EDUCATION AND THE MODE OF INFORMATION - AN INTERVIEW WITH POSTER,MARK

This interview with Mark Poster focuses largely upon his book The Mode of Information (1990), and his more recent work, with the aim of draw ing out the implications of his theorizing for the field of education. The Mode of Information delineates a field of social and critical inq uiry concerning electronically mediated communication and ifs power to transform modem institutions, including the nature of communication i tself. Central to his thinking is the idea that electronically mediate d communication creates new language experiences, transforming the mod em institutions of speech, reading and writing. This change is clearly evident in the well recognized fact that the exchange of symbols is n ow less subject to traditional constraints of space and time. His appr oach to this field of critical endeavour can be termed broadly, postst ructuralist; indeed, his book, as he indicates, is to be taken above a ll ''as an attempt to suggest the value of poststructuralist theory to the history of communications'' (Poster, 1970, p. 7).