years after Gutenberg converted an old wine press into a printing machine with movable type, there were presses in 110 cities in six different countries. Fifty years after the press was invented, more than eight million books had been printed, almost all of them filled with information that had previously been unavailable to the average person. There were books on law, agriculture, politics, exploration, metallurgy, botany, linguistics, pediatrics, even good manners. There were also assorted guides and manuals; the world of commerce rapidly became a world of printed paper through the widespread use of contracts, deeds, promissory notes, and maps. (emphasis added, 41)

Suddenly, with books no longer relegated to the elite in society, average people began to learn how to read. And, it is difficult to overstate the profound impact this development had on society. Richard G. Cole observes, "It is frequently stated that the Reformation would have been impossible or would have had little chance of popular acceptance without the rapid spread of typography" (327). And, The Economist suggests, "... if printing did not actually cause the intellectual changes taking place in Europe at the time, it certainly catalysed [sic] them" (97).

The changes brought about by the invention and widespread adoption of the printing press went beyond merely increasing literacy rates. Reading Today points out, "The attitude toward knowledge and learning was utterly changed. Inquiry, and the questioning of received wisdom, greatly increased. In many ways, the communal medieval world gave way rapidly to the modern world and its focus on the individual. In both obvious and more subtle but profound ways, the world had changed" (41). Marshall McCluhan takes this a step further, asserting:

I venture to suggest that all of the reasons for nationalism are included in the penetrative powers of Gutenberg technology. Not only does print vividly discover national boundaries, but the print market was itself defined by such boundaries, at least for early printers and publishers. Perhaps also the ability to see one's mother tongue in uniform and repeatable technological dress creates in the individual reader a feeling of unity and power that he shares with all other readers of that tongue. Quite different sentiments are felt by preliterate or semiliterate populations. (571)

In addition to increased literacy rates, a greater ease in sharing knowledge and scholarship, and the notion of national identities, there are other ripple effects of the printing press. David Vincent asserts, "Literacy is inextricably linked to notions of progress. Its measurement... was a means by which societies began to calibrate their advance, and in developed as well as developing countries command of the basic skills of written communication is still seen as central to economic growth" (405). And, Reading Today observes, "Just 70 years after the press appeared, Francis Bacon said printing was one of three inventions (the others were gunpowder and the compass) that had 'changed the appearance and state of the whole world'" (41).

It is difficult to imagine living in a world without the ubiquitous printed material with which we are surrounded. We see the printed word on billboards, bus ads, television commercials, subtitles of foreign language films, product packaging, and, of course, books, magazines, and, newspapers. While not all of this is generated with the use of an actual printing press anymore, none of it would exist without the initial development of the printing press. Marshall McCluhan puts it quite succinctly when he states, "The penetrative powers of the Gutenberg technology, irresistible under any conditions, became the means of forming the very ground plan and the superstructure of social and business institutions" (569).

It is difficult to even catalogue all of the ways in which we are impacted by the written word in our everyday lives. Without it, how would we know how to operate our appliances, our vehicles, our computers, or, our personal entertainment systems? How would we navigate on our own without the use of maps and atlases? Even the fishermen and the farmer are dependent upon the written word in consulting weather reports and almanacs. Every day, in countless ways, we are interacting with words. The invention that enabled the written word to be produced efficiently and in an economic manner truly changed the world, and in so doing, paved the way for all technologies that followed.

Works Cited

Cole, Richard G. "Unsung Heroes." Sixteenth Century Journal. 15.3 Autumn 1984: 327-339. JSTOR. Roosevelt U Library. 23 Mar. 2007 < http://links.jstor.org>
Economist Magazine. "Hang on lads, I've got an idea." 353.8151 Dec. 31, 1999: 97. Academic Search Premier. EBSCO Host. Roosevelt U Library. 23 Mar. 2007
< http://search.ebscohost.com>.
Gray, Paul. "Johann Gutenberg." 154.27 Dec. 31, 1999: 158-160. Academic Search Premier. EBSCO Host. Roosevelt U Library. 23 Mar. 2007
< http://search.ebscohost.com>.
Koscielniak, Bruce. Johann Gutenberg and the Amazing Printing Press. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2003.
Man, John. Gutenberg: How One Man Remade the World with Words. New York: John Wiley & Sons, 2002.
McLuhan, Marshall. "Effects of the Improvements of Communication Media." The Journal of Economic History. 20.4 Dec. 1960: 566-575. JSTOR. Roosevelt U Library. 29 Mar. 2007 < http://links.jstor.org>
Reading Today. "Gutenberg's millennium." 18.3 Dec. 2000: 41. Expanded Academic ASAP. Thomson Gale. Roosevelt U Library. 23 Mar. 2007 .
Vincent, David. "The Progress of Literacy." Victorian Studies. 45.3 Spring 2003: 405-431. Academic Search Premier. EBSCO Host. Roosevelt U Library. 23 Mar. 2007
< http://search.ebscohost.com>.

