In a previous post, we said that the functions of communication include sales and advertisement, and entertainment and art. In this post, we will summarily explore these two fields of communication endeavor, calling them business and art respectively. Yesterday, we showed how communication is science. Today, we will show how it is art and business. Some universities place communication studies in their Humanities Faculty; some place it in their Business Faculty, and some place it in their Social Science Faculty. It seems to me that the ones that place it in their humanities college see communication as an art; those that place it in their business college see it as business studies, and those that place it in their social science college see it as a science. Communication studies is in many ways all of these things. Indeed, there is no human activity that cannot be explained as a communication activity in some way, shape or form, as they say. There is a maxim in communication studies: Humans cannot not communicate. So it is that everything we do or say is communication.
Communication as art flows from Aristotle's techne. It is communication at the service of entertainment, of making things that are pleasing to the senses and to the mind. When we layout newspapers and magazines to look beautiful and to appeal to the readers' eyes, we are engaged in communication as art. When we make radio or audiovisual broadcast content to be appealing, we are appealing to the eyes and ears of viewers and listeners. It is the same with advertisements. Many of them make us laugh - think for example of many of the Geico commercials, like the pig driving a convertible, or the Pillsbury doughboy on his way to a baking convention. These skits are so pleasing to the senses and the mind that they entertain in very substantial ways. Communication as art is creativity: creativity in story telling; in design; in composition - in everything that pleases human beings as sensate and sensible animals, possessed with reason. But again, even animals can be pleased or perturbed, depending on the artistic content of communication. A case is told of a chimpanzee that turned away each time a particular scene of its favorite movie came on: the scene was of the emotional parting ways of two people that loved each other. The chimpanzee turned away so it would not have to witness the sad spectacle. I know Aristotle limited his techne to humans alone, but I disagree with him on this point. I think that non-human animals are capable of techne. When beavers build dams for example, what are they displaying if not techne? When birds build nests, is it not owing to techne? I think animals are capable of techne.
Communication as business flows from Aristotle's phronesis. This is another virtue I think even animals are capable of. Aristotle calls it practical wisdom. Business in my opinion is the height of practical wisdom. The ability to be prudent with finances - and another word for phronesis by the way is prudence - is a chief talent in the effective conduct of business. Advertisement, integrated marketing communication campaigns; public relations and publicity - these are all instances of communication at the service of business. When goods and services are manufactured and ready to be sold to the prospective consumer, we need to make sure that such prospects know that the goods and services are available. This is where communication comes in. Through communication, awareness of the presence of goods and services is shared by the producer or marketer with the prospect. Everything from door-to-door selling to the sophisticated use of ads and campaigns are business or marketing communications. And so ads are both artistic and commercial expressions of communication endeavor. They please, and they sell products and services. Commercials also sell candidates for political office. Approved messages over especially television allow us to see and hear the people we want to elect to positions of power. We want to be aware of their track records. We want to be aware of their personalities. We want to be aware of all the things they can do for us once elected. Communication in this regard helps us with decision-making. It gives us the power to shape our sociopolitical destiny. Communication is very important in the public sphere.
Research into the use of communication in the public sphere is a feature of contemporary communication studies. A philosophy of communication borrowing from Heidegger in this regard would challenge communication to be authentic, and to appeal to the truest situation of phusis, so that human societies can better live up to the metaphysical standard that reason and language prescribe. Linguistic communication in any case is social and communal, and its Dasein speaks volumes of human progress from prehistoric tactile communication to the ever-dynamic technological breakthroughs in Internet instantaneity. A philosophy of communication would borrow from Wittgenstein and propose clarity in meaning; a semantic underpinning to mere syntax of words and pictures. It would borrow from Augustine's call for signification, and from Heidegger's clarion call to "the things themselves." A metaphysical approach to human communication is underscored by the functionality of meaning in the direction of human affairs in the public sphere; the organization of people and groups in a network of participatory frameworks all working harmoniously for the progress of the human species. A philosophy of communication serves as Locke's substratum that holds together the otherwise disparate communications we are perennially bombarded with by all the media of communication seeking our attention as we go about our daily doing and business.
No comments:
Post a Comment