Showing papers in "Communication Theory in 2001"
TL;DR: Practical theory as discussed by the authors is based on the notion of inquiry developed in human systems research and pragmatism and treats theory as formalizations aiding inquirers' efforts to join with human systems to improve them, rather than as propositional maps of social reality.
Abstract: Practical theory, as distinct from applied theory, is based on the notion of inquiry developed in human systems research and pragmatism. It rejects the practitioner-theorist dualism and treats theory as formalizations aiding inquirers' efforts to join with human systems to improve them, rather than as propositional maps of social reality. This article offers criteria for evaluating such theories and discusses the way practical theory establishes reliability, validity, and generality.
149 citations
TL;DR: In this article, cultural-historical activity theory (CHAT) was employed in the service of a conflict-monitoring network in the former Soviet Union, based upon historical and participant observation research on the development of the Network for Ethnological Monitoring and Early Warning during 1990-1999.
Abstract: As the number and intensity of conflicts increased around the world during the latter part of the 20th century, scholars, policymakers, and practitioners of non-violent conflict management strategies created conflict-monitoring networks to track the escalation of tensions in conflict-prone regions. This essay demonstrates how cultural-historical activity theory (CHAT) was employed in the service of a conflict-monitoring network in the former Soviet Union. Based upon historical and participant observation research on the development of the Network for Ethnological Monitoring and Early Warning during 1990–1999, a CHAT-based analysis of the Network's systemic contradictions illuminates its development through one expansive cycle and into a second. Summaries of findings consider relations within the Network, the evolution of the Network's complex object, and the Network's development of tools for monitoring ethnic relations and building an epistemic community. The essay concludes with an analysis of the correspondence between the CHAT framework and the 5 features of practical theory laid out by Cronen (1995).
144 citations
TL;DR: This paper found that participants tended to equate successful outcomes with successful processes, and most of the participants were only moderately satisfied with public meetings, while the majority of participants associated success with the process or the outcome of public participation.
Abstract: Public meetings are among the most commonly used, frequently criticized, yet least understood methods of public participation in community planning. Although systematic research on public meetings is sparse, a vast, if fragmented, amount of experiential knowledge exists, and that can form the basis for a working theory of why some public meetings work and others do not. Characteristics of successful public meetings can be generally grouped by whether they relate to the process or the outcomes of public participation. Although a relationship exists, extant research would suggest that successful processes do not always lead to successful outcomes; however, officials interviewed for this study tended to equate successful outcomes with successful processes. Officials' satisfaction with public meetings seemed to be more tied to outcomes, and most officials were only moderately satisfied with public meetings.
104 citations
96 citations
69 citations
TL;DR: The field of development communication faces a critical juncture regarding its theoretical and pragmatic relevance due to both internal debates and criticisms, and external restructuring of political, economic, and social systems on a global scale as mentioned in this paper.
Abstract: The field of development communication faces a critical juncture regarding its theoretical and pragmatic relevance due to both internal debates and criticisms, and external restructuring of political, economic, and social systems on a global scale. The internal debates and criticisms indicate, at best, that the field is in some degree of conceptual disarray and, at worst, that it is detrimental to the goals of improving the human condition materially and symbolically. The concomitant external changes to social systems constitute a daunting context that questions the legitimacy and rationale of development efforts while fostering new forms of social change. This article argues that the field must redirect its attention in order to respond to the persistence of substandard living conditions that demonstrate the continued relevance of development efforts in general, specifically by drawing from the findings of scholarship of new social movements, combining them with relevant areas from participatory communication for development research.
66 citations
TL;DR: The authors propose dialogic civility as a guiding interpersonal metaphor in a time of narrative disagreement, an era in which ethical standpoints that traditionally have undergirded discourse are in contrast, dispute, and disruption.