Overview

I found this essay really helpful to give an overview of what were some of the major effects of the printing press. It has effected our entire human race and has paved the way for many of today's machines and communication methods. There are so many different aspects of the world that have been effected that it would be really hard to talk about them all. I need to narrow down the subject as the body of work as it stands is ginormous. This essay has helped to point me in the right direction for where to look for more research and has also given me a good range of possible quotes that will work in favour of my dissertation. I need to think about the social implications the printing press had on civilization aswell as the technological and cultural changes. I believe that the printing press is one of the most important inventions known to man and I am looking forward to exploring more of the effects.

Quotes

 "Gutenberg's invention made the soil from which sprang modern history, science, popular literature, the emergence of the nation-state, so much of everything by which we define modernity"

"Suddenly, in a historical eye-blink, scribes were redundant. One year, it took a month or two to produce a single copy of a book; the next you could have 500 copies in a week"
 
 Man, John. Gutenberg: How One Man Remade the World with Words. New York: John Wiley & Sons, 2002.

  "We can hardly imagine a world without an abundance of printed matter, and thus we take for granted an invention that produced astonishing consequences"
Gray, Paul. "Johann Gutenberg." 154.27 Dec. 31, 1999: 158-160. Academic Search Premier. EBSCO Host. Roosevelt U Library. 23 Mar. 2007 

"Gutenberg did not, as many believe, invent movable type. That had been invented in China in the 11th century" 
Reading Today. "Gutenberg's millennium." 18.3 Dec. 2000: 41. Expanded Academic ASAP. Thomson Gale. Roosevelt U Library. 23 Mar. 2007 . 

"...there is little question that, like many great technological revolutionaries, Gutenberg took a number of extant technologies, refined or invented others, and used them in a new and unquestionably superior way"

"The attitude toward knowledge and learning was utterly changed. Inquiry, and the questioning of received wisdom, greatly increased. In many ways, the communal medieval world gave way rapidly to the modern world and its focus on the individual. In both obvious and more subtle but profound ways, the world had changed"  

"Just 70 years after the press appeared, Francis Bacon said printing was one of three inventions (the others were gunpowder and the compass) that had 'changed the appearance and state of the whole world'" (41).
Reading Today. "Gutenberg's millennium." 18.3 Dec. 2000: 41. Expanded Academic ASAP. Thomson Gale. Roosevelt U Library. 23 Mar. 2007 . 

 "Affordable books made literacy a crucial skill and an unprecedented means of social advancement to those who acquired it. Established hierarchies began to crumble. Books were the world's first mass-produced items. But most important of all, printing proved to be the greatest extension of human consciousness ever created"
Gray, Paul. "Johann Gutenberg." 154.27 Dec. 31, 1999: 158-160. Academic Search Premier. EBSCO Host. Roosevelt U Library. 23 Mar. 2007  

Forty years after Gutenberg converted an old wine press into a printing machine with movable type, there were presses in 110 cities in six different countries. Fifty years after the press was invented, more than eight million books had been printed, almost all of them filled with information that had previously been unavailable to the average person. There were books on law, agriculture, politics, exploration, metallurgy, botany, linguistics, pediatrics, even good manners. There were also assorted guides and manuals; the world of commerce rapidly became a world of printed paper through the widespread use of contracts, deeds, promissory notes, and maps.
Neil Postman
Reading Today. "Gutenberg's millennium." 18.3 Dec. 2000: 41. Expanded Academic ASAP. Thomson Gale. Roosevelt U Library. 23 Mar. 2007 .
 
 "It is frequently stated that the Reformation would have been impossible or would have had little chance of popular acceptance without the rapid spread of typography" 
Cole, Richard G. "Unsung Heroes." Sixteenth Century Journal. 15.3 Autumn 1984: 327-339. JSTOR. Roosevelt U Library. 23 Mar. 2007 < http://links.jstor.org> 

 "... if printing did not actually cause the intellectual changes taking place in Europe at the time, it certainly catalysed [sic] them"
Economist Magazine. "Hang on lads, I've got an idea." 353.8151 Dec. 31, 1999: 97. Academic Search Premier. EBSCO Host. Roosevelt U Library. 23 Mar. 2007 

 I venture to suggest that all of the reasons for nationalism are included in the penetrative powers of Gutenberg technology. Not only does print vividly discover national boundaries, but the print market was itself defined by such boundaries, at least for early printers and publishers. Perhaps also the ability to see one's mother tongue in uniform and repeatable technological dress creates in the individual reader a feeling of unity and power that he shares with all other readers of that tongue. Quite different sentiments are felt by preliterate or semiliterate populations. (571)
McLuhan, Marshall. "Effects of the Improvements of Communication Media." The Journal of Economic History. 20.4 Dec. 1960: 566-575. JSTOR. Roosevelt U Library. 29 Mar. 2007 < http://links.jstor.org> 

