ABSTRACT
This chapter explores video as a communication medium, focussing on the history and the operation of video technology. By writing about a media archaeological approach, the author aims to explore the effects of the technology of video on models of communication, with a focus on the cultural imperatives of video’s technical operation. After briefly summarising the important work done in media theory and art history on video, the author uses the work of Vilém Flusser to explore the relationship between video technology and culture from the perspective of technical operations, rather than aesthetic or sociological phenomena. This is a perspective that has largely been missing from English-speaking media theory and allows us to approach a media historical analysis of video from an entirely new angle. From here, the author extends the media archaeology approach by arguing for the political significance of video as a form that replaces the dialetics of film with a sense of agonism.
