Mass Communication Theory 2015 spring sem Prof. Jaewon Joo 7 traditions of the communication theory
Key Seven Traditions in the Field of Communication Theory 1. THE SOCIO-PSYCHOLOGICAL TRADITION: Communication as Interpersonal Interaction and Influence 2. THE CYBERNETIC TRADITION: Communication as a System of Information Processing 3. THE RHETORICAL TRADITION: Communication as Artful Public Address 4. THE SEMIOTIC TRADITION: Communication as the Process of Sharing Meaning Through Signs
Key Seven Traditions in the Field of Communication Theory 5. THE SOCIO-CULTURAL TRADITION: Communication as the Creation and Enactment of Social Reality 6. THE CRITICAL TRADITION: Communication as a Reflective Challenge of Unjust Discourse 7. THE PHENOMENOLOGICAL TRADITION: Communication as the Experience of Self and Others Through Dialogue
01 The socio-psychological tradition
01 The socio-psychological tradition a. Helps us understand individual human beings as communicators. b. The study of the individual as a social being. c. individual social behavior, personalities and traits, perception, and cognition. d. Concern for behavior and for the personal traits and cognitive processes that produce behavior. e. Individualistic approach.
01 The socio-psychological tradition f. Key Ides of the socio-psychological tradition i. This tradition is most often associated with the science of communication ii. Focuses on persuasion and attitude change message processing iii. Cognitive in nature, provides insights in to the ways human beings process information.
01 The socio-psychological tradition iv. Themes in this tradition: How can individual communication be predicted? How does an individual take into account and accommodate different communication situations? How do communicators adapt their behavior to one another? How is information assimilated, organized and used in forming message strategies & plans
01 The socio-psychological tradition v. Variations in the socio-psychological tradition: Behavioral how people actually behave in communication situations Cognitive centers on patterns of thought, how individuals acquire, store, and process information that leads to behavioral outputs Biological believe that many of our traits, way of thinking and behavior are wired in biologically and derive not from learning or situational factors but from inborn neurobiological influences (psychology)
02 The cybernetic tradition
02 The cybernetic tradition a. You cannot interpret something by consciously looking at it and thinking about it. Real understanding comes from careful analysis of a system of effects. b. Cybernetics is the tradition of complex systems in which many interacting elements influence one another. c. Theories in this tradition to explain how physical, biological, social and behavioral processes work.
02 The cybernetic tradition e. Key Ideas of the Cybernetic Tradition i. The idea of a system forms the core of cybernetic thinking. Systems are sets of interacting components that together form something more than the sum of the parts. ii. System theorists are not simply interested in its functions but in how it manages to sustain and control itself over time. iii. Networks a series of feedback loops connects the parts, these feedback loops are called networks iv. +/- relationships
02 The cybernetic tradition f. Useful for understanding communication in general as well as instances of communication occurring in everyday life. Excellent for understanding relationships, less effective in helping us understand individual differences among the parts of the system.
02 The cybernetic tradition
03 The rhetorical tradition
03 The rhetorical tradition a. Where the communication discipline began b. Was the art of constructing arguments and speech-making c. The process of adjusting ideas to people and people to ideas in messages of all kinds d. All the ways humans use symbols to affect those around them and to construct the worlds in which they live
04 The semiotic tradition
04 The semiotic tradition a. The study of signs Signs = signifier + signified ( 기표, shape) ( 기의, meaning) b. Includes a host of theories about how signs come to represent objects, ideas, states, situations, feelings and conditions outside of themselves. c. The study of signs not only provides a way of looking at communication but also has a powerful impact on almost all perspectives now employed in communication theory.
04 The semiotic tradition d. Key Ideas in the Semiotic Tradition: i. The basic concept unifying this tradition is the sign. Ex)thumbs up, A man who are smoking ii. The 2 nd basic concept is symbol, which usually designates a complex sign with many meanings, including highly personal ones
04 The semiotic tradition iii. Most semiotic thinking involves the basic idea of the triad of meaning, which asserts that meaning arises from a relationship among three things the object (referent), the person (or interpreter), and a meaning. iv. CK Ogden and IA Richards semantic triangle v. Semiotics rests on the belief that signs are always understood in relation to other signs.
04 The semiotic tradition
04 The semiotic tradition e. Variations in the Semiotic Tradition i. Semantics addresses how signs relate to their referents, or what signs stand for what does a sign represent? ii. Syntactics is the study of relationships among signs. Refers to the rules by which people combine signs into complex systems of meaning. Syntactic rules enable human beings to use an infinite combination of signs to express a wealth of meanings.