"Literacy is inextricably linked to notions of progress. Its measurement... was a means by which societies began to calibrate their advance, and in developed as well as developing countries command of the basic skills of written communication is still seen as central to economic growth" (405)
Vincent, David. "The Progress of Literacy." Victorian Studies. 45.3 Spring 2003: 405-431. Academic Search Premier. EBSCO Host. Roosevelt U Library. 23 Mar. 2007 

"The penetrative powers of the Gutenberg technology, irresistible under any conditions, became the means of forming the very ground plan and the superstructure of social and business institutions" (569).
McLuhan, Marshall. "Effects of the Improvements of Communication Media." The Journal of Economic History. 20.4 Dec. 1960: 566-575. JSTOR. Roosevelt U Library. 29 Mar. 2007 < http://links.jstor.org>

Technologies of Writing Essay - Research

Technologies of Writing   Jaishree K. Odin University of Hawaii at Manoa   Just as we are at the threshold of a new electronic revolution that is redefining all aspects of our lives, it is worthwhile to look back and understand how another revolution--the printing revolution--brought about long lasting and deep changes in western social and cultural landscape. That change, as we look back, might have had a similar life-transforming effect on the people who lived in centuries shortly following the invention of printing press. In any analyses of the manifold impact of the printing revolution, it is important to look at it as part of a varied phenomena occurring in the European socio-political landscape which unleashed a complex set of changes, both small and large. These changes mutually affected one another which led to great leaps in scientific progress while at the same time resulting in political, social and economic changes.

Printing Revolution and its Impact on Social and Cultural Formations

Printing revolution ushered in the era of modern Europe by making both ancient and medieval texts available to a broader audience which produced a fertile ground for new ideas and new theories. Marshall McLuhan rightly notes that the shift from predominantly oral culture to print culture also affected the nature of human consciousness in that print represented an abstraction of thought which gave precedence to linearity, sequentiality and homogeneity. This mode of thinking is very much evident not only in rationalist philosophy, realistic fiction, but also in the rise of scientific materialism in the following centuries. Printing also led to the standardization of various European languages as works began to be published in these languages. Eventually this standardization of vernacular languages contributed toward promoting literatures which were used to create national mythologies. Whereas maps were in circulation since ancient times, cartography as a science is the child of print revolution. And cartography was not only important in demarcating national boundaries, but also mapping the territories that were colonized in the new world.

In order to understand the deep changes that were the result of printing revolution, we need to focus our attention at the transition from the scribal to the print culture which brought the book culture from inside the monasteries to outside into the universities. This outwards movement got lay people involved in reading and writing activities. During the Middle Ages, the book production in the manuscript form was confined to monasteries and other ecclesiastical centers which had thus direct control of the resulting book culture. The scribal culture of the Middle Ages depended on the meticulous copying of manuscripts by scribes who spent hours at their task in scriptoria. Such a labor intensive task could not lead to large scale duplication and hence, access to manuscripts was confined to chiefly the clerics who became custodians of the book culture. In the feudal social structure, therefore, the scholarly activities were confined to monasteries and reading was usually the occupation of clerics.

The modes of communication transform modes of production as well as modes of consumption. In the preprint era, when only a small percentage of the population had access to written sources of information or knowledge, both public and private affairs were primarily conducted through oral communication. The primacy of physical presence in communication promoted community formations that were very much dependent on geographical togetherness and within that constraint further determined by communities based on parochial and family bonds. Printing revolution changed all that--for the first time, it was possible for political, economic, and culture producers to reach people who were dispersed geographically. As a result new types of communities were formed that were based on personal or professional interests, or political affiliations.

Even though printing involved a different mode of production, early printers used conventions of the scribal culture as they produced books. Printing was seen initially as a more efficient way of mass copying of manuscripts rather than as a totally new medium which would transform the way people read, wrote, as well as handled texts. Just as manuscript copyists showed preoccupation with surface appearance making sure that the copy was as close to the original, so did the early printers aim at producing printed books which looked very similar to manuscripts in surface appearance. Soon however, printers started seeing the advantages inherent in the print medium that allowed more things than possible through hand copying. Mechanical reproduction led to freeing of time that could be devoted to the other aspects of text production. This included appearance, meaning, as well as ease of reading which led to editing conventions very different from those used in manuscript production. Since a small mistake could be reproduced in thousands of copies, so a great deal of attention was given to proof reading and editing. Even the readers got involved by sending in the errors they detected which were corrected by issuing errata pages in the already printed editions and using corrected future editions. We now stand at another divide--between the print and the electronic culture-and we see a similar conflation of two very different modes of production. Print practices and standards are used to evaluate or produce texts in a totally different medium. Only slowly are we beginning to realize that inherent ephemerality, and transmutability of the electronic text changes the text's relationship to both the reader as well as the writer.

