Multimedia Histories ─ From the Magic Lantern to the Internet

Lyons (film studies, Exeter U., UK) and Plunkett (Victorian literature, Exeter U., UK) bring together 16 chapters of new media scholarship by contributors in the fields of communication, media studies, film, English, and others from the UK and US. In historical and theoretical case studies, these scholars discuss connections between digital culture and the history of screen and audio technologies in the nineteenth through twenty-first centuries in addition to the social, political, and aesthetic ramifications of multimedia history. They consider the multi-media character of devices ranging from the stereoscope to television, including automata, digital art, wireless radio, curiosity cabinets, and early film exhibition. Sections are organized around concepts: culture, aesthetics, and influence; remediation; consumption and interactivity, and convergence. Specifically, they address the impact of cinema, radio, and computing, the remaking of pre-existing artistic forms through new media, screen entertainments and interactive experiences, and processes of media convergence. Distributed in North America by The David Brown Book Co. Annotation c2007 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)