Includes bibliographical references (pages 227-245) and index.
Part 1: Contemporary reaction to three new media. "Lightning lines" and the birth of modern communication, 1838-1900 ; American motion pictures and the new popular culture, 1893-1918 ; The ethereal hearth : American radio from wireless through broadcasting, 1892-1940 -- Part 2: Theorists of modern communication. Toward a new community? : modern communication in the social thought of Charles Horton Cooley, John Dewey, and Robert E. Park ; The rise of empirical media study : communications research as behavioral science, 1930-1960 ; Metahistory, mythology, and the media : the American thought of Harold Innis and Marshal McLuhan -- Epilogue: Dialectical tensions in the American media, past and future.