Elizabeth Eisenstein argues that printing brought about a revolutionary change in the ways in which knowledge was preserved, used and passed on to the succeeding generations. Unlike the print era, copying in the scribal era was a laborious process and it was almost impossible to get exactly similar copies of the original manuscripts. Thus, a number of variant manuscripts would be in circulation. Due to limited number of copies, each manuscript was unique and had to be guarded in public places, usually chained to bookshelves, or stowed away in vaults and other safe places, so it was not lost or destroyed. The distinction that we make now between the original and the copy came into existence with the rise of the print culture. Printing made it possible for the mass production of identical copies which could be distributed widely amongst people separated geographically as well as historically. As printing made ancient as well as medieval texts available, it also allowed opportunities to future scholars, literary men, or scientists to be able to study, compare, and synthesize this knowledge and come up with their own theories. Describing "typographical fixity"as necessary for "rapid advancement of learning," Eisenstein notes that what chiefly distinguished the print era from the preprint was the accumulation of knowledge made possible through the preservative powers of print. In the preprint era due to the scarcity of manuscripts it was not possible for the general public to have recourse to the accumulated knowledge of the past. Thus, even before the close of the sixteenth century, the areas of charting the planets, mapping the earth, synchronizing chronologies, codifying laws or compiling bibliographies underwent a major change in that the old knowledge was retrieved and given typographical fixity which made it available for broader study and perusal, soon to be replaced by new schemes and charts which were continually corrected and refined by the following generations. The error free compilation and distribution of technical literature, for example, astronomical or geographical data, maps, charts and so on, freed the technical personnel to engage in observation and data collection. Eisenstein finally concludes, that printing by making simultaneous viewing of identical data by people geographically separated "constituted a kind of communication revolution in itself."

In their exhaustive study The Coming of Book , Febvre and Martin note that the book trade through mass copying of manuscripts turned books into commodities of exchange which could be sold for profit. Gutenberg's invention of printing press, as scholars point out, perhaps was one of the successful experiments by people in that era to find mechanical means of reproduction so that increasing demand for books could be met expeditiously. Printing has indeed been described as the first assembly line industry where a team of typographers produced a finished product that could be copied for mass distribution.

As the book trade became more lucrative and the reading public increased in number, publishers invested in printing books that would appeal to a broader audience. Initially, religious and devotional literature constituted a higher percentage of literature that was printed, but this changed by the eighteenth century when new forms of literature slowly established themselves. The society based on print culture relied on individual acts of writing as well as reading which promoted notions of individuality, originality, and creativity which was reflected in new literary forms. The romantic movement in Germany and England further promoted the idea of the inspired writer who produces a totally unique and original work which is different from other works. It was in the late eighteenth and beginning of nineteenth century that authors actively campaigned for intellectual right or copyright to their own work.

---

Printing and Authorship

In the earlier scribal and partially oral cultures, the concept of authorship was very different and did not have the same meaning that it has nowadays. In the East, for example, authors of preprint era attributed their work either to their teachers or they described them as a revelation. In the commentaries of the ancient texts, too, the focus is on the tradition rather than on the authors who wrote these works. The origin of these ancient traditions is usually associated with nebulous historical or mythical figures. When one studies any corpus of such texts along with the commentaries, one tends to think more in terms of collective authorship instead of an individual author. Thus, the idea or the knowledge transmitted was more important than the individuals who contributed to the tradition. In Europe, too, the function of author as it appeared in preprint culture was not attached to the idea of ownership. Writing was an act to materialize knowledge of universal nature in tangible material form. It was thus not a product or a commodity to be sold for monetary profit. Writing became a commodity with an exchange value with the invention of the printing press which made it possible to have mass multiplication of the same manuscript. As printed text made its way into the hands of a broad audience, its content as well as form was slowly transformed. The laws of the market promoted publication of lighter literature which had broader appeal. Thus, came into existence new literary forms which were more geared toward recreation and entertainment. 

Martha Woodmansee shows how the notion of "author", was very different in the renaissance and neoclassical period. The writer then was seen as a craftsman who learned his tools to manipulate traditional materials to produce works to satisfy his patrons who provided for his livelihood and social status. If the piece was unique, it was seen as the result of an act of inspiration that came from the outside or from the above. Even as late as 1750, the author was regarded in Germany as one of the participants in the process of book production along with other craftsmen that included the papermaker, the typefounder, the typesetters and the printer. The two notions describing writing as a craft and as an act of inspiration existed side by side until the middle of the eighteenth century when a slow shift occurred. Critics and writers increasingly tended to see their work as arising from an act of inspiration from within rather than from the above and this notion was given precedence over that of the writer as a craftsman. This shift, Woodmanse argues, was directly linked to changed patterns of production, distribution and consumption of reading materials. Not only did new literary forms, for example, the novel, book review, and periodical make their appearance, but also the distribution of printed materials was facilitated through the setting up of circulating libraries. As serious writers competed against hack writers who produced popular literature, they began to see an urgent need to create narratives that would emphasize the uniqueness of their work. Increasingly, with the rise in romantic modes of thought first in Germany, then in England, the notion of the genius who, in an act of inspiration, produced a work that was original gained popularity. Thus, a creative piece of work was associated with a particular author and it was seen as something totally different from what was produced before. This thinking, Woodmanse concludes, shaped the intellectual property or copyright laws in Europe.

