Transcript Seminar Slides

ICTs and Communication 1
ICTs, Context, and Face-toFace Communications
John Mingers, Raul Espejo and
The Black Group
Warwick Business School, Warwick University
Coventry CV4 7AL, UK
email: [email protected]
John Mingers
ICTs and Communication 2
Black Topic
“ICTs, and the approaches by which they are
developed, can enhance data access and transmission
but not interpersonal communications; they don't take
account or provide the channel capacity required by
the embodied nature of human communication and
cognition. In particular they restrict the expression of
emotions and thus restrict significantly the scope of
virtual conversations in human interactions.”
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ICTs and Communication 3
Black Outcome
We recognise the rich, complex, multifaceted nature of human
communication, especially because of the embodied and autonomous nature
of human cognition.
We also see a range of communication models/media both face-to-face and
ICT enabled.
We wish to explore the limits (and potential enhancements) and
opportunities of these media with respect to communication.
In order to do this we will develop the above into a framework, looking
specifically at:
– The various media/modes of communication whether ICT-enabled or not.
– The way we model and frame our understanding of what human
communication requires.
– The significance of appreciating the participants' local contexts in the quality
of human communication.
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ICTs and Communication 4
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ICTs and Communication 5
Preliminaries
• We are primarily concerned with human communications
and the effects that the increasing use of ICTs has on them,
both positively as enabling and negatively as restricting.
• We are concerned with the pragmatics of communications,
that is communication as it really occurs in its full richness
rather than abstract or restricted forms or aspects of
communications.
• At this early stage we will restrict ourselves to some
generalities concerning communications and to looking at a
few theoretical approaches that may be relevant to the overall
task - in particular the theories of Maturana, Luhmann,
Habermas, and Merleau-Ponty.
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ICTs and Communication 6
Three Basic Elements of Communication
Mode
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Meaning
Media
ICTs and Communication 7
Theoretical Assumptions



The “transmission metaphor” which sees communication as the simple
transmission of information from one’s party’s head to another is quite
inappropriate. To the extent that communication occurs it is based on an
ontogenetically established structural coupling between the parties. Particular
selections or distinctions are drawn by the sender; these are transmitted, with or
without distortion by the media; and trigger (or do not trigger) distinctions and
selections in the receiver which may, or may not, be those intended by the sender.
Indeed, the nature of the communication only becomes specified after the event.
The embodied nature of much cognition and communicative action needs to be
stressed, as does the importance of language, emotion and context. This applies
both to the sender and receiver. It is particularly important when considering the
media used for a communication, and what it will and will not transmit.
Terms such as information, meaning, utterance, and understanding, cannot be taken for
granted but must be the subject of theoretical scrutiny.
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ICTs and Communication 8
Habermas’s Theory of Communicative Action
• A rational reconstruction of the basis of social action, and
especially communicative action. He distinguishes between
– instrumental action (nonsocial, oriented towards success)
– communicative action (social, oriented towards understanding), and
– strategic action (social, oriented towards success)
• Communicative action is seen from the point of view of
participants undertaking speech acts (utterances) with the
purpose of generating mutual understanding. A speaker
selects a particular utterance that is:
 Comprehensible to a competent speaker of the shared language;
 that is about something - i.e., concerns some state of affairs;
 that is acceptable in a normative sense within the shared social
community;
 that truthfully expresses the beliefs of the speaker.
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ICTs and Communication 9
• These are implicit assumptions of the utterance - criticisable
validity claims - which can be questioned or rejected. The
relate to three “worlds”:
• truth relates to the material world of objective states of affairs
and possibilities;
 rightness relates to our social world of intersubjectively shared
norms and practices;
 sincerity relates to my personal world of subjective experiences.
• Habermas envisages that a “rational” society will be one that
fosters and encourages wide ranging discussions and debates
in which anything and everything can be questioned and
challenged in as free and unfettered way as possible. This he
terms the “ideal speech situation” although he recognises
that this can never be fully realised in an actual society
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ICTs and Communication 10
Luhmann’s Autopoietic Communication
• Behaviour becomes action when it is a selection
from a range of possibilities.
• Action becomes communication when it involves
the understanding and response of another.
• Communication is more basic (socially) than action
since:
– it is intrinsically social.
– action only becomes identified as such through and indication and
communication.
• Communication is inherently self-referential
• Society is an autopoietic network of
communications
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Information
Utterance
Understanding
Understanding
Information
Utterance
Information: what the communication is about
Utterance: the form of the communication (who,
when, how etc.
