Week6: birth of mass media...

Being born in an age where mass communication is already a crucial part of social life, I cannot really imagine what astonishing experiences the early scholars of media in the 1930-40s went through. Rapid urbanization and worldwide industrialization brought forth rapid changes in social structure, and the communication system with it. Technology brought about new media forms such as the radio, which "reaches a larger population of people at greater distances than the other mediums, and it reaches them both instantaneously and cheaply" (Cantril & Allport, p.111). State and commercial interests at that time has observed the stunning success of Nazi propaganda, and was exploring efficient ways to transform the groups of people into a mass consumer market through media communication. The emergence of this notion of mass media is directly linked to what Habermas calls "refeudalization of the public sphere". Being bound together as a large mass with little cohesion and mixed up private interests, the bourgeois public sphere of public focused individuals was dissolved.

Though different in their research methods and normative directions, the (still) dominant paradigm of 'administrative approach' set by Lazarsfeld and the critical approach share some of the same views: Mass media functions to maintain the social status quo, standarize and stereotype people. Critical reflexivity as advocated by Frankfurt school or the trust on the partly autonomous receiving capabilities of the audience advocated by the dominat paradigm both are solutions to the same set of problems. The difference of the two approaches was in assessing how dominant such effects were on the individual and the society, not the basic role mass media plays in the social system. And with media technologies ever improving and global media conglomerates gaining more and more ground, it is even more so today.

Then, what does mass media do to the interacting model of community, communication and democracy? Is mass media a dysfunctional foe to be fought against, if we want to recover the great community? Surely mass media tends to get commercial, standarizing in its nature. After all, it carries the same message to a lot of people at the same time, and to do so requires efforts which involve some forms of commercial interests. In this process, some information and messages get salient, whereas others are outshadowed or even actively undermined. But I don't think such unbalanced and one-way flow communication patterns are something awfully new, not then and not even now. the important thing is whether the monopoly of a particular mass media channel can be broken and alternative messages circulated. Sometimes those alternatives utilize existing mass media, or even constitute a mass medium of its own. It may sound paradoxical, but the soultion to the social dysfunctions of mass media is even more mass media. With a broader range of diverse alternative views, that are more relevant to the various lifeworlds of the individuals.

Media Sociology: The Dominant Paradigm.

1. In his article “Media Sociology: The dominant paradigm,” by Todd Gitlin, the author regards Katz and Lazarsfeld’s “Personal Influence” as exemplifying the dominant paradigm of the US communication studies, and explores its ideological and institutional backgrounds. When he says "the dominant paradigm,” it refers to empirical and quantitative mass communication studies. His core assumption is that methodology is not value-neutral: the conceptions and designs for researches and the processes that accompany it are shaped by, and come out of, the broader socio-political context existing at the time. In many ways, his arguments are not value-neutral either. Gitlin’s resolute arguments echo the decisive attitude of Marx, who “disdain(ed) to conceal” his views. (Manifesto of the communist party, p.500)

2. According to Gitlin, the fatal error of “abstracted empiricism” (p.225) lies in its ignoring “the systemic and institutionalized nature” of media phenomena. (p.245) Only looking at ‘media effects’ at micro level in a specifically “behaviorist fashion” (p.206), abstracted empiricism has never caught the political economy of media phenomena. As a result, what the US communication studies has done is to “consolidate and legitimize the cornucopian regime of mid-century capitalism.” (p.245) What, then, should be the alternative paradigm that improves the limitations of the dominant paradigm? He does not answer to this question, but the way he presents his idea in this article indirectly shows what the alternative method is: qualitative, or critical paradigm of media sociology. The way he traces the background of “Personal Influence” symbolizes the core of qualitative media sociology. It explores historical and ideological context reflected in “Personal Influence,” and ‘in that way’ qualitative media sociology is carried out. However, it poses a real problem that the boundaries and methods of qualitative media studies are ever-changing, so that nebulous. Paradoxically, this is the strong point of qualitative studies.