Initially, as the book writing industry started, authors did not get paid for their creation, instead they acquired patrons to whom they dedicated their works and who in return provided them with financial rewards. As the middle class reading public increased in number, book trade became a profitable business and the profession of author slowly established itself. The authors could no longer rely on the patronage of a few wealthy individuals who in the earlier times had contributed toward their livelihood and social status. In order to assure their livelihood based on the popularity of their works, they had to satisfy the needs of the general reading public who bought the work. A new kind of literature, characterized as lighter literature, more for entertainment than dealing with serious ideas, made its appearance. Printing not only made possible mass multiplication of the manuscript, it also created a fixed personality for the author in that a particular narrative came to be associated with the creator of a particular set of works which were seen as containing a certain line of thinking which distinguished it from other works. Printing thus gave rise to a different concept of authorship--particular works came to be associated with particular authors who made their living based on the popularity of the works they produced. The notion of the uniqueness of the writer and his creation could be exploited both by the publisher and the writer, because it could be used to justify the ownership of intellectual property.

---

Evolution of Copyright 

The legal and commercial aspects of copyright evolved in Europe over almost two centuries which ended up in the institution of a system of royalty whereby the writer enters into a contractual agreement with the publishers regarding his share of profits on the sale of printed copies of the manuscript. The royalty system is based on the assumption that the writer owns the product of his intellectual labor which appears in the form of "work" over which he has common-law right before it is published and copyright after it is published. Looking at copyright laws now, it is hard to imagine that there was a time when the author did not have any control over his manuscript after he sold it to the publisher. It was customary towards the end of the sixteenth century for the publisher to buy the manuscript from the author for a lump sum. After the manuscript was bought, the publisher had total control over it and any profits made on the sale of printed books and any future reprints. Writing was not a means of livelihood for writers in this era. In keeping with the feudal modes of behavior which emphasized dependence and reciprocal codes of duty and service, the authors at this time sought cultivated patrons in the court to whom they dedicated their works and who in return compensated them in financial terms.

While elaborating on the evolution of copyright laws in Germany, Elizabeth Woodenmanse notes that the right of privilege was issued initially as a favor by the court to protect the publishers from unauthorized reprints. As the book business expanded in the seventeenth and the eighteenth century and greater number of people got involved in the printing business, the limited right of privilege proved to be an inadequate protection since it was only applicable within the borders of the territory or state. Since Germany was comprised of about three hundred states and each state issued its own privilege rights, it created a situation where unauthorized reprints seen as an infringement of privileged rights in one state was seen as a source of revenue in another. The privilege continued in Germany into the eighteenth century which was the only means of protection the publishers had against unauthorized reprints. It was toward the end of the eighteenth century that various copyright acts went into effect in Germany (43).

While in Germany the copyright evolved out of the right of privilege, in England it began in 1557 when the Crown chartered the Stationers's Company which consisted of an association of printers who had right to print. Other printers who did not belong to the Stationers's Company had to get special permission to print. As the reading public expanded, book publishing became a profitable business. Soon unauthorized reprints of books made their appearance in the market. Although book piracy was around since the beginning of publishing history, it became a problem for the publishers when it targeted the popular book market. The unauthorized reprints of popular books which were sold at lower prices affected the legitimate printers who had invested in the production of these books. In order to combat book piracy which was cutting into their profits a part of which were used by legitimate printers to cover the investment in printing books of more specialized nature, publishers appealed for protection to own the rights to copy. The sixteenth century British Licensing Act instituted that each manuscript published had to be officially licensed. The licensing took the form of making an entry of the manuscript title into the Stationers's Company register which gave the publisher the right to copy. Whoever made the entry of a particular manuscript first owned the right to copy that manuscript. As Benjamin Caplan points out, though this looks like the present day copyright arrangement, this was not really so because it did not specify that the work was supposed to be an original contribution, instead it included both ancient and new works. Also, this arrangement was more to protect the publishers from unauthorized reprints rather than the author. Also, the officers of the Company acted as the royal censorship agency which had absolute control over what was printed. Since members of the Stationers's Company were a group of London based publishers loyal to the crown, soon they obtained rights to copy all the manuscripts that were worth printing. The Licensing Act lapsed in 1694 and the publishers in order to maintain their copyright protection petitioned to the parliament which resulted in the Statute of Anne in 1710. However, instead of giving the publisher perpetual copyright, it was the first legal copyright act which gave the author a limited copyright of fourteen years that could be extended by another term of fourteen years if the author survived the first term. The author had to register the work in the Stationers's register in order to ensure his copyright and each time the work was reprinted the printer had to pay the author. For works that were already in print, a limited copyright of twenty one years was given to the publisher. Mark Rose notes that the parliaments' decision to introduce the author's right into the Act was to break the monopoly of London booksellers who owned most of the copyrights of value. The author's rights were used by booksellers to promote their own interest. By proposing that the author had common law right in the manuscript turned the manuscript into property which when it was to break the monopoly of a few London booksellers that had total control over manuscripts that were of value that the limited copyright was instituted.