Abstract: This essay offers dialogic civility as a guiding interpersonal metaphor in a time of narrative disagreement, an era in which ethical standpoints that traditionally have undergirded discourse are in contrast, dispute, and disruption. Dialogic civility is an interpersonal metaphor grounded in the public domain and in a pragmatic commitment to keeping the conversation going in a time of narrative confusion and virtue fragmentation. This essay frames a pragmatic case for dialogic civility as a key interpersonal metaphor for negotiating difference in the public domain of postmodern communicative interaction.
58 citations
TL;DR: A school-wide dialogue process was developed in the context of a community-wide project and designed to develop citizenship skills and enhance school climate as mentioned in this paper, where participants were self-reflexively aware of working from a particular theory (the coordinated management of meaning, or CMM) and developing that theory in the process.
Abstract: A school-wide dialogue process was developed in the context of a community-wide project and designed to develop citizenship skills and enhance school climate. As we worked on the project, we were self-reflexively aware of working from a particular theory (the coordinated management of meaning, or CMM) and developing that theory in the process. Our reflections led to 3 criteria for evaluating our work and practical theory in general: engaging in continuing conversations with participants, practitioners, and theorists; celebrating and working with the interests of the participants; and developing principles and models that increase the abilities of all involved in the project to describe what is happening perspicaciously and to act into unfinished situations prudently. These criteria are consonant with a particular theoretical temperament: taking a participant's perspective on social worlds understood as pluralistic in which the theorist's goal is the continued exercise of curiosity. The 5-phase, 10-step SHEDD model was developed in successive iterations of the dialogue process and is presented as an example of the work of practical theorists.
47 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors present a new method of analysis that enables us to study the strengths and weaknesses of the associations created during the organization of coalitions, based on a case study.
Abstract: This article presents a new method of analysis that enables us to study the strengths and weaknesses of the associations created during the organization of coalitions. Based on a case study, this model shows that organizing a coalition consists of making different agendas compatible by establishing a series of translations between them. As illustrated in this article, these translation activities are enacted through narrative forms in which actors (individual or collective) construct points of articulation between their different objectives. It is therefore the narrative embedding of a series of actions that ultimately structure social and physical reality and constitute what we call a coalition. To illustrate this new approach to organizational communication, the analytical model presented is applied to analyze the associations involved in the organization of coalitions during an environmental controversy, the Great Whale River project. In this article, I present a new method of analysis that enables us to study the strengths and weaknesses of the associations created during the organization of coalitions. Using the Great Whale River controversy as an illustration, I present a theoretical framework that gives us the tools for analyzing coalitions in such a way that their stability, the sources of instability, and means of protecting them can be specified. According to the approach proposed, it is not sufficient to assess the relative stability of a coalition based upon the common ground of parties to a coalition, nor would such an analysis reveal specific sources of instability for a coalition or what could be done to defend against them. We lack a method of analysis that enables us to show how different actors can organize a coalition by articulating their different projects with each other. As we will see, the mechanism of this articulation is based on the narrative construction of one or several translations that assure a certain stability in a network of coalitions. This article introduces critically the current research in organizational
46 citations
TL;DR: The authors analyzed the interactional trouble in one community's school board meetings and drew upon three theories relevant to this school board site -argumentative processes, rhetorical action, and moral conflict -to diagnose the school board problem.
Abstract: Communication, Craig (1989, 1995a, 1995b; Craig & Tracy, 1995) argues, is and should be a practical discipline: a field whose scholarly work would be helpful in improving the communicative practices it studies. Following explication of Craig's notions of practical theory and communication as a practical discipline, this paper analyzes the interactional trouble in one community's school board meetings. Drawing upon 3 theories relevant to this school board site - proposals about argumentative processes, rhetorical action, and moral conflict - we show how each theoretical lens leads to a different diagnosis of the community's ‘school board problem’. The second part of the paper inverts the analytic focus. Based on study of this school board's troubles, we critique the usefulness of the 3 theories. In the conclusion, we reflect about the often-invisible task of labeling the problem that a group is facing.
45 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors specify two independent theoretical frameworks in which it is a practical necessity to engage in compliance seeking incrementally and interactively in order to establish the social meanings of solicitation and of response.