3. When a certain discipline has rigorously established methodology, the academic dialogue carried out in the boundary of the discipline becomes economic and productive. This constitutes the strong point of quantitative communication studies. Expecting a completed and all-agreeable methodology in critical/qualitative communication studies to bear the imprint of the whole tradition of humanities may be unreasonable. However, the protean and ever-changing methodology of qualitative/critical studies signifies that it is vividly alive and has fundamental significance. It seems undeniable that a discipline with completed methodology tends to withdraw into its own boundaries. And this might already be happening in the realm of quantitative media research.

Week 6- The Media Research Industry

Today’s readings explore the social and historical context of the genesis and evolution of media research as we know it today. Communication influences and is influenced by economic, cultural, social and political factors. In the 1940s, as mass media proliferated and concern about the effects of propaganda increased, funding and interest in media research also grew. Social scientists then debated about the role and the direction that media research should take. Two of schools of thought -- the Columbia School led by Lazarsfeld and Merton and the Frankfurt School, with Horkheimer and Adorno-- differed in philosophical approach and methodology, but both sought to understand the role of communication in society.

The Columbia School viewed the role of media research as a type of commodity, which should not only contribute to a better understanding of how communication works, but should be used to improve the effectiveness of communication for advertisers, the government, and other organizations. The Frankfurt School believed that media research should be for the social good and draw attention to positive moral ideals and should be used to critique and seek to improve these economic, political, social and cultural entities. understand the philosophical underpinnings of what is happening.

Both Schools and their respective followers approached the design, implementation and analysis of media research from two directions -- the Columbia School’s administrative approach and the Frankfurt School’s critical theory. The basic communication process includes a sender and a receiver. Research influenced by the Columbia School, took a mechanistic approach to examining individual effects on the receiver by measuring such aspects as changes in attitude and behavior as a result of media use. It did reflect the behaviorists’ “stimulus-response” concept which was applied to the use and interaction with media as a force for changing opinions. Followers of the Frankfurt School called for a critical examination of the sender or the “culture industry.” James Rorty’s “The Business Nobody Knows” which examined advertisers effect on the individual and social psyche and Adorno’s “A Social Critique of Radio” are examples of the Frankfurt School.

There are strengths and weaknesses to both approaches.. With any new media, whether it’s radio or the internet, it is logical to begin by examining the effect on the person. While there was so much focus on the passive receiver that Lynd called it seeking “truth by counting noses,” Lazarsfeld did bring scientific discipline and professionalism to communication research. It was also implied that Lazarsfeld “sold out” because he received funding from sources with a vested interest in the results. As Simonson and Weimann point out, the limited effects paradigm was one small part of Lazarsfeld body of work and in other writing he and Merton did identify specific conditions in which media might have strong effects, drew attention to the ideological force of commercial media systems, and addressed other issues relevant to the culture industry. It could also be argued that today’s field of media researchers would not enjoy the current level of credibility without that initial investment of those vested interests.

Media researchers must continually question their motives and the tools they use to examine the social, political, economic and cultural ramifications of communication. While Gitlin’s critique of the Lazarsfeld and Katz Decatur study was a bit strident, he did raise important questions for media researchers to ask themselves today and into the future. In many respects, media research has become a self-sustaining industry on university campuses. It’s important to understand the social and historical context that has and continues to shape media research. As Gitlin points out so well, “mass communications research descends directly from the development of sophisticated marketing techniques. Even today, research is conceived, not because of what society needs to know, but what business needs to know to sell”. Even today, how does one explain the rash of research about internet use and effects? Is it driven by a need for greater social understanding or to answer the question – what sells?

Week5. communication for the modern public, how?

Dewey gives us similar explanations as Tocqueville, when he describes the democratic virtues of the pre-urbanization American community democracy model. Public life of a community are maintained through various associations. Also it is based upon a sense of limited size locality where direct communication is feasible, and in the veins of all this was public education. Communities build states and states build up a nation; a federative republic, so to say. Though it is debatable today whether such community forms back then were truly inclusive to all its members, it was regarded as a rather concrete model of self-governance. Political parties rule, but do not govern (p121). Because people govern themselves.