Due to changing political and economic conditions, the official licensing through the Stationers' Company gradually lost its effectiveness. As the book industry expanded, the authors increasingly demanded right to their works but the legal, political, and economic institutions were not ready to recognize this right. Once the publishers bought the manuscript from the author, they had total control on printing and reprinting it and the profits made from it. and both the publishers and the authors saw the necessity for resolving copyright issues legally which made it possible for the author to have exclusive rights over the manuscripts for a definite period of time, after which it went to public domain. In 1710 the Statute of Anne came into existence which was the first legal arrangement to bestow the right to copy to the author for a period of fourteen years after the first date of publication. If the author was still living after the initial term, a second term of fourteen years was granted to him to own the copy. In order to ensure the ownership of the copy the author had to register his work in the Stationer's register. Each time the work was reprinted the publisher had to seek the permission of the author and pay him for the reprint. Soon the author began to ask for high sums for their manuscript which the booksellers resented because it was hard to tell which manuscript would be a success. Throughout the eighteenth century both in England and Europe the authors continued their struggle to own the rights over their work

The writers had incentive to keep themselves engaged in the lonely task of writing because usually not only their subsistence was dependent on it, but also their personal fame. Printed book assured the writer's immortality. Notions of authorship, individuality, as well as creativity have been challenged in recent years by theorists. Michael Foucault shows how the notion of "author" as it appears in recent history of literature, philosophy and sciences, is a construction that was shaped by legal, economic, and social institutions.

DISSERTATION RESEARCH - HOW PRINT CHANGED THE WORLD

Affects of the the printing press

In the last 5000 years, several turning points have shaped the world in which we live.  One of the first turning points was the invention of writing, which gave stable societies the ability to account and record.  The invention of the alphabet was another major turning point that brought writing and communication to societies through cultural diffusion.  This site deals with a third major turning point,which was the invention of the printing press in the 15th century by Johann Gutenberg.  

Printing itself was invented long before the printing press.  China was the pioneer for printing.  With their invention of wood block printing, they applied ink to carved wooden blocks, which were used to transfer an image to paper.  Koreans later used this process allowing playing cards, picture images, and books to make their way to Europe.  Eventually Europe began using this process for printing, but the true turning point came with Gutenberg’s metal moveable type system.  This system made printing faster and more efficient.  While it normally took a month or two to produce a single copy of a book, Gutenberg’s press made 500 copies a week possible.  This led to an increase of education in Europe, the scientific revolution, and the spread of the Protestant Reformation.  It has also continued the spread of communication, technology, learning, and entertainment in today’s society worldwide, which can be seen in Barnes and Noble along with Amazon book sales in 2008.  The two major media salers combined to sale more than $9.5 billion in books.        

The Protestant Reformation

The Protestant Reformation came about because Catholics were questioning the practices of their church.  These practices in question were the purchases and sales of church positions, buying indulgences, and overall corruption in the church’s hierarchy involving even the Pope.  A man named Martin Luther challenged the Pope and the church on these abuses in 1517 with his famous publication of the Ninety-Five Theses.  These ninety-five points were Luther's way of calling the Catholic Church out on their wrongs.  In number 82, Luther asks the Pope why he doesn't empty purgatory out of holy love for the souls rather than for money.  

   

During this encounter, many German people asked for the translation of the document since many of them didn't speak Latin, and a young college student took on this very task.  After his translation was complete, he sent it to his university's printing press where hundreds of copies were made.  These copies spread throughout Europe quickly giving the reformation support.  In the long run, the printing press was the main catalyst that conveyed Luther’s ideas by allowing him to mass-produce pamphlets that outlined the church’s wrongs and emphasized their abuses.  The printing press helped the Protestant propaganda spread throughout Europe furthering Martin Luther’s success and affording him many supporters. 

The Scientific Revolution

The Scientific Revolution was a period in the Middle Ages when new ideas about the major sciences led to a rejection of Ancient Greek doctrines that had prevailed up to that point.  The printing press made it possible for Scientists to publish their findings without misinterpretation, which was a common occurrence when scribes were hired to write books.  Once the printing press was set, an exact copy was printed again and again.  This led to the publications of many key ideas during the Scientific Revolution.