04 The semiotic tradition iii. Pragmatics looks at how signs make a difference in people s lives, or the practical use and effects of signs and their impact on social life. Particularly powerful in looking at understanding and misunderstanding. f. Criticisms: i. We learn from semiotics that signs (outside ourselves) come to represent objects, but only through our internal perceptions and feelings.
05 The socio-cultural tradition
05 The socio-cultural tradition a. While the socio-psychological tradition forgegrounds the individual, the sociocultural tradition emphasizes the social interaction part of the equation. b. Explore the interactional worlds in which people live, posting that reality is not an objective set of arrangements outside us but constructed through a process of interaction in groups, communities and cultures. c. This tradition focuses on patterns of interaction between people rather than on individual characteristics or mental models.
05 The socio-cultural tradition d. Key Ideas: i. Interaction is the process and site in which meanings, roles, rules and cultural values are worked out. ii. People together create the realities of their social groups, organizations and cultures. iii. Categories used by individuals to process information are socially created in communication. iv. Reality is constructed by language, knowledge is highly interpretive and constructed. v. Deal with how meaning is created in social interaction in actual situations
05 The socio-cultural tradition vi. Focus on how identities are established through interaction in social groups and cultures vii. Identity becomes a fusion of our selves as individuals within social roles, as members of communities and as cultural meanings.
05 The socio-cultural tradition e. Variations in the Sociocultural tradition: i. Symbolic Interactionism social structures and meanings are created and maintained in social interactions Herbert Blumer and George Herbert Mead Emphasized the importance of participant observation in the study of communication as a way of exploring social relationships
05 The socio-cultural tradition ii. Social constructionism Originally called the social construction of reality Peter Berger and Thomas Luckmann Investigation on how human knowledge is constructed through social interaction The identity of a thing results from how we talk about that object, the language used to capture our concepts, and the way in which social groups orient to their common experience. The nature of the world is less important that the language used to name, discuss and approach that world.
05 The socio-cultural tradition iii. Sociolinguistics the study of language and culture People use language differently in different social and cultural groups. Language enters into the formation of who we are as social and cultural beings. iv. Philosophy of language Ludwig Wittengenstein Meaning of language depends on its actual use Language game: People follow rules to do things with language, each language game has a different set of rules JL Austin speech act theory when you speak, you are actually performing an act may be stating, questioning, commanding, promising, or a number of other possibilities.
05 The socio-cultural tradition v. Ethnography observation of how actual social groups come to build meaning through their linguistic and non-linguistic behaviors Looks at the forms of communication used in specific social groups, the words they use and what these mean to the group, as well as the meanings for a variety of behavioral, visual and auditory responses vi. Ethnomethodology careful observation of microbehaviors in real situations Harold Garfinkel looks at how, in social interaction, we manage or mesh behaviors at actual moments in time Influenced how we look at conversations, including the ways in which participants manage the back and forth flow with language and non verbal behaviors
06 The critical tradition
06 The critical tradition a. Follows closely many of the interests and assumptions of the sociocultural, but it moves from the descriptive to the critical b. Concerned with how power, oppression and privilege are the products of certain forms of communication throughout society, making the critical tradition significant in the field of communication theor today
06 The critical tradition c. Key Ideas: i. The critical tradition seeks to understand the taken-for-granted systems, power structures and beliefs or ideologies that dominate society with a particular eye to whose interests are preserved by those power structures Who does and does not get to speak, what does and does not get said, who stands to benefit from a particular system
06 The critical tradition c. Key Ideas: i. The critical tradition seeks to understand the taken-for-granted systems, power structures and beliefs or ideologies that dominate society with a particular eye to whose interests are preserved by those power structures Who does and does not get to speak, what does and does not get said, who stands to benefit from a particular system
06 The critical tradition ii. Interested in uncovering oppressive social conditions and power arrangements in order to promote emancipation or a freer and more fulfilling society. iii. Makes a conscious attempt to fuse theory and action. to read the world with an eye towards shaping it. Della Pollock and J. Robert Cox iv. How messages reinforce oppression in society. Focus on discourse and the texts that promote particular ideologies, establish and maintain power, and subvert the interests of certain groups and classes.
06 The critical tradition d. Variations: i. Marxism the originating branch of critical theory Marx taught that the means of production in society determines the nature of society, so the economy is the basis of all social structure. Called the critique of political economy Communication practices are seen as an outcome of the tension between individual creativity and the social constraints on that creativity
06 The critical tradition Only when individuals are truly free to express themselves with clarity and reason will liberation occur. The language of the dominant class makes it difficult for working class groups to understand their situation and to discover the means to achieve emancipation. The dominant language defines and perpetuates the oppression of marginalized groups.