The reason why Dewey sticks to the notion of that era is clear. he uses it as a reference model to pursue in a fully urbanized and even more urbanizing "machine age", which seems to have lost a great deal of the democratic virtues. He sees the urbanization which was accompanied by "too much public, too many publics" (p.187) as one of the most important reasons why people are not becoming publicly engaged citizen. He also mentions that there are too much readily available forms of distractions such as amusement, further disengaging people from the public. Such notions are also shared by Lippman as he calls them the "phantom public". People are disconnected from public and political issues, and it raises questions on their capability of self-government which is the key element of democracy. Also, people are different in their communication pattern by their class and ethnicity (Warner et al), and would rather enjoy for themselves than in groups(Lynd & Lynd). Even though living in the same locality, they don't share much communitiveness in matters of common public interest.

Both Dewey and Lippman come to the conclusion that communication is the key to solve this problem. Of course they do not refer to every kinds of communication, and certainly not the notion of propaganda as the crucial communication tool by Lasswell, or the notion of public opinion as something that can be manipulated via media communication. When Dewey says that "when communication occurs, all natural events are subject to reconsideration and revision" (p35) or Lippman talks about "debates", they strongly imply a communication practice that is utilized to foster consensus and decision-making.

However in reality, such debates can only be fruitful if the effects of that consensus actually leads to some form of decisions that affect one's own interest. Efficacy, or at least the feeling of efficacy, is one of the key factors that would encourage individuals to engage in communication in the first place. Another thing to notice is, that the pursuit for common good is achieved by realizing that there is one. That is, individuals of conflicting interests in a certain community achieve a public consensus, when they throughly communicate with others that there is a greater common interest that can be gained when they agree upon some specific matters. In the same matter, such certain communities can reach consensus along with other communities when they communicate a greater common 'public' goal than their individual ones (And this pattern goes all the way up to international level). What I am trying to say is, that communication, especially public debates with other conflicting ideas in a uncomfortable normative setting require a great deal of motivation. Whether it be through democratic education, the experience of dictatorship(!) or any other measure, the prime theoretical and practical interest sould be on how to provide that motivation, as realistic and down-to-life as possible.

Communication and the modern public

1. Depersonalization of state authority and the rise of bourgeois (Habermas) gave birth to public sphere. However, a strange thing began to happen: ‘public’ to be in the public sphere began to disappear from the public sphere. What does this fact mean? How can we solve the problem? What roles does ‘communication’ play in bringing the public back to the public sphere? Readings of this week directly or indirectly wrestle with these questions.

2. According to Dewey, modern technology and economics have created a new form of ‘large scale’ human associations that is utterly different from community associations. As a result, “there are too many publics,” (p.126) and those publics are “inchoate, amorphous” (p.125) and “disenchanted” (Lippman, p.36) so that their “sovereignty is a fiction.”(Lipmann, p.37) In addition, though they have diverse kind of communicative tools such as newspapers and magazines, those tools are not shared across different classes (Warner et.al.) so that they seem to “erect barriers to keep others out.” (Lynd and Lynd, p.70) Thus, the crucial question is how to bring an “organized, articulate Public” (Dewey, p.184) back to the public sphere. The solution can be “open debate” (Lipmann) and “propaganda.” (Lasswell and Bernays) Here, Dewey suggests an interesting solution. He points out that “physical machinery of transmission and circulation” (p.184) must be utilized in order for an organized Public to come into being. However, is it not true that the very machinery have brought about the atomization of the public? It seems that Dewey escapes from this contradiction by employing Aristotle causal theories and Thomistic transubstantiation: the physical machinery can be transubstantiated by changing formal, efficient and final cause of the machinery. He says: “[…] subtle, delicate, vivid and responsive art of communication must take possession of the physical machinery of transmission and circulation and breathe life into it […] it will be a means of life and not its despotic master.” (p.184) However, there still remains a question. What if machinery has inherent and invariable properties to atomize citizens, as Ong and McLuhan insisted?

3. Too many publics are there. But there is no genuine public on a national scale. To resolve this ironic situation, a new form of communicative measurement would be necessary. The corollary of this is the birth of mass communication and theories on it. The readings of this week clearly show how society evolved into mass society where mass communication was nearly inevitable. In this sense, the readings of this week are the prelude to the next week, the birth of mass communication.