·        Nicolaus Copernicus published On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres in      1543.  This advanced the Heliocentric Theory of cosmology. 

·        Andreas Vesalius published On the Fabric of the Human Body in 1543.  He found that the heart was responsible for the circulation of blood in the human body. 

·        William Gilbert published a book in 1600 that laid the foundations on the theory of magnetism and electricity.

·        Johannes Kepler published his first two laws of planetary motion in 1609.

·        Rene Descartes published Discourse on the Method in 1637, which helped establish the Scientific Method. 

Notes on Elizabeth Einsteins : Printing Press an Agent for Change

I came across a power point presentation online by Frank W. Elwell, based on the theories of Elizabeth Eisenstein as presented in her works. A more complete summary of Eisenstein’s theories can be found in Sociocultural Systems: Principles of Structure and Change, by Frank W. Elwell. The presentation highlights some key factors the printing press had on the world as we know it today. It was a huge turning point in the history of man kind. I have highlighted aspects of the text which will help me piece my disertation together. 

http://www.faculty.rsu.edu/users/f/felwell/www/Theorists/Eisenstein/Elizabeth.pdf

Technological Innovation

While Gerhard Lenski and Jarred Diamond capture the grand sweep of the social evolutionary process, historian Elizabeth Eisenstein has focused upon a single technological innovation and traced its impact on the rest of the sociocultural system. In elaborate detail, she traces the beginnings of the communications revolution started by the invention of the printing press.

She successfully demonstrates two principles of ecological-evolutionary theory:

1.    Technology is a potent force in sociocultural evolution that often has far reaching effects throughout the sociocultural system; and

2.    Communications technology, in particular, because it involves both the storage and dissemination of information and data, is an intensifier of the evolutionary process.

Modernity, Eisenstein claims, is too indefinite a concept for careful scholarship. Rather, she examines the effects of a “communications revolution” on a variety of social movement in sixteenth century Europe. While many look to the discovery of the New World, or class struggle and the triumph of capitalism, or the scientific revolution, or the schism of Christianity to explain the turmoil and innovation of that century, Eisenstein looks to the printing press as the primary agent of change.

Eisentein claims that the impact of the new print technologies on medieval life beginning in the 1450s was profound. By 1500 she writes that every major city in Europe had at least one printer’s workshop (43-44). The focus of her historical analysis is on the effects of these early print shops on the social structure and culture of Europe over the next 100 years.

Print Shops

Many of these print shops brought together scholars and craftsmen, and served as a bridge between universities and cities. These workshops were also capitalist enterprises and training new occupational groups, utilizing new technologies and developing new techniques; they were constantly seeking new markets to increase their profits and expanding their entreprises.

Eisenstein characterizes the relationship as one of the shops serving a coordinating function for scholarly, religious, state, and scientific activities while producing commodities for profit. As such, these shops represent a new destabilizing force in Europe, both in their organization and in their products.

As capitalist enterprises with consequent increases in overhead, and debt the printer must constantly search for ways to expand his markets in order to increase his profit. In many of these shops job-printing accompanied book printing in which printers would produce commercial advertising, official documents, propaganda for the state and the church, seditious material for radicals (thin Communist Manifesto) , as well as the necessary documents for state and private bureaucracies.

Early printers were in a unique position in regard to other commercial enterprises, Eisenstein asserts, because in seeking to expand their own product line they also “contributed to, and profited from, the expansion of other commercial enterprises” (60).

Power of the Press

There were a variety of motives behind the power of the press in 16th century Europe—profit, evangelical, individual fame, bureaucratic necessity, and extending the power of the state all among them. In this sense, Eisenstein states, the press is not a single technological innovation that changes everything, but rather an invention that could be used by the church and state, capitalists and scholars to further their interests.

In a different culture, she asserts, the technology may have been used for very different ends, or perhaps entirely suppressed (702-703). Accordingly, institutional context is important when considering technological innovation. It also specifically points to the importance of the material interests of elites. Early printers were effective change agents, but only in combination with other institutional forces. This function of communications as a catalyst makes printing different from other innovations.

While scribal errors in writing, mathematics, charts, graphs, and inferior maps continued to be printed after the advent of the press, a process had begun to address these errors with more surety, and far greater confidence could eventually be placed in the accuracy of the record (686, 699).

The major impact of the printing press is, of course, the marked increase in the number of books that were made available to reading publics. “The fact that identical images, maps and diagrams could be viewed simultaneously by scattered readers constituted a kind of communications revolution in itself” (53).

Readers had more sources to draw from and thus a greater diversity of views, facts, contradictions, observations, theories, drawings, illustrations, and maps to heighten their “awareness of anomalies or discontent with inherited schemes” (686).

