summary of reading 3.2

This article is based on three periods of ethnographic reasearch between 1989 and 1991 on a small island situated off the coast of south west ireland. whiddy island lies in Bantry bay, country cork Eire. It is but three miles long and one and a half miles wide.
the purpose of the research was to calculate for the role of technology in changing social relationships on the island. It also discusses how whiddy island's 40 remaining inhabitants use the telephone and how the use has changed over time. the whiddy island population had declined from 259 to a mere of 40 in 1990. 34 of them were born on that island while the remaining six married an islander and settled there. when the research started, the island didnt have much facilities, and was hardly connected to the main island. even running water was introduced in 1982. suprisingly, like so many writers on the media, whiddy islanders priviliged television above all of the other modern items when the technologies simply arrived. television did not displace another media, that is one of the reasons why it is accepted uncritically. Unlike other technologies, its ancestors did not fall into disuse when it arrived. In the other hand, telephone, like other technologies was seen as a part of a progression by islanders. but yet it was much more efficient compared to postal systems. until the television arrived, the written and aural massages were received by the islanders as despictions of semi-strangers. but the telephone, was, however the first means of electronic communication.

summary of reading 3.1

The focused theme of my reading is about the saturation of space and time caused by the modern electronic media. Television, radio, and telephone turn once private places into more public ones by making them more accesible to the outside world. and car stereos, wristwatch televisions, and personal sound systems such as the Sony 'Walkman' make public spaces private. Through such media, what is happening almost anywhere can be happening wherever we are.those entering many places no longer find them informationally special. Places visited for the first time now look familiar if they (or places like them) have already been seen on television. with electronic media, now have a strong common denominator. Those aspects of group identity, socialization, and hierarchy that were once dependent on particular physical locations and the special experiences available in them have been altered by electronic media.

Summary of Reading 3.1 (p.72-79)

Generally, my reading discusses the impact of vast development of electronic media on its consequences to the relationship between physical place context and social experience.

The latest communication technology literally vanishes the distance between the 'sender' and the 'receiver'. In the old days, the physical place context is a vital element that influences the process of communication. People can only communicate synchronously through face-to-face interaction. Nowadays, people don't need to be on a certain given-place to be able to communicate with others directly. The most common example is probably the introduction of handphones, and even chatting applications now can be accessed through mobile phones.

Another point that the reading discusses is para-social relationship. Para-social relationship is formed through the interaction one experiences when watching television, movies, or plays, with the performer. Although it is not a face-to-face interaction, but psychologically it resembles one. That's why fans usually feel like they actually know their favorite actor or singer and consider them as an actual friend. Because while watching them performing, people get to see and understand their character or personality. One of the most famous example of this kind of relationship is the murderer of John Lennon, Mark David Chapman, who knew John Lennon so well, eventually at one point he actually thought that he was John Lennon.

Comments on Reading 2.1 & 2.2

I find the history of the 'audience' concept is very interesting. Amazing how it has changed in a relatively short period of time. How the 'theatre-audience' concept lasted for several hundred years in the age of Greek and Roman empire, and how it's definition has changed because the audience no longer has to be on a specific place to 'receive the message' due to the vast development of mass media in the 19th-20th century.

I'm just wondering, does the concept of audience has room to change yet again? Let's say, from the ways of information recording or storage, that maybe sometime in the future there will be a technology that can enable people to access TV or internet by mind? In that way, the concept of audience where "no one will be obliged to accept the same package of information at the same time as anyone else" can exist, which is the exact opposite of the earliest concept of audience. I guess it's fair to say that as long technology can develop, so does the media.

I'm also wondering wether audience-as-public paradigm can survive, because apparently it seems that the primary purpose of mass media has shifted from education/culture transmission to profit.

1. Reading 1.1 discusses the linear or process model of communication, sometimes known as the Sender/Message/Receiver. What are the limitations of this model?
2. 2. How does Thompson (Reading 1.2) distinguish the term 'mass communication' from face-to-face communication?
3. 3. What are the three objects domains of analysis proposed by Thompson (Reading 1.2) in the analysis of mass communication?

Comments:

1. The limitations of this model can be illustrated through reference to an example that often appears in process model text. In this example, the communication is almost completely decontextualised. In other words, most bacground or relevant information, most contextualising detail, is left out.

2. He suggests that the growth of 'mass communication' in the modern period has seen several distinctive and important developments which distinguish it from face-to-face.

3. The three aspects are closely interconnected in the process of producing and transmitting media messages, but by distinguishing between them we can delineate three object domain of analysis.

a) The first aspect is the process of production and diffusion, that is, the process of producing the material of mass communicatin and transmitting or ditributing it via channels of selective diffusion.
b) The second aspect is the construction of the media message. The materialtransmitted by the mass communication is a produck which is structured in various ways: it is a complex symbolic construction which displays an articulated structure.
c) The third aspect of nass communication is the reception and appropiation of media messages. these messages are recieved by individuals, and groups of individuals, who are situated within specific social historical circumstances, and who employ the recources available to them in order to make sense of the messages received and to incorporate them into their everyday lives.

Study Questions and Comments on Reading 1.1 & 1.2

Study Questions:

1. Reading 1.1 discusses the linear or process model of communication, sometimes known as the Sender/Message/Receiver. What are the limitations of this model?

2. How does Thompson (Reading 1.2) distinguish the term 'mass communication' from face-to-face communication?

3. What are the three objects domains of analysis proposed by Thompson (Reading 1.2) in the analysis of mass communication?

Comments:

1. The limitation of the process model of communication is that it only works if the differences between the sender and receiver are ruled out. It concludes an analogy that compares communication with the system of postal service. It is an over-simplifying statement because in reality the process of communication is much more complicated than that. There are a number of factors to be considered that influence the process of communication, such as cultural literacy and the relationship between communication and culture.

2. Thompson distinguishes mass communication from face-to-face communication by highlighting these following four differences:

- Mass communication offers no direct and immediate audience response, whereas direct and immediate response or feedback occurs in face-to-face communication.
- In mass communication, messages are encoded in a certain medium that persists. On the other hand, the exchange of messages in daily interaction is impermanent.
- The encoded messages in mass communication are commodified and reproducible. They can be treated as objects which are exchanged in a market.
- Because the messages in mass communication are encoded in a permanent medium, they can be circulated and further spread among an extended audience.

3. The three objects domains of analysis proposed by Thompson in the analysis of mass communication are the process of production and diffusion, construction, and the reception and appropriation of media messages.

Introduction and Welcome

Welcome, Ghian, Miriam & Anisa:
Please send questions and comments about your readings or anything else that relates to Communications. Please remember to keep up with the readings and check the course outline for important assignments and deadlines. Don't forget to watch TV critically and go to films as often as possible. You will also need to read books, newspapers and magazines as part of this course. You need to keep communicating and consider the nature of the transmission-reception model that we discussed. Be aware of yourselves as communicators; how this has changed in the past and how it is continually changing for you and everyone. I hope you enjoy this course and learn something about the nature of Communications. Welcome!