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CMNS 302: Communication in History (Rev. C7)
CMNS 302: Communication in History (Rev. C7)
Communication Studies 302: Communication in History is designed to help you situate the history of communication technology in Western society; it does this by focusing separately on specific technologies at particular moments, and then revisiting those technologies at other moments. In this way, the course highlights important and recurring themes in the invention, introduction, and establishment of such technologies as writing, the printing press, photography, the telegraph, the telephone, film, radio, television, and the computer. The course also suggests the interplay among these technologies. Finally, Communication in History introduces some of the debates about the relations between communication technologies and the people who use them.
Unit 1
Marshack, Alexander. 1976. “Some Implications of the Paleolithic Symbolic Evidence for the Origin of Language.” Current Anthropology 17
Schmandt-Besserat, Denise. 1982. “How Writing Came About.” Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik 47
Havelock, Eric. 2007. "The Greek Legacy." In Communication in History: Technology, Culture, Society (5th ed.), 55-60. Edited by David Crowley and Paul Heyer. Boston: Pearson.
Ascher, Maria. 1992. “Before the Conquest.” Mathematics Magazine 65
Innis, Harold. 2007. "Media in Ancient Empires." In Communication in History: Technology, Culture, Society (5th ed.), 23-30. Edited by David Crowley and Paul Heyer. Boston: Pearson.
Salutin, Rick. 1997. “Last Call from Harold Innis.” Queen's Quarterly 104
Chandler, Daniel. 2002. “Technological or Media Determinism.”
Unit 2
Ong, Walter. 1999. "Orality, Literacy, and Modern Media." In Communication in History: Technology, Culture, Society (3rd ed.), 64-70. Edited by David Crowley and Paul Heyer. Boston: Pearson.
Finnegan, Ruth. 1988. Excerpt from Literacy and Orality: Studies in the Technology of Communication ,140-161, and refs. New York: Basil Blackwell.
Bloch, Maurice. 1989. "Literacy and Enlightenment." In Literacy and Society , 15-37. Edited by Karen Schousboe and Mogens Trolle Larsen. Copenhagen: Akademisk Forlag.
Street, Brian V. 1984. "The 'Autonomous' Model: II Goody." In Literacy in Theory and Practice , 44-65, and refs. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Neuliep, James. 1996. "The Systems-Interactioanal Approach." In Human Communication Theory : Applications and Studies , 275-292. Boston: Allyn and Bacon.
Supplementary Reading
Illich, Ivan, and Barry Sanders. 1998. "Text." In The Alphabetizaton of the Popular Mind , 29-51. New York: Vintage Books.
Please note that the selection begins on page 29.
Grosswiler, Paul. 2004. “Dispelling the Alphabet Effect.” Canadian Journal of Communication 29, no. 2: 145–158.
Unit 3
Burke, James. 2003. "Communication in the Middle Ages." In Communication in History: Technology, Culture, Society (4th ed.), 74-82. Edited by David Crowley and Paul Heyer. Boston: Pearson.
Eco, Umberto. 2003. "A Medieval Library." In Communication in History: Technology, Culture, Society (4th ed.), 71-74. Edited by David Crowley and Paul Heyer. Boston: Pearson.
Manguel, Alberto. 1996. "The Silent Readers." In A History of Reading , 41-53. New York: Viking.
Wittmann, Reinhard. 1999. "Was There a Reading Revolution at the End of the Eighteenth Century?" In A History of Reading in the West , 290-312. Edited by Guglielmo Cavallo, Roger Chartier, and Lydia G. Cochrane.Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press.
Unit 4
Snowden, Collette, and Kerry Green. 2007. “Media Reporting, Mobility and Trauma.” M/C Journal: A Journal of Media and Culture 10,
MacDougall, Robert. 2006. “The Wire Devils: Pulp Thrillers, the Telephone, and Action at a Distance in the Wiring of a Nation.” American Quarterly 58,
Sawhney, Harmeet. 2003. “Wi-Fi Networks and the Rerun of the Cycle.” Info 5,
Buck, George H. 2006. “The First Wave: The Beginnings of Radio in Canadian Distance Education.” Journal of Distance Education 21,
Lacohée, Hazel, Nina Wakeford, and Ian Pearson. 2003.“A Social History of the Mobile Telephone with a View of its Future.” BT Technology Journal 21,
Tenhunen, Sirpa. 2008. “Mobile Technology in the Village: ICTs, Culture, and Social Logistics in India.” Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute 14
Unit 5
Williams, Rosalynd. 2007. "Dream Worlds of Consumption." In Communication in History: Technology, Culture, Society (5th ed.), 169-175. Edited by David Crowley and Paul Heyer. Boston: Pearson.
Fulford, Robert. 1968. "Introduction," "The Greatest Show on Earth," and "An Exultation of Form and Structure." In This Was Expo , 8-44. Toronto: McClelland & Stewart.
Klaffke, Pamela. 2003. "Consumers and Consumerism." In Spree: A Cultural History of Shopping , 26-39. Vancouver: Arsenal Pulp Press.
Sontag, Susan. 1977. "In Plato's Cave." In On Photography , 3-24. New York: Delta.
Early Cinema, Timeline
From http://earlycinema.com/
Unit 6
Lowery, Shearon, and Melvin L. DeFleur. 1983. "The Invations from Mars: Radio Panics America." In Milestones in Mass Communication Research: Media Effects , 58-84. New York: Longman.
War of the Worlds .
Vipond, Mary. 2004. “British or American?: Canada’s ‘Mixed’ Broadcasting System in the 1930s.” The Radio Journal 2,
Soley, Lawrence. 1982. “Radio: Clandestine Broadcasting, 1948–1967.” Journal of Communication 32,
Bosch, Tanya. 2006. “Radio as an Instrument of Protest: The History of Bush Radio.” Journal of Radio Studies 13,
Supplementary Listening
Cayley, David. 2011. "The Radio League." Turning Points in Public Broadcasting: The CBC at 75 . Ideas . CBC.
Supplementary Reading
Gwyn, Robert J. 1983. “Rural Radio in Bolivia: A Case Study.” Journal of Communication , 33, no. 2: 78–87.
Unit 7
Newcomb, Horace M., and Paul M. Hirsch. 1983. "Television as a Cultural Forum: Implications for Research." Quarterly Review of Film Studies (Summer): 45-55.
Paglia, Camille. 1991. "SHE WANTS HER TV! HE WANTS HIS BOOK!: A (Mostly) Polite Conversation about our Image Culture." Harper’s Magazine 282,
Gruneau, Richard. 1996. “Introduction: Why TVTV?” Canadian Journal of Communication 21,
Znaimer, Moses. 1996. “TVTV Talks Back: A Rebuttal.” Canadian Journal of Communication 21,
Squire, Corinne. 1994. “Empowering Women? The Oprah Winfrey Show .” Feminisim and Psychology 4,
Nichols, Bill. 1994. Excerpt from "At the Limits of Reality TV." In Blurred Boundaries: Questions of Meaning in Contemporary Culture , 51-60. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.
Boorstin, Daniel J. 1961. "From News Gathering to News Making: A Flood of Pseudo Events." In The Image; Or What Happened to the American Dream , 7-44. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson.
Unit 8
Course Resource