The long and uneven spread of literacy after the invention of printing occurs over the next several centuries (indeed, is still occurring). A knowledge explosion occurs in the 16th century, and although this explosion is often attributed to the discovery of the New World, the Reformation, or the rise of science, Eisenstein believes that access to a greater variety of books deserves at least equal attention.

The increase in texts and literacy exposed ever greater numbers to classical literature as well as cross-cultural information, discoveries, religious beliefs, philosophies, fashion, and ways of thinking in societies geographically remote from Europe. Such a sudden abundance of literature—often contradictory or novel to established patterns and though in such traditional societies—created great intellectual ferment in 16th century Europe.

Printed material, Eisenstein claims, also facilitates problem-solving and directly affects the life of the mind (689). Along with Marshal McLuhan, Eisenstein speculates that the format and presentation of books— from scanning lines of print from left to right, to chapter organization, presentation of argument, arrangements of facts—may well serve to affect the thought patterns of readers (88-89).

Printing also helped to codify and standardize languages, thus giving aid to national identities as well as the centralization of the state. Finally, printing serves the function of “amplifying and reinforcing” norms, values, beliefs, and ideologies (126).

Printing also contributed to the fragmentation of Christianity. With the advent of print religious divisions become more permanent. Heresy, and its condemnation, she writes, becomes more fixed in the minds of followers; religious edits more “visible” and “irrevocable” (118-119). The study of scripture became more individualized and fragmented the religious beliefs and experiences of Christians, helping to start wars, heresy trials, and intolerance of other beliefs, a result very different form the effect of printing on science (701).

Individualism

The advent of printing also contributed greatly to the spread of individualism in the West. Because of the dearth of written materials a scribal culture required communal gatherings to receive messages from government or church. With the advent of the mass duplication of printed materials these messages could be given directly to individual readers. This leads to a weakening of the social bond with local groups, but gives opportunity for allegiance and attachments to larger collectives (say the nation state, or socialism).

“Printed materials encouraged silent adherence to causes whose advocates could not be found in any one parish and who addressed an invisible public from afar. New forms of group identity began to compete with an older, more localized nexus of loyalties” (132).

Over time printers began to differentiate the markets for their printed materials to better target the reading tastes of males and females, newly created occupational groups (due to an increasing division of labor), as well as different age groups. The latter, combined with newly established schools for youth, served to create distinctive youth cultures for children and, somewhat later, adolescence (133-134).

In general, the marketing of printed materials to specific groups serves to further differentiate their social experience, beliefs, interests, ideologies, and values from one another. A process that has been “amplified and reinforced” as the communications revolution has continued (158-159).

Conclusions

While Eisenstein’s focus was on the communications revolution that occurred in sixteenth century Europe, the revolution has continued with the development of metal presses, the harnessing of steam and then electricity to the presses, the development of photography, telegraph, telephone, Linotype, radio, television, computers, and the Internet.

“Since the advent of movable type, an enhanced capacity to store and retrieve, preserve and transmit has kept pace with an enhanced capacity to create and destroy, to innovate or outmode. The somewhat chaotic appearance of modern Western culture owes much, if not more, to the duplicative powers of print as it does to the harnessing of new powers in the past century” (704).

Macrosociology is steeped in evolutionism; there is much common ground among its practitioners regarding the material foundations of sociocultural systems: environment, population, technology, and the division of labor. Eisenstein’s exploration of the effects of technological innovation in communications technology on the rest of the sociocultural system stands as an excellent example of the power and scope of materialist theory.

References

Eisentein, Elizabeth. 1980. The Printing Press as an Agent of Change, Vols. 1 & 2. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press

Elwell, Frank. 2013. Sociocultural Systems: Principles of Structure and Change. Canada: Athabasca University Press.


Check out :

Marshal McLuhan
Gerhard Lenski
Jarred Diamond

Disertation Lecture - Richard Miles

Reflection of research within practical work, on going documentation. 

Reflection - theorize - action.

Plan and organize personal program of in depth critical research, to collate and present a coherent written argument and a related practical investigation based on analysis and evaluation, presented in the form of an extended formal written study and related practice based research. The chosen subject relevant to a students main course of study.

The work undertaken will show the students appreciation and application of research approaches and methodologies.

Methodology

The science of method, employed in a particular activity.

A logical and predefined and systematic strategy by which to undertake a research project, including methods of evaluation, schedules and stated intentions.

400 HOURS STUDY TIME = 40 CREDITS

6000-9000 WORDS

DEADLINE : 17TH JANUARY

Cognitive Skills

Evidence the ability to use logic, reasoning and critical judgement to analyse indes from a range of a primary and secondary sources, and empliy critical and theoretical methodologies tyo evaluate examples from the relevant subject diciplie.


Exhibition could be a possibility
Form of cultural studies
Sociological Research
Own Reflections