Communication and the Evolution of Society

Author: Jürgen Habermas
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 0745694160
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 213

Book Description
In this important volume Habermas outlines the views which form the basis of his critical theory of modern societies. The volume comprises five interlocking essays, which together define the contours of his theory of communication and of his substantive account of social change. 'What is Universal Pragmatics?' is the best available statement of Habermas's programme for a theoryof communication based on the analysis of speech acts. In the following two essays Habermas draws on the work of Kohlberg and others to develop a distinctive account of moral consciousness and normative structures. 'Toward a Reconstruction of historical Materialsim' takes these issues further, offering a wide-ranging reconstruction of Marx's historical materialsim understood as a theory of social evolution. The final essay focuses on the question of legitimacy and on the legitimation problems faced by modern states. This book is essential reading for anyone concerned with the key questions of social and political theory today.

A History of Communications

Author: Marshall T. Poe
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1139495577
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 483

Book Description
A History of Communications advances a theory of media that explains the origins and impact of different forms of communication - speech, writing, print, electronic devices and the Internet - on human history in the long term. New media are 'pulled' into widespread use by broad historical trends and these media, once in widespread use, 'push' social institutions and beliefs in predictable directions. This view allows us to see for the first time what is truly new about the Internet, what is not, and where it is taking us.

A History of Communications

Author: Marshall Poe
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780511987311
Category : Communication
Languages : en
Pages : 337

Book Description
"Communications and Humanity advances a new theory of media that explains the origins and impact of different forms of communication - speech, writing, print, electronic devices, and the Internet - on human history in the long term. New media are "pulled" into widespread use by broad historical trends and these media, once in widespread use, "push" social institutions and beliefs in predictable directions. This view allows us to see for the first time what is truly new about the Internet, what is not, and where it is taking us"--Provided by publisher.

A Sociological Theory of Communication

Author: Loet Leydesdorff
Publisher: Universal-Publishers
ISBN: 1581126956
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 368

Book Description
Networks of communication evolve in terms of reflexive exchanges. The codification of these reflections in language, that is, at the social level, can be considered as the operating system of society. Under sociologically specifiable conditions, the discursive reconstructions can be expected to make the systems under reflection increasingly knowledge-intensive. This sociological theory of communication is founded in a tradition that includes Giddens' (1979) structuration theory, Habermas' (1981) theory of communicative action, and Luhmann's (1984) proposal to consider social systems as self-organizing. The study also elaborates on Shannon's (1948) mathematical theory of communication for the formalization and operationalization of the non-linear dynamics. The development of scientific communications can be studied using citation analysis. The exchange media at the interfaces of knowledge production provide us with the evolutionary model of a Triple Helix of university-industry-government relations. The construction of the European Information Society can then be analyzed in terms of interacting networks of communication. The issues of sustainable development and the expectation of social change are discussed in relation to the possibility of a general theory of communication. REVIEW In this book, LoetLeydesdorff sets out to answer the question, "Can society be considered as a self-organizing (autopoietic) system. In the process, Leydesdorff, develops a general sociological theory of communication, as well as a special theory of scientific communication designed to analyze complex systems such as the Euroean Information Society. (from review in JASIST 53[1], 2002, 62-63)

Cultural Evolution

Author: Peter J. Richerson
Publisher: MIT Press
ISBN: 0262019752
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 499