Abstract: We specify 2 independent theoretical frameworks in which it is a practical necessity to engage in compliance seeking incrementally and interactively in order to establish the social meanings of solicitation and of response. One theoretical framework ties social meaning to the interactional positioning of solicitation and response; the second framework ties social meaning to the way solicitation and response each are framed relative to shared cultural or other premises about persuadables and about the rights and obligations of each party. Accordingly, the chief communication mechanism that promotes compliance must be a give-and-take process in which each party can influence, and accommodate, the other's understanding of what solicitation and response mean. We analyze 2 naturally occurring compliance-seeking episodes and find support for our initial theorizing and discuss consequences for theory.
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors argue for an enlargement of our conception of rationality to include forms of reasoning, intelligence and cognition that are communicatively, rather than discursively, based.
Abstract: This paper argues for an enlargement of our conception of rationality to include forms of reasoning, intelligence and cognition that are communicatively, rather than discursively, based. To defend the thesis that understanding emerges in the collective interactive processes of practically situated conversation, as well as in individual thought, the paper examines the theoretical literature devoted to self-organizing systems, and the empirical literature which describes how distributed intelligence is developed by groups in materially embedded contexts of work. It then explores the phenomenon of emergence of organization as an actor, capable of expressing an intention, and participating in a dialogue involving other organizations. It explains this phenomenon of the emerging organizational self as a logical implication of the theory of self-organizing which predicates selfness as an effect of the coupling of an autopoietic system to an observer. While this has tended to be interpreted in inter-subjective contexts of communication it can also be applied to organizational communication. Implications of such a revision of perspective are briefly considered, including a critique of current interpretations of dialogics.
TL;DR: The authors employ a critical analysis of media images of white women adorned in the symbols of Indian femininity to explore the circulating economy of seeing and representation, revealing that the contemporary "ethnic chic" preserves power hierarchies by locating the White woman as sexual object, and the Indian woman as the disembodied fetish that supports White female sexuality.
Abstract: The media's showcasing of nose rings, mehndi, and bindis in U.S. fashion is contemporary appropriation of South Asian symbols by Western popular culture. This paper employs a critical analysis of media images of White women adorned in the symbols of Indian femininity to explore the circulating economy of seeing and representation. The theoretical intervention offered here turns on the notion of the Third Eye - the potential for the object of ethnographic spectacle to return the gaze. The analysis reveals that the contemporary ‘ethnic chic’ preserves power hierarchies by locating the White woman as sexual object, and the Indian woman as the disembodied fetish that supports White female sexuality. The implications for South Asian American women include the need to re-imagine sexuality with reference to critical race theory and the potential to return an oppositional gaze.
TL;DR: Their new subjectivity emerges in the process of drawing borders around their old subject positions, a process that constitutes them as nascent specular border intellectuals as discussed by the authors, whose contemplation of the condition of their lives represents a freedom, or at least an attempt to have freedom, from the politics of imaginary identification and opposition.
Abstract: Thus, their new subjectivity emerges in the process of drawing borders around their old subject positions, a process that constitutes them as nascent specular border intellectuals Their contemplation of the condition of their lives represents a freedom, or at least an attempt to have freedom, from the politics of imaginary identification and opposition, from conflation of identity and location, and so on - in short, from the varied and powerful forms of suturing that are represented by and instrumental in the construction of their sedimented culture The process of decoding as well as the emerging command of literacy permits them a gradual shift from the confines of the imaginary to the outer edges of the symbolic realm
TL;DR: In this paper, four major hypotheses for why mass media might affect fertility were developed: economic and time use effects of the medium, effects of ideas on policy actions of members of the elite, general effects on population basic values and fertility-specific cognitions, and effects of deliberate mass media-based interventions on fertility-related behavior.