06 The critical tradition ii. Frankfurt School refers to a group of German philosophers, sociologists and economists Max Horkheimer, Theodor Adorno, Herbert Marcuse associated with the Institute for Social Research in Frankfurt in 1923 Members believed in the need for integration among disciplines in order to promote a broad social philosophy or critical theory capable of offering a comprehensive examination of the contradictions & interconnections in society. A reliance on reason established through science, the individual as an agent of change, and the discovery of taken for granted aspects of culture
06 The critical tradition iii. Postmodernism characterized by a break with modernity and the enlightenment project Rejects elitism, Puritanism and sterility Production of commodities has given way to the production and manipulation of knowledge. Simulations has taken over, and signs are reproduced to the degree that they no longer refer to actual objects or things in the material world
06 The critical tradition Call into question traditional notions of reality ; if the stories of culture cannot be believed and artificial constructions of signs often are deemed more real than the signs themselves, reality is constantly changing and fleeting construction. a. Gave way to cultural studies focus on social change from the vantage point of culture itself to make intelligible the real movement of culture as it registered in social life, in group and class relations, in politics and institutions, in values and ideas Poststructuralism - rejects the modern effort to find universal truths, narratives, methods, and meanings by which to know the world a. Jacques Derrida a rejection of universalizing meanings determined by structural constraints, conditions and stable symbols
06 The critical tradition Postcolonial Theory refers to the study of all the cultures affected by the imperial process from the moment of colonization to the present day a. Edward Said the colonizing process creates othering, which is responsible for stereotypic images of nonwhite populations b. Study many of the issues as race, class, gender, sexuality but always as they are situated within geopolitical arrangements and relations of nations and their inter/national histories. Feminist studies seeks to offer theories that center women s experiences and to articulate the relations between the categories of gender and other social categories, including race, ethnicity, class and sexuality.
07 The phenomenological tradition
07 The phenomenological tradition a. While semiotics tends to focus on the sign and its functions, phenomenology looks such ore at the individual interpreter as the key component in this process b. Assume that people actively interpret their experiences and come to understand the world by personal experience with it. It concentrates on the conscious experience of the person. Process of knowing through direct experience.
07 The phenomenological tradition c. Key Ideas in the Phenomenological Tradition i. Phenomenon refers to the appearance of an abject, event or condition that is perceived. ii. Actual lived experience is the basic data of reality. iii. Phenomenology means letting things become manifest as they are
07 The phenomenological tradition iv. Stanley Deetz 3 basic principles of phenomenology: Knowledge is found directly in conscious experience we come to know the world as we engage it. The meaning of a thing consists of the potential of that thing in one s life how you relate to an object determines its meaning for you. Language is the vehicle of meaning. We experience the world through the language we use to define and express the world. We know KEYS because of language we associate with them: lock, open, metal, weight etc.
07 The phenomenological tradition d. The process of interpretation is central to most phenomenological thought. the active process of assigning meaning to an experience e. Interpretation is an active process of the mind a creative act of clarifying personal experience. Involves going back and forth between experiencing an event or situation and assigning meaning to it, moving from the specific to the general and back to the specific again. (hermeneutic circle). We construct an interpretation of an event or experience and then test that interpretation by looking closely at the specific of the event once again a continual process of refining our meanings.
07 The phenomenological tradition f. Variations in the Phenomenological Tradition: i. Classical Phenomenology associated with Endmund Husserl Truth can only be ascertained through direct experience, but we must be disciplined in how me experience things Highly objective ii. Phenomenology of perception Maurice Merleau- Ponty The human being is a unified physical and mental being who creates meaning in the world. We know things only through our own personal relationship to these things. As persons, we are affected by the world, but we also affect the world by how we experience it. A dialogic relationship exists between people as interpreters and the things they are interpreting
07 The phenomenological tradition iii. Hermeneutic phenomenology like the 2 nd but extends the tradition further by applying it more completely to communication Martin Heidegger known for his work in philosophical hermeneutics, also known as hermeneutic of Dasein (which means interpretation of meaning ) Most important for Heidegger is the natural experience that inevitably occurs by merely existing I the world. The reality of something is not known by careful analysis or reduction but by natural experience, which is created by the use of language in everyday life.
07 The phenomenological tradition Words and language are not wrappings in which things are packed for the commerce of those who write and speak. It is in words and language that things first come to being and are. Communication is the vehicle by which meaning is assigned to experience. When you communicate, you work out new ways of seeing the world your speech affects your thoughts, and new meanings are in turn created by those thoughts. Language, then, is packed with meaning and the discourse available in everyday life constantly affects our experience of events and situation.
A Survey Map of Traditions in the Field of Communication Theory
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