Book Description
Leading scholars report on current research that demonstrates the central role of cultural evolution in explaining human behavior. Over the past few decades, a growing body of research has emerged from a variety of disciplines to highlight the importance of cultural evolution in understanding human behavior. Wider application of these insights, however, has been hampered by traditional disciplinary boundaries. To remedy this, in this volume leading researchers from theoretical biology, developmental and cognitive psychology, linguistics, anthropology, sociology, religious studies, history, and economics come together to explore the central role of cultural evolution in different aspects of human endeavor. The contributors take as their guiding principle the idea that cultural evolution can provide an important integrating function across the various disciplines of the human sciences, as organic evolution does for biology. The benefits of adopting a cultural evolutionary perspective are demonstrated by contributions on social systems, technology, language, and religion. Topics covered include enforcement of norms in human groups, the neuroscience of technology, language diversity, and prosociality and religion. The contributors evaluate current research on cultural evolution and consider its broader theoretical and practical implications, synthesizing past and ongoing work and sketching a roadmap for future cross-disciplinary efforts. Contributors Quentin D. Atkinson, Andrea Baronchelli, Robert Boyd, Briggs Buchanan, Joseph Bulbulia, Morten H. Christiansen, Emma Cohen, William Croft, Michael Cysouw, Dan Dediu, Nicholas Evans, Emma Flynn, Pieter François, Simon Garrod, Armin W. Geertz, Herbert Gintis, Russell D. Gray, Simon J. Greenhill, Daniel B. M. Haun, Joseph Henrich, Daniel J. Hruschka, Marco A. Janssen, Fiona M. Jordan, Anne Kandler, James A. Kitts, Kevin N. Laland, Laurent Lehmann, Stephen C. Levinson, Elena Lieven, Sarah Mathew, Robert N. McCauley, Alex Mesoudi, Ara Norenzayan, Harriet Over, Jürgen Renn, Victoria Reyes-García, Peter J. Richerson, Stephen Shennan, Edward G. Slingerland, Dietrich Stout, Claudio Tennie, Peter Turchin, Carel van Schaik, Matthijs Van Veelen, Harvey Whitehouse, Thomas Widlok, Polly Wiessner, David Sloan Wilson

Communication in History

Author: David Crowley
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317349407
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 337

Book Description
Updated in a new 6th edition, Communication in History reveals how media has been influential in both maintaining social order and as powerful agents of change. With revised new readings, this anthology continues to be, as one reviewer wrote, "the only book in the sea of History of Mass Communication books that introduces readers to a more expansive, intellectually enlivening study of the relationship between human history and communication history". From print to the Internet, this book encompasses a wide-range of topics, that introduces readers to a more expansive, intellectually enlivening study of the relationship between human history and communication history.

The Evolution of Media Communication

Author: Beatriz Peña-Acuña
Publisher: BoD – Books on Demand
ISBN: 9535131974
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 103

Book Description
Media communication is a young discipline, if we compare it with others. It has been studied scientifically from the last century in social sciences. This topic, as it is a human process, is complex, and it is changing because of new technologies. It transforms our society too. It is recognised that we are in a communication society. The management of knowledge is settled in business area too. Communication skills are recognised as competences in education for preparing future citizens. Media communication feeds from different disciplines and it keeps their attention. This book is an attempt to provide theoretical and empirical framework to better understand media communication from different point of views and channels in various contexts. The international authors are specialised on the issues. They cover a wide range of updated issues. They span from deepening about behaviour of media or trends to national cases related to social net and to new phenomena - as it is mindfulness applied to creativity. So in this book, two sections are presented. The first section focuses on the behaviour of media, when it is applied in education field and reception research. The second section provides three case studies about the Internet: platforms and social nets developed and applied to different publics.

Why We Don't Talk To Each Other Anymore

Author: John Locke
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 9780684855745
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 268

Book Description
The cyber-age is robbing people of the most important aspect of communication: face-to-face encounters and heart-to-heart conversations. Now, a professor of human communication sciences shows where community has disappeared to and why it matters.

The Evolution of Media Communication

Author:
Publisher:
ISBN: 9789535131984
Category :
Languages : en
Pages :

Book Description

Noise Matters

Author: R. Haven Wiley
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 0674287061
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 517

Book Description
Noise, as we usually think of it, is background sound that interferes with our ability to hear more interesting sounds. In general terms, though, it is anything that interferes with the reception of signals of any sort. It includes extraneous energy in the environment, degradation of signals in transit, and spontaneous random activity in receivers and signalers. Whatever the cause, the consequence of noise is error by receivers, and these errors are the key to understanding how noise shapes the evolution of communication. Noise Matters breaks new ground in the scientific understanding of how communication evolves in the presence of noise. Combining insights of signal detection theory with evidence from decades of his own original research, Haven Wiley explains the profound effects of noise on the evolution of communication. The coevolution of signalers and receivers does not result in ideal, noise-free communication, Wiley finds. Instead, signalers and receivers evolve to a joint equilibrium in which communication is effective but never error-free. Noise is inescapable in the evolution of communication. Wiley’s comprehensive approach considers communication on many different levels of biological organization, from cells to individual organisms, including humans. Social interactions, such as honesty, mate choice, and cooperation, are reassessed in the light of noisy communication. The final sections demonstrate that noise even affects how we think about human language, science, subjectivity, and freedom. Noise Matters thus contributes to understanding the behavior of animals, including ourselves.