Understanding: the interpretation made by the
receiver
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ICTs and Communication 12
Maturana and Varela - Biological Phenomenology
• Systems are structure-determined - there can be no instructive
interactions with the environment and thus no transmission
of information
• Yet systems become structurally coupled and develop a
consensual domain of linguistic interactions
• Social interaction can be seen in terms of conversations (an
ongoing coordination of actions in language among a group
of structurally-coupled observers) which are an inter-twining
of:
– language
– emotion
– integrated through the body
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Merleau-Ponty - Phenomenology
• Follows a trajectory in phenomenology from:
Husserl - pure thought free from the everyday
Heidegger - Being as concerned activity in the everyday
Merleau-Ponty - perception and cognition as embodied
phenomena
• Always concerned to resist dualisms such as
body/mind, empiricism/idealism,
behaviourism/intentionality, thinking/language
• Emphasises the intertwining of these modalities
(chiasma) and their reciprocal interplay
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Cognition and Embodiment
“When I reflect on the essence of subjectivity, I find it bound up with that of the body and
that of the world, this is because my existence as subjectivity is merely one with my
existence as a body and with the existence of the world, and because the subject that I am,
when taken concretely, is inseparable from this body and this world”
(“Phenomonology of Perception”, p.408).
Behaviour is determined neither externally, by the world, nor
internally, by intentional consciousness. Rather, it must be
explained structurally in terms of the physical structures of the
body and nervous system as they develop in circular interplay
with the world.
I.e., structural determinism and coupling
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ICTs and Communication 15
Thought and Language
“There is not thought and language: upon examination each of the two orders splits in
two and puts out a branch into the other. ... Expressive operations take place between
thinking language and speaking thought; ... It is not because they are parallel that we
speak; it is because we speak that they are parallel... Speaking to others (or to myself),
I do not speak of my thoughts; I speak them and what is between them …”
(“Signs”, p. 18, original emphasis)
• There is no dualism between thought and language speaking is thinking. Consciousness only becomes articulate
when we speak.
• Speech is thus an act of the body and so is entwined with
gestures, expressions, and emotions
• Many of the fundamental categories of language stem from
spatial and bodily functions (Lackoff and Johnson)
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Habermas
Luhmann
Maturana
Merleau-Ponty
Mode
1-1
1-2
1-many
many-1
many-many
Meaning
Purpose,
intention,
function, context
Generally assumes a single
individual speaker but is also
concerned with processes of
debate and discussion - the
ideal speech situation
Does not assume a particular
speaker or even an actual person. Is
more interested in the network of
communication per se.
Does analyse the mass media
Generally assumes F2F
interactions. Recognises
people may be part of
different and potentially
conflicting groups
Is interested in
thought and language
in general, not
particular
communications or
interactions.
Distinguishes between
strategic action oriented
towards success and
communicative action oriented
towards understanding.
Three validity claims:
Truth - states of actual or
possible affairs
Rightness - normatively
acceptable
Truthfulness - sincerity
Generally interested in
physical presence but
recognises that this has
become impossible.
Communication media have
developed that replace
traditional interaction. These
“systems” invade and
colonise the lifeworld.
Communication always relies
on previously established
structural coupling in a
linguistic domain.
Emphasises the importance
of mood and emotion (and
thus non-conscious
communication).
Sees language as part of the
ongoing flow of mutual coordinations of activity.
Language is connotative not
representational.
Little said explicitly but the
emphasis on the body would
suggest that virtual
technologies have serious
limitations.
Emphasises the
strongly embodied
nature of both
cognition and
language.
Media
The mechanism
of
communication
Sees communication and meaning
as always a selection from manifold
possibilities
Recognises communication not as
transmission but as a mutual
triggering.
Distinguishes between:
Information - that which is
communicated
Utterance - the form of the
communication.
Understanding - the way the receiver
interprets the communication
The technology of dissemination
constitutes a medium. All
institutions/technologies that
distribute communications.
The “mass media” is where there is
no direct contact between sender
and receiver.
His model could easily be applied to
the internet as a network of
communications.
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Generally quite similar
to Maturana.
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To Do
• Synthesize the above theoretical work to create an
underlying theory of communication
• Identify the main dimensions of mode and meaning
• Classify the characteristics of the main
communication media
• Consider the effects of the media on both
– Actual instances of communication - e.g. using email for
socially sensitive communications
– Social interaction and communication in general - e.g.,
what are the effects of mobile phone technology on
society?
John Mingers