Analysis of Amusing Ourselves to Death

Neil Postman’s Amusing Ourselves to Death is a book about the effect television has on our culture. He argues that television has become dominate over the printed word and has created a huge problem. It has greatly impacted economics, politics, religion, and education. Children are now unable to learn because they expect their teachers to entertain them like television does. The public is unable to vote sincerely because TV portrays presidential candidates like celebrities. On religious television shows, the preacher is the star and God is second. Postman stresses to his audience the importance of their attentiveness towards this great influence.

Postman uses many rhetorical devices to capture his audience. He uses an anaphora on page 78 when he says, “There is no audience so young that it is barred from television. There is no poverty so abject that it must forgo television. There is no education so exalted that it is not modified by television. And most of all, there is no subject of public interest that does not find its way to television.”. . . . “We do not tell stories of its wonders. We do not confine our television sets to special rooms. We do not doubt the reality of what we see on television (page 79).”

The author also constantly uses personification when he discusses television. “I will try to demonstrate television’s way of knowing is uncompromisingly hostile to typography’s way of knowing; that television’s conversations promote incoherence and triviality; that the phrase “serious television” is a contradiction in terms; and television speaks in only one persistent voice- the voice of entertainment (page 80).” On page 128, when Neil Postman claims, “What the advertiser needs to know is not what is right about the product but what is wrong about the buyer,” he is using an antithesis.

As Neil Postman presents his argument, I found that he will often ask himself and the reader rhetorical questions. For instance, on page 153, he asks, “What is television good for? What is education good for?” I believe Postman does this often because he wants the reader to understand his thought process and continue to dwell on the issue, searching for an answer.

One major persuasive appeal Postman uses is logos, the appeal to reason. To fully grasp the subject of television, it is obvious that the author had to do much research, especially on the history of the media. Chapters 2-5 focus a lot on the history of the transformation from print to television. Many facts can be found to support his argument, such as back in the 19th century, speakers were able to have long, complex arguments without having to oversimplify them like nowadays.

I believe Neil Postman was very accurate in his predictions. I felt like he wrote the book in 2007 instead of 1985. Since 1985, there have been many new inventions (DVDs, Ipods, PDAs, etc.) that replicate television. Amusing Ourselves to Death definitely impacted the way I now look at television. It made me more aware of how much control the media has on my life. Before, I had no idea how powerful this invention was, and how easily it can manipulate the American culture. In the final paragraph, Postman states what the purpose of his book was. It wasn’t to convince the public to completely stop watching television (for that would be impossible), but for us to understand how and why our society has become so centered around the media.