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Traditions of communication sciences

Persone

Rocci A.

Docente titolare del corso

Descrizione

Course Calendar
November 13, 2017 13,30-14,30 (1 hour)
December 4, 2017, 8,30-17,30 (7 hours, pause from 12,30 to 14,30)
December 5, 2017, 8,30-16,30 (6 hours, pause from 12,30 to 14,30)
Aims
Is communication a field? Is it a discipline? Or rather an interdisciplinary field of inquiry? To what extent does your thesis refer to communication as a field? Or, more substantially, does your thesis rely on notions of communication that go beyond the commonsensical (and vague) understanding of this term? Is it of any use to make communication a technical concept? From what discipline or disciplines do you draw the basic concepts, theories and models of communication phenomena? As soon as one starts being socialized in a multidisciplinary community of researchers such as the USI Ph.D. School in Communication Sciences one discovers, either with amazement or with discomfort, that questions such as the above receive a wide range of answers, when they are not dismissed as too broad or too far removed from the nitty-gritty of highly specialized PhD research projects.
This course will tackle these very questions to foster the creation of common ground among communication PhD students and, perhaps, more importantly, to encourage to dare theorize about communication.
Topics
The course is divided into two topical distinct units. One day-long session will be devoted to each unit.
1. Defining what is communication and what is not communication. Defying skepticism about definitions and delimitations of communication, we will try to work out one (or several) useful delimitations of the scope of communication phenomena, built around properties that are interesting for understanding cognitive and social phenomena. We will focus on a philosophical tradition that puts concepts such as inference and representation, intention, recognition of intention, second order intentions, common ground, convention and commitment at the core of the definition of what is (not) communication. Through a series of readings from this tradition we will grapple with the concepts of signaling, non-natural meaning, covert communication, overt communication and the implicit vs. explicit distinctions. At the end of the day each participant will have to write a short comment on how the examined communication concepts can interact with their research.
2. Mapping the field. In the second session we move from a purely conceptual to a more historical approach and look at some historically noteworthy examples of communication theorizing and to the field’s attempts at defining and mapping itself. We first give a brief look at (Aristotelian) classical rhetoric as a first example of theorizing about communication. Then we look at some attempts to define the field either programmatically (e.g. Raymond Williams on communication as a “cultural science”) or a posteriori (e.g. Robert Craig’s well known reconstruction of 7 traditions of communication theorizing). We will also examine how concepts can migrate from one disciplinary tradition to another using the example of the conduit metaphor. At the end of the session each PhD student will have to position her own research in a map of the field and consider how it could possibly change, and perhaps improve, by injecting ideas from other traditions.
Evaluation
The evaluation of the course will be based on the following items:

  1. A preliminary 300 words statement containing the following information: 1) thesis topic, 2) indication of the tradition of communication science with which the participant is more familiar (if any), 3) indication of the main communication concepts and theories involved in the thesis. To be delivered before session 1.
  2. A short power-point presentation of one of the readings for either session one or session two (5-8 slides). Participants should be ready to present or discuss their chosen reading in class during both sessions.
  3. A short comment (max 300 words), to be submitted at the end of the first session, on how the examined communication concepts can interact with their research.
  4. A short comment (max 300 words), to be submitted at the end of the second positioning their own research in a map of the field and consider how it could possibly change, and perhaps improve, by injecting ideas from other traditions.
  5. A final retrospective comment (900-1800 words) on the trajectory of the course, recasting the previous assignments in one revised text. The final comment must include one specific bibliographic suggestion for next year’s edition of the course. This final essay should be submitted no later than January 10 2018.

Readings
Mandatory reading:
All participants are to read the following short article before session 1:
Craig, Robert T. 2016. “Traditions of Communication Theory.” The International Encyclopedia of Communication Theory and Philosophy, 1–10. doi:10.1002/9781118766804.wbiect119.
Readings for presentations:
The following readings are eligible for assignment 2. For each text a limited number of slots is available to ensure that all texts are covered. Slots are assigned on a first come, first serve basis. Ph.D. students that are assigned the same text can work together as a group and produce one presentation. However, they are not obliged to do so.
Readings for session 1 presentations:

  • Posner, R. 1993. “Believing, causing, intending: The basis for a hierarchy of sign concepts in the reconstruction of communication” (pp. 215-270). In: R.J. Jorna, B. van Heusden, R. Posner (eds.) Signs, search and communication. Semiotic aspects of Artificial intelligence. Berlin/ New York: De Gruyter. For this article 3 slots are available.
  • Spence, Michael. 1973. “Job Market Signaling.” The Quarterly Journal of Economics 87 (3): 355. doi:10.2307/1882010. One slot is available for this article.
  • Grice, Herbert Paul. 1957. “Meaning.” The Philosophical Review 66 (3): 377–88. One slot is available for this article.
  • Taillard, Marie-Odile. "Persuasive communication: the case of marketing." Working Papers in Linguistics12 (2000): 145-174. One slot is available for this article.
  • Crook, John. "On covert communication in advertising." Journal of Pragmatics 36.4 (2004): 715-738. One slot is available for this article.
  • Carassa, Antonella, and Marco Colombetti. "Layers of joint commitments in interpersonal communication." Proceedings of the Cognitive Science Society. Vol. 33. No. 33. 2011. One slot is available for this article.
  • Carassa, Antonella, and Marco Colombetti. "Joint meaning." Journal of Pragmatics 41.9 (2009): 1837-1854. One slot is available for this article.

Readings for session 2 presentations:

  • Gross, Alan G., and Marcelo Dascal. 2001. “The Conceptual Unity of Aristotle’s Rhetoric.” Philosophy and Rhetoric 34 (4): 275–91. doi:10.1353/par.2001.0016. One slot is available for this article.
  • Craig, Robert T. 1999. “Communication Theory as a Field.” Communicaction Theory 9: 119–61. For this article 3 slots are available.
  • Williams, Raymond. 1974. “Communications As Cultural Science.” Journal of Communication 24 (3): 17–25. doi:10.1111/j.1460-2466.1974.tb00385.x. One slot is available for this article.
  • Reddy, Michael J. 1979. “The Conduit Metaphor: A Case of Frame Conflict in Our Language about Language.” In Metaphor and Thought, edited by Andrew Ortony, 284–310. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. One slot, the presenter has to coordinate with the presenter of Axley 1984.
  • Axley, S. R. 1984. “Managerial and Organizational Communication in Terms of the Conduit Metaphor.” Academy of Management Review 9 (3): 428–37. doi:10.5465/AMR.1984.4279664. One slot, the presenter has to coordinate with the presenter of Reddy 1979.
  • Craig, Robert T. 2013. “Constructing Theories in Communication.” In Theories and Models of Communication, 39–57. One slot is available for this article.

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