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COM 101: Human Communication. Ron Bishop, Drexel University. 60 percent of our time on earth…. Don’t really have an elegant definition of communication. We talk about it in utilitarian, matter-of-fact, pragmatic terms. It’s so much more than a tool, a skill.
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COM 101: Human Communication Ron Bishop, Drexel University
60 percent of our time on earth… • Don’t really have an elegant definition of communication. • We talk about it in utilitarian, matter-of-fact, pragmatic terms. • It’s so much more than a tool, a skill. • More than just developing “good communication skills.” • It impacts, defines so much human activity. • Studying it is sometimes like foraging in a junkyard. • Studying it is to embrace the interrelatedness of ideas – from a variety of fields (“Consilience”).
What communication isn’t… • Linear • Without purpose (Usually…unless you’re talking in your sleep). • Manifest v. latent functions of communication. (Merton) • A visit to the land of polysemy. • Perfect • Mechanistic • Consider the frames of reference. • Acknowledge your gatekeeping. • Intermittent • Can one not not communicate?
What communication isn’t • Just a transaction • Less un-sponsored activity these days. • As private as before • Would you accept a Jumbotron marriage proposal? • Easy • Always the right call • The importance and impact of silence.
Dewey knew, Radar… • “….of all things communication is the most wonderful.” • Experience and Nature, 1939, p. 385. • “Society exists not only by transmission, by communication, but it may fairly be said to exist in transmission, in communication.” • Democracy and Education, 1916, p. 5.
Dewey knew, Radar… • Saw the contradiction in our use of the word “communication.” • Two dominant views of communication that are still hanging around: • Transmission view of communication • Ritual view of communication
The transmission view • Comes from a metaphor of transportation, geography. • We “impart,” “send,” “transmit” messages. • At its core: the transmission of messages over distance, often for the purpose of control. • Still very much alive today in most ads for smartphones. • Information as commodity, as competitive advantage.
The ritual view • Communication linked to ideas like “sharing,” “participation,” “association,” “fellowship.” • Shares roots with “commonness,” “communion,” “community.” • Not focused on extension of messages in space, but toward maintenance of society in time. • Not the act of transmitting information, but the representation of shared beliefs. • See it in the ceremony that draws us together in fellowship and commonality.
Consider the newspaper… • Transmission view: it’s an instrument for disseminating news and knowledge. • Ritual view: nothing new is learned, but a particular view of the world is confirmed. News is drama.
Toward a cultural model then… • Communication is a “symbolic process where reality is produced, maintained, repaired, and transformed.” • “Contemplate the particular miracles of social life that have become for us just there, plain and unproblematic for the eye to see.” • Develop a sense of awe, of wonder, about this seemingly “commonplace activity.” • James Carey, Communication as Culture
Toward a cultural model… • “Reality is brought into existence, is produced, by communication…by the construction, apprehension, and utilization of symbolic forms.” • James Carey, Communication as Culture
Types (levels?) of communication • Intrapersonal • Interpersonal • Group • Public • Mass
Some definitions… • “The transmission and reception of information.” • “The management of messages for the purposes of creating meaning.” • “The process of human beings responding to the symbolic behavior of other persons…”
Some more definitions… • “The mechanism through which human relations exist and develop – all the symbols of the mind, together with the means of conveying them…through space and preserving them through time.” • Charles Cooley, sociologist
Some more definitions… • “A process involving the selection, production, and transmission of signs in such a way as to help a receiver perceive a meaning similar to that in the mind of the communicator.” • “A systemic process in which people interact with and through symbols to create and interpret meanings.”
Still more definitions… • “Communication is an ‘effort after meaning,’ a creative act initiated by man in which he seeks to discriminate and organize cues so as to orient himself in his environment and satisfy his changing needs.” • Dean Barnlund, 1968
The one that’s stuck with me… • “Who says what in which channel to whom with what effect?” • Harold Lasswell, 1948
Thoughts on Berger… • Relationship between what we see and what we know or learn is fluid, never settled. • We don’t just react to stimuli. • You choose to attend to something, to situate yourself in relation to it. • We’re all making sense of the “visible world.” • We make active choices – we are gatekeepers! • What you see depends on where you are when…
Thoughts on Berger… • How you see – how an artist sees, a photographer sees, a writer sees – is all there in the subject. • What’s the impact of figuring out that a photo outlasts its subject? • Do you need an audience to have art? • Publicity becomes ideology; we want legacies! • Images mystify, blur the past. • Deprived of history; left to navel-gaze. • Reclaim the history! Ditch the experts! And overuse of exclamation points!
Thoughts on Berger… • Reproduction destroys the uniqueness of the subject. • It comes to us, rather than us going to it. • You experience art – communication of all types – differently than anyone else. • Don’t force your perceptions into the boxes provided by experts. • Does damage to uniqueness.
Thoughts on Benjamin… • We don’t observe, we take pictures. • The original preserves its authority. • Reproductions more independent of the original. • The aura of the work withers, detached from tradition. • We reactivate the product, but at the same time chip away at its traditional value.
Thoughts on Benjamin… • Everything comes to seem equal, universal. • Nothing’s special, nothing’s an event. • The importance of formula…the illusion of audience…the importance of technique. • Copies become more valuable than originals to us.
Signs • Something “which can be taken as significantly substituting for something else” (Eco). • The “something else” doesn’t have to exist. • “Something which stands to somebody for something in some respect or capacity” (Peirce). • Relationship is arbitrary, caused by social convention; no logical connection. • We, the interpreters, bring the meaning.
Is it a sign? • Signifier = the word “open” • Signified = the concept/idea that the store is open for business.
What’s the new idea? • Representamen: the form the sign takes. • Object: what the sign refers to. • Interpretant: the sense we make of the sign.
Who let the dogs out? • The word “dog” isn’t a dog, of course. • But…it’s a sign that represents a dog. • So… • Representamen: the word “dog” • Object: the actual dog • Interpretant: the fact we understand the sign as meaning “dog.”
Peirce would say… • Representamen: the light facing the traffic. • Object: the stopped vehicles. • Interpretant: the indication that you understand that you have to stop.
Orders of signs… • Likeness: it resembles the object, but there’s no connection. • Index: a physical connection with the object. It exists, then we talk about it. • Symbol: “connected with its object by virtue of the symbol-using mind” (Peirce).
A symbol is a type of sign… • Something that stands for something else that is often hidden. • Used to represent things, processes, ideas, wishes, events. • We create our own interpretations. • We create our own “core images” – symbols that represent how we understand our lives.
A symbol is like a sign… • Ambivalent; interpretation depends on one’s experience. • Three types: conventional, accidental, and universal. • Enable us to unlock the doors shielding our unconscious feelings from scrutiny.
The difference? • Symbols grow out of signs. • Symbols spread. • As we use them, the meaning grows, changes, evolves. • Can mean different things to different generations. • Never entirely arbitrary, says de Saussure.
The difference? • With symbols, there seems to be a “natural bond” between the signifier and signified. • Couldn’t just replace the symbol of justice with another symbol.
So always be asking… • How does a signifier take on its meaning? • How do we come to learn the meanings? • Where do we find the instructions to learn?