Modern Public & Communications

Today’s readings conclude that there is no longer a rational, engaged well informed citizen that is sustaining democracy and that communication could be used to inform and guide opinion and to reengage the public. According to Dewey, the public must have the intelligence to engage in political affairs and be “omnicompetent” for a genuine democratic society and state – two elements that he did not think were present. People’s apathy and indifference to the operation of the government was reflected in the declining percentage of the population that votes. Dewey stated that the reasons for the confusion and apathy of the public were due 1) to the normal run of events, 2) to issues that were too complicated, 3) to the disintegration of the small communities and the emergence of too many diffuse publics, and 4) too many competitors for public attention (movies and other emerging leisure time activities).

The discussions and studies that were conducted during this time period time were important in trying to understand the effects that industrialization, new technologies, and communication media – radio, automobile, movies, mass media – were having on society and ultimately on democracy. It was understood that public institutions and opinion are formed locally, but for democracy to function effectively, the public must understand what’s needed for the national state. It is the role of communication to not only provide the public with knowledge and understanding, but to also help form public opinion through “communication of the results of social inquiry”(Dewey, p.177). As the amount of information and the number of communication channels grew, concern arose about the effect on the public. The studies that were done on media effects examined how people used various media, but didn’t really explore the actual outcome or effect from using the particular media. Media effects were implied based upon ethnicity, class and other factors.

The problem posed by a number of the writers was how to reengage the public in the democratic process and to create what Dewey called the “great community.” Public opinion was seen as a way to control political conduct. For Dewey public opinion was continuous inquiry, connected and persistent, which provides “material of enduring opinion about public matters” (p.178). Although Lippman felt that “opinions may now and then be able to define the acts of men, but these opinions do not execute these acts” (p.41), he also saw the need to shape or distill general public opinions in order for them to be effective in democracy. It was the role of communication, as publicity or propaganda, to shape public opinion through the “use of symbols, which assemble emotions after they have been detached from their ideas” (Lippman, p. 40). For Lasswell, propaganda was the “new hammer and anvil of social solidarity” and was an antidote to “willfulness” or individualism of the age by helping to crystallize public opinion. For others, these new technologies were isolating people, encouraging individualism and breaking down families,

The arguments and studies in these readings eerily echo what is being said today about the future of democracy because of an apparently indifferent and apathetic public and what role new communication technology might play in either reengaging or isolating the public further. There is the same tone of optimism about the potential for the new communication media, such as the Internet, to enable the public to form associations and to become better informed. However, today’s politicians have become much more sophisticated in their use of symbols to trigger emotions which would shape public opinion. And sadly, the warnings by Dewey and Lippman for the public to purge itself of self-interested groups, has not been heeded.

Public sphere as a communicative practice

Habermasian public sphere is in a nutshell a social space constructed with open discursive communication, maintained through the norms of rationality. How you say (rationality) it precedes what you say (specific partisan viewpoints), and also precedes who you are (class, status). “The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere” is Habermas’ earliest attempts to explain the notion of the public formed and held together by such communication. Unlike his later works where public sphere acts more and more as normative ideals rather than concrete forms, here he refers to historical examples of how such concepts have been arisen and perished. With the advent of modern capitalism, the state and the society begin to be separated. The state maintained its position as the sphere of public authority, but corresponded to the society through the mediation of the bourgeois public sphere. And this public sphere, which was initially formed through open discussions in gatherings at clubhouses, enlarged its scope from literary to the political.

However, the problem is that such an idealized form of “rationality” can be hardly applied or maintained in the real world. Thus, Habermas’ bourgeois public spheres re-feudalized. Though the institutions of bourgeois public sphere were open to the public in a literal sense, the norms of what can be considered as a rational communication is an entry barrier itself. Being able to follow such norms requires being educated in the proper way, and this in turn requires one to be part of a specific socio-economic condition. If this “rationality” can be only maintained by keeping cohesiveness among private interests and keeping public and private domains apart, it can facilitate only a limited scope of discourses and is bound to lose its connection to the vast parts of the lifeworld.