Abstract: We develop four major hypotheses for why mass media might affect fertility. These include economic and time use effects of the medium, effects of ideas on policy actions of members of the elite, general effects on population basic values and fertility—specific cognitions, and effects of deliberate mass media—based interventions on fertility—related behavior. The paper examines correlational and some longitudinal evidence at the cross—national, intranational, and individual levels, as well as the evidence for effects of deliberate interventions. The correlational evidence is consistent with a mass media effect on fertility. However, the evidence about discrete program effects, which reveals short—lived increases in demand for clinic services, is less consistent. We speculate that, if the spread of mass media has effects on fertility, it reflects a complex social process rather than a medium effect or a discrete learning process: multiple channels, providing reinforcing messages, over time, producing interpersonal discussion and a slow change in values, and working at a level of social aggregation higher than the individual.
TL;DR: In this article, the authors examine the intersection of development discourse and local patriarchal discourse in a World Bank project implemented in the agricultural frontier in Colombia, and explain how this type of discourse maintains and reinforces patriarchal cultural codes that exclude women from active participation in development projects.
Abstract: This article analyzes the construction of gender in development discourse. As development projects are designed and implemented by Third World men and women, local symbolic constructions of gender, class, and race permeate development discourse. The result is a multilayered discourse of development that negotiates Western discourse of modernity with local discourses of race, class, and gender. This analysis examines the intersection of development discourse and local patriarchal discourse in a World Bank project implemented in the agricultural frontier in Colombia. Through textual analysis of project documents and a consultant's field diary, the analysis sheds light on the rhetorical formulas, metaphors, and iconic signifiers that articulate women as ahistorical, static, and passive subjects. Despite its bottom—up, participatory approach to development, this World Bank project keeps marginalizing women, assuming that only men play crucial roles in processes of community and nation building and considering only male community members in processes of empowerment. In conclusion, the article explains how this type of development discourse maintains and reinforces patriarchal cultural codes that exclude women from active participation in development projects.
TL;DR: This article argued that the theory and practice of development communication would be strengthened by drawing on insights from both feminism and liberation theology, arguing that women are included or empowered in applications of liberation theology to development communication.
Abstract: This essay notes the relative neglect of considerations of both liberation and gender in the scholarship and practice of development communication. Liberation perspectives on development, grounded in religion and spirituality, argue for individual and collective empowerment, and therefore appear to offer consistency with feminist thought. In practice, it is unclear to what extent women are included or empowered in applications of liberation theology to development communication. This paper argues that the theory and practice of development communication would be strengthened by drawing on insights from both feminism and liberation theology.
TL;DR: In this article, the authors argue that the promotion of human rights represents an unacceptable form of global cultural homogenization, and that it is possible to respect the dignity of individual cultures even while advancing the cause of rights as a matter of right versus wrong.
Abstract: This essay examines the promise of universal democratization in relation to the threat of cultural homogenization. Does the promotion of human rights represent an unacceptable form of global cultural homogenization? How might it be possible to respect the dignity of individual cultures even while advancing the cause of rights as a matter of right versus wrong? The paper argues the case that these two conflicting impulses can be addressed within a discursively oriented theory of global democracy. The argument relies on Habermas's theory of communicative action, applying his discursive theory of democracy to the prospect of cosmopolitan democracy at the global level. An analysis of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights illustrates the application of discursive democracy in a cosmopolitan setting.
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors argue that conceptual innovation is both a fundamental scientific activity and essentially a communication phenomenon, and that science as an institution is predicated on the development of new knowledge.
Abstract: This essay exploring the nature of scientific communication begins with the premise that conceptual innovation is both a fundamental scientific activity and essentially a communication phenomenon. Conceptual innovation is fundamental as a scientific practice in that science as an institution is predicated on the development of new knowledge. It is essentially communicative in that it is the public character of science that relies on the consensual and communal evaluation of knowledge claims that determines the fate of new ideas. Science comprises a number of overlapping discursive formations whose nature is determined by the positions of (and relationships among) actors and ideas within communication and ideational networks, and which are characterized by a particular situational logic. The nature of these situational logics is such as to give rise to some of the characteristic communication dynamics of science, including consensus, problemshift, branching, and demarcation.