Making Communication Theory Matter

Abstract

This article considers the role of theory in the development of communication as a field of inquiry. Arguing that the relationship between the parts and whole of the field has not been adequately understood, it suggests that embracing a fuller understanding of communication's singularity might work better for both communication scholars and those situated in other fields of inquiry.Time complicates the appraisal of theory development in a field of study like communication. Unlike more traditional disciplines that have been entrenched for longer than individual members can remember, communication's development provides an uneven backdrop on which the activities of current members rest. Its unevenness is exacerbated by the field's temporal newness, where the relationship between the field's parts and its imagined whole remains out of sync. Rather than provide a reliable landscape on which theory might develop in more or less predictable ways, the theoretical horizon associated with communication has had other effects: It has created unchallenged and often unarticulated coalitions, lent stature to mythical giants while marginalizing their more diminutive neighbors, linked known scholars in automatic ways to otherwise abstract research agendas and challenged academic identities still in formation. With time's passage always subject to simultaneous pathways of opportunity and diminution, depending on who is reflecting, appraising the development of theory in conjunction with a platform like Communication Theory depends ultimately on the circumstances and identities of those engaging in its appraisal.The time span of 25 years is significant for me because I received my doctorate at just about the point that Communication Theory launched. The field of communication was then primed for a growth spurt, supported largely by both the so-called end of the "Cold War" and the explosion of the digital revolution. Making efforts at rapprochement timely, by opening the East-West master narrative to an increasingly vocal North-South distinction, and rendering aspects of communication-its devices, effects, and institutions-more widely and differently relevant than they had been, these developments helped orient the field upward and outward, as measured by its premier scholarly association, the International Communication Association: In

Theorizing international inequalities in communication and media studies. A field theory approach

“…Because of their almost absolute power in determining career possibilities of young researchers, selection committees play the role of gatekeepers to the field of forces. The earlier mentioned international scientific communities like ICA, NCA or IAMCR play serious roles in the field of forces of CMS, and the bias against Global South authors is well known in case of all these associations (Wiedemann and Mayen, 2016;Zelizer, 2015). Another important factor of the field of forces is language, more precisely, the academic English of the international community of CMS scholars.…”

“…Beside leading periodicals like the above mentioned Journal of Communication, international academic associations also recognized the importance of de-Westernization (Meyen, 2012;Wiedemann and Meyen, 2016;Zelizer, 2015). Nevertheless, their research show that most fellows of the ICA has exclusively American background, and all fellows has very strong, typically educational relations to the Global North.…”

De la comunicación como campo a la comunicación como concepto transdisciplinar: historia, teoría y objetos de conocimiento

“…El segundo problema, y quizá el menos evidente, es el papel que la historia ha tenido en la construcción del campo académico de la comunicación, dado que no solo se ha aceptado como un acuerdo generalizado una narratividad histórica particular, sino que también se ha naturalizado con el discurso histórico el conocimiento disciplinarizado sobre la comunicación, es decir, la forma en que los modos disciplinares de pensamiento se convierten en aspectos predeterminados de los marcos para la investigación académica. Para Zelizer (2008), por momentos la naturalización de la perspectiva disciplinar se vuelve tan rígida que podemos olvidar cuánto de eso que conocemos en la academia es llevado a cabo sin una clara correspondencia sobre cómo es que llegamos al conocimiento que poseemos, puesto que el discurso histórico ha omitido tanto el procedimiento metodológico como la transformación misma de los fenómenos comunicativos en el mundo social. Qué sabemos y cómo lo sabemos, es una relación pendiente entre la comunicación y la historia.…”

“…De esta manera, se vuelven más importantes las dimensiones políticas y de poder en el campo que las propiamente intelectuales y cognitivas. Para Zelizer (2008), si bien en la ciencia contemporánea las barreras disciplinares son difíciles de identificar, los académicos siguen existiendo dentro de esas fronteras y límites de las comunidades interpretativas separadas, en donde cada grupo determina no solo la entrada de nuevos miembros a su comunidad, sino también qué es lo que cuenta como evidencia verdadera, de qué forma y específicamente, cuáles son las preguntas sobre las que hay que pensar y la investigación que realmente vale la pena hacer. Se crean así las agendas locales e internacionales de investigación que responden en muchas ocasiones a dimensiones políticas y no a dimensiones propiamente intelectuales.…”

The circuit of culture: A model for journalism history

“…And new interest in theorizing the changing nature of journalism is developing against the backdrop of digital transformation, technological change and economic challenges. Special issues of Digital Journalism (2015) and Journalism Practice (2015) featured a variety of scholars who presented novel strategies of conceptualizing journalism in an interconnected, digital era (see also Zelizer, 2015). Moreover, these efforts come at a time when the field of cultural history has established conceptual tools in a variety of subdisciplines in historical research (see Lipsitz, 2008 andGlickman, 2011).…”