To resolve this problem, we should step back to the original meaning of public sphere itself. Though historical examples of Tischgesellschaft as a bourgeois public sphere are given, public sphere doesn’t refer to the specific space, place or institution. It refers rather to the forms of social interaction that are conducted in them. If we take this into account, it becomes clear that communication does not simply ‘play an important role’ in forming the public sphere, but ‘is public sphere itself’. It is not a question of where a public sphere is or whether it is a public sphere or not. It is a question of what elements of public sphere can be found, or should be encouraged in a specific communication practice of a community.

Communication and Birth of the Public

Communication and Birth of the Public

The birth of the ‘public’ as key players in the formation of public opinion in modern sense was possible apparently by a specific socio-historical and political situation in history. Jourgen Habermas, by his concept “public sphere,” traces back how the ‘public’ as a counterpart of state forming public opinion came to exist, and how the public - though it is limited to ‘bourgeois’ public in Habermas’s explanation - has lost its critical property in the course of modern history.

According to Habermas, a transition from monarchic society to civil one was a seedbed for the birth and formation of public sphere. Thus, the condition that moved society toward civil society is also one that enabled the formation of public sphere. What then was “the condition?” The condition is summarized into depersonalization of state authority and the rise of bourgeois. Depersonalization of state authority parallels the change of court society into state bureaucracies, though it was rudimentary. Here, bourgeois, “the public of the now emerging public sphere of civil society,” (p.23) had to use their reason ‘publicly’ and ‘critically,’ in other words, ‘politically’ to maintain their status. For this reason, public sphere then was critical sphere, thus political sphere. Press, here, functions as an instrument that enables the public to take on this challenge. However, in mass welfare-state democratic system, the public sphere becomes “a field for competition among interests,” and specified large civil organization mostly, not private persons, takes the mediating function between state and society: commodity consumption replaces public and critical use of reason. This results in the loss of critical edge of public sphere.

Though some parts of Habermas’s argument, for example, the historical evidence of the bourgeois public sphere, have been severely challenged, Structural Formation still remains a canonic text in studying democracy and community. It seems that the shortcomings of Structural Formation is offset by its other strong points, his longing for the progression of human society, and providing normative ideals of modernity. In this way, one can find both motivation and destination of sociology in Habermas’s work. However, it is somewhat peculiar that a normative model drawn from the ‘bourgeois’ public sphere can be a generalizable model for the ‘whole’ society. Can bourgeoisies’ use of reason in the 18th century be truly ‘critical’ and ‘publicly’ relevant? Might it not be rather protective and self-interested use of reason for the construction of bourgeois hegemony? Here comes the crucial question. What is the meaning of ‘critical’ use of reason?

