The Skin of Culture: Investigating the New Electronic Reality
by Christopher Dewdney and Derrick de Kerckhove

The Skin of Culture provides an overview of de Kerckhove's research and speculations. The 'Skin of Culture' is a bold and highly original vision of the electronic media and the nature of reality in a world increasingly wired to technology. It proposes that: we are already in a new age; democracy is outmoded and must be redesigned to reflect how technology affects power structures; the electronic media have extended our psychology as well as our nervous systems and our bodies; our planet is poised on the verge of either fragmentation or globalisation; art must redress science and reclaim technology; television is a projection of our emotional unconscious; television violence actually hits us physically; our sense of touch is becoming our dominant electronic modality; virtual reality will soon eliminate the gap between an idea and its actualisation; we will soon be wearing our machines; electronic media are reversing the effects of language, literacy and the alphabet, and this might be a good thing' we are about to create a collective mind that will exceed the capabilities of any individual human.