Harold Innis (1894 – 1952)
Canadian professor of political economy at the University of Toronto and the author of seminal works on media, communication theory and Canadian economic history.
Anybody who has looked up the reference material that Innis cites so frequently will be struck by the skill with which he has extracted exciting facts from dull expositions. He explored his source materials with a "Geiger counter," as it were. In turn, he presents his finds in a pattern of insights that are not packaged for the consumer palate. He expects the reader to make discovery after discovery that he himself had missed.
The overwhelming pressure of mechanization evident in the newspaper and the magazine, has led to the creation of vast monopolies of communication. Their entrenched positions involve a continuous, systematic, ruthless destruction of elements of permanence essential to cultural activity.
The discovery of printing in the middle of the fifteenth century implied the beginning of a return to a type of civilization dominated by the eye rather than the ear.
To this day, in my opinion, the last chapter of Innis's The Fur Trade in Canada still represents the most concentrated and profound single piece of writing for anyone seeking to understand the nature of Canada.
We have not yet realized that the Indian and his culture were fundamental to the growth of Canadian institutions.