Week4-The Political Public Sphere

The relationship of society and democracy is embodied in the political public sphere. As the public sphere emerged, it played a critical role in history in bringing about social change and in shaping democracy. The interplay of economic forces, communication, and key social foundations drew private people together as a public. This emerging public used what they had learned within their private sphere, such as its decision making process and the use of discussion, for political confrontation. As the scope and reach of the public sphere broadened beyond the educated, property owner, these social foundations deteriorated and its function weakened as public opinion was no longer unified and unambiguous and was only one power among other powers.
Habermas proposed the public sphere as an ideal political framework in which rational discussion and reasoned action brought about meaningful social change. The public sphere evolved into public opinion which “put the state in touch with the needs of society.” Public opinion was shaped by rational, critical political debate that was characterized by both the quality of the discourse and the quantity of participation. Publicity became” whatever attracts public opinion” such as legislative debate, which should be to inform public opinion (Habermas, p.3). His definition and discussion of what is public opinion and publicity help clarify and frame the discussion today of the role of the public in the political process and, perhaps, how the political public sphere can be reclaimed.
Habermas held that critical, rational dialogue of the political public sphere was needed for democracy to survive. Yet the two tendencies that he identified as undermining the public sphere – too much publicity which is eroding privacy rights and “secrecy in areas hitherto considered public” (p.140) seem to define today’s political public sphere. The debate continues today on what should be the role of public opinion in the political process, whether it is still relevant to the political function. Politicians today are accused of both reacting too quickly to the ebb and flow of public opinion, which is often formed without any debate in either the public or legislature and of also trying to shape public debate through the control of messages and symbols. Perhaps public opinion has become what Marx called it, “false consciousness” and the “mask of bourgeois class interest” (Habermas, p.124).
Habermas has an almost idealized view of the emergence of the political public sphere and its reshaping of governments and society. He credits the values and skills used within the private sphere of discussion as compromise and being used by private persons as they evolved into the public sphere. Habermas appears to have a belief in the innate goodness of mankind and that the broadening of the public sphere to include such segments of society as the working class, came about because it was the just and right thing to do. When in reality there were stronger economic reasons for this development. As Marx pointed out, the bourgeois public sphere was not that anxious to give up legislative power to the “mass of nonowners.” In his historical review, Habermas glossed over the violent uprising of the labor movement and other groups, which also drove this shift in power and public opinion.
The interplay of public opinion and publicity, on the part of legislators and those in authority, continues today, but not in the form of critical, rational dialogue that Habermas identified as the basis for democracy. Today’s political public sphere more closely resembles theater in which the politicians put on a show and the public, acting as an audience, shows its approval or disapproval of their performance through responses to public opinion polls. Habermas provides historical insights on how to either reengage the public or to recognize the emergence of a new form of the political public sphere. Habermas saw the press, a new and emerging medium, as a facilitator in the evolution of the political public sphere. The traffic in commerce and news developed together and formed invaluable communication network. New media, such as the internet, have also been identified as powerful drivers of a new form of global commerce and have also provided indications of placing the power for social change back into the hands of the public sphere. Perhaps this new media will again facilitate rational, critical political debate and foster the emergence of democracy worldwide.

Communication and community

1. What has been the main paradigm of researching community, and what is the problem of the paradigm? As an alternative, from what perspective can we define ‘community?’ What makes community possible in the first place? The four readings of this week, broadly speaking, is the answer to those questions. According to Bender, researches on community conducted by Louis Wirth and Talcott Parsons, the major figures in this field, rest on Toennies’s concept of the Gemeinschaft-Gesellschaft distinction. Toennis’s original usage of the distinction implied two patterns of social relations that can be coexisted, and yet Wirth and Parsons misunderstood Gemeinschaft-Gesellschaft as there existed time order between the two modes of society. This misunderstanding results from the fact that Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft are understood as places: in fact, “they were forms of human interaction.” (Bender, p.33) Based on this argument, Bender insists that community is a “social network” (p.11) first and foremost, and research on community should be an “overview of the simultaneous polarity and reciprocity of these two patterns of human interaction,” (p.43) going beyond ahistorical, structural functionalistic and linear model of Wirth and Parsons. In community as such, according to Chicago school, what makes community possible is communication as the medium of social interaction (Park and Burgess), specifically, press (Addams), publicity (Park and Burgess), new means of communication such as fast mails, telegraphs (Cooley). This reflects their views that human identity is formed in interaction between self and society. Here, what humans exchange in society is symbols, and their concept of ‘symbolic interaction’ comes from the premise just mentioned. Tocqueville’s observation exemplifies the role of media in formation of the community.

2. These arguments seem significant in a sense that they give normative directions to mass communication studies. If we accept the argument of Chicago school – media forms community – research on media may well lead to contribution to the formation of community. Without this type of normative necessity, mass communication research might remain as a neuter discipline in a vacuum situation in which methodological validity becomes everything.

3. Chicago sociology seems to stand on ‘social determinism by technology (media).’ In this view, social development is determined by technology in a broader sense, by media in a narrower sense. Thus, it was press that formed society, not vice versa. When social changes are needed, those who follow ‘social determinism through technology’ tend to consider introduction of ‘new technology’ (or new social engineering) first. When Mahatma Gandhi began the revolution, he did only sit down and started spinning. This is worth thinking about.

