It is an honor to open this special issue of the Journal of Communication on ''intersections.'' Debates about the nature of our field have been extraordinarily productive, and to my mind, the navel-gazing we have reflexively undertaken over the years has been inspiring and stimulating. A bit self-absorbed, perhaps, but it underscores our sensitivities as a relatively new discipline. We certainly cannot claim infancy at this point, but our field is still in youthful adulthood, an opportune moment to scrutinize both our progress and chronic challenges.My argument is that the field of communication has a tremendous challenge ahead, now that we have grown in size and stature. We need to keep building the field, proving our ''value added'' on the scholarly scene but, at the same time, remain as broad and open to the offerings of other disciplines as possible. We need more coherence and more legitimacy if we are to strengthen the field, yet not at the cost of isolation, an enticing temptation for us as we build our own house. Navigating this complex terrain is exceedingly difficult, and so after a few forays into our various struggles, let me end with some practical solutions and questions we might ask ourselves moving forward.As preface, I should note that this article focuses primarily on communications as a field of inquiry in the United States. I focus on our intellectual lives, but primarily those pursued within the nuanced, idiosyncratic contexts of departments at North American colleges and universities. I regret any provincialism that results from this focus, but I am most familiar with communication studies in the United States, and always best to stay with what one knows. In the same vein, most of my examples, and view of the history of our field, are from the general perspective of media and audience studies.
Foundations and institutional strugglesMuch has been written about the founding of communication, as a field or discipline, so I will not repeat these histories, anecdotes, and reviews. At this point, we have been treated to a plethora of volumes on the general intellectual history of the field (Rogers, 1994) as well as histories of particular ideas, technologies, industries, and practices (Nord, 2007;Peters, 1999). Among the more exciting projects have been those that bring together rigorous archival social history and the study of
