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Speaking into the air: a history of the idea of communication
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New TechnologiesRhetoricCommunicationContemporary DebatesContemporary CultureCommunication StrategyDiscourse AnalysisConversation AnalysisLanguage StudiesIntellectual HistoryCommunication ActivismJohn Durham PetersCommunication StudyInternational CommunicationPopular CommunicationSpeech CommunicationHumanitiesHuman CommunicationInterpersonal CommunicationGlobal CommunicationMass CommunicationArtsModernity
Communication is invoked as a panacea for democracy and love, a dream of a new information society, and a wistful ideal of human relations, drawing on teachings from Socrates to William James to understand its role in contemporary debates. The book asks how and why communication has come to bear the responsibilities it now carries. It traces the yearning for contact through philosophy, literature, and the cultural reception of communication technologies from the telegraph to the radio. Peters shows that across centuries thinkers have struggled with contact, the impact of technology, and altered worldviews, and that the history of communication is not a linear march toward harmony but a collection of uncanny devices conjuring angels, spirits, and alien intelligences.
In contemporary debates, communication is variously invoked as a panacea for the problems of both democracy and love, as a dream of a new information society brought about by new technologies, and as a wistful ideal of human relations. How, and why, did communication come to shoulder the load it carries? In John Durham Peters's work, the teachings of Socrates and Jesus, the theology of Saint Augustine, the political philosophy of Locke, and the American tradition from Emerson through William James all become relevant for understanding communication in our age. Peters finds that thinkers across the centuries have struggled with the same questions - how we can hope for contact with others, what has become of human beings in increasingly technological times, how new modes of communication have altered the ways the world is imagined and how we relate to others - and he weaves intellectual history and communications history together. The book traces the yearning for contact not only through philosophy and literature but also by exploring the cultural reception of communication technologies from the telegraph to the radio. The history of communication, Peters shows, is not a triumphant progress toward global harmony but rather a collection of uncanny devices that conjure angels, spirits and alien intelligences. His is an account of a complex concept that has both shaped us and been shaped by us.