Week 3: Classical Statements

This week’s reading sets initial ground for the theoretical construct that weaves together democracy, community and communication. Tocqueville, in his exploration on the American democracy, advocates Americans’ tendency to form ‘associations’ on all matters and levels as the significant factor. Pursuit of self-interest leads to greater good as well, because they are coordinated for a common goal through close social interactions in those associations. Achieving this commonness is made possible through communication of information and ideas, and association newspapers play that role. As Park says, “the newspaper must continue to be the printed diary of home community” (Park, 1932).

To put the theoretical implications in short: democracy functions and maintains itself through communities, and communities are integrated by means of communication. The role of communication in this process becomes even more relevant with Bender’s argument that communities are not merely geographical or a specific form of goal attainment, but a form of human relationship experience. Such experiences cannot but be carried out by communication, especially mediated ones in today’s larger and/or more dispersed setting.

However, the classical view of democracy-community-communication is a basically a unidirectional one whereas in reality the relationships are more interlinked into an organic whole. For example, these views leave out the question of how can mediated communication can maintain its relevance to the common good of the community as a whole. Even in a small community media there are ‘journalistic choices’ to be made, on what messages should be selected to be circulated. It raises the issue of the democracy of communication itself. Other considerations such as the effects of the institutional features of the democratic system on the community structure are also crucial. Also, there are outside effects that play important roles that affect this democracy-community-communication model such as cultural values and shared historical memory. Thus, we must always remind ourselves that we are dealing with an open organic system, not a closed mechanical one.

Week 3-Community, Society & Communication

The “problem of community,” whether or not traditional patterns of social life are threatened or in a state of transformation, and what the role of communication is in that transformation or deterioration, has long concerned social philosophers. There appears to be consensus around Bender’s definition of community as being a “network of social relations marked by mutuality and emotional bonds” (1978, p.7) and that there are two forms of social interaction, community, which is family, neighborhoods, etc., and society, an artificial construction, such as the city. The debate is over how to define and explain the concept of the community-society continuum and what role communication plays in that dynamic. Modernization and urbanization were seen by Toonie and Wirth as disruptive social forces to this continuum that needed to be understood and corrected. Lewis and others found that the rise of one didn’t automatically mean the decline of the other and that community continued to exist despite what appears to be the relentless or apparent dominance of the “society.”
Communication must exist as community and society continues to change, but the form and content that the communication takes, also grows and changes as it reflects what is happening in society. So is communication predominantly a force of good, facilitating social interaction, or a force of evil, promoting gossip and false hopes as Jane Addams felt. De Tocqueville saw newspapers as not only guaranteeing liberty, but as also preserving civilization because he felt the rise of individualism was a menace. It was in the 20th century where the emerging mass media was both canonized and demonized. Does communication allow for the free flow of information and connect people of related interests across space or does it tend to isolate people? Either way observers have long recognized that if, media content is not consumed “it ceases to be an influence in the community” (Park, 1923, p. 98).
The relationship between community-society continuum continues to change and evolve which calls for ongoing research in to that transformative relationship and the role of communication. Does mass media cause community and society to change or do people use media to build community and shape society? Certainly in recent decades there have been extensive studies into mass media effects, but it was conducted within the context of the community-society continuum in place at that point in time. Perhaps too much focus has been on mass media and more research needs to be done on interpersonal communication networks. Sociologists, past and present, are enamored by new media, whether it is the newspaper or the internet, and have had a tendency to overlook or minimize the power and impact of the oral tradition or people’s interpersonal networks. Just as urban and rural senses of community can coexist in the same society, so can the oral form of communication and mass media play equally powerful roles and that interplay needs to be explored.
In recent years the new communication technologies, primarily the Internet, are continuing to influence and reshape the relationship between what is community and what is society. The emergence of the Internet has allowed for more interpersonal communication by providing what Park credited newspapers with doing in 1923, and that is connecting us to community and defining it by informing us. As a result, the traditional mass media is struggling, with newspaper readership declining 26% in the last few years. New forms of communication are facilitating social interaction on a large scale and at a distance and are redefining the social, cultural and political life and the economy at a global level. At the same time, the sheer multitude of communication channels has also added obstacles and created a lack of communication between people.

It was interesting as the number of communication channels increased and the scope of their reach grew, sociologists became more concerned about the effect of media. --Vicky Hildebrandt