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CMNS 302: Communication in History (Rev. C8)
CMNS 302: Communication in History (Rev. C8)
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. “Some Implications of the Paleolithic Symbolic Evidence for the Origin of Language.” Communication in History: Technology, Culture, Society . 4th ed., edited by David Crowley and Paul Heyer, Longman, 2003.
Schmandt-Besserat, Denise. “How Writing Came About.” Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik , vol. 47, 1982,
Havelock, Eric. “The Greek Legacy.” Communication in History: Technology, Culture, Society . 5th ed, edited by David Crowley and Paul Heyer. Pearson Education, 2007.
Ascher, Marcia. “Before the Conquest.” Mathematics Magazine , vol. 65
Innis, Harold. "Media in Ancient Empires." Communication in History: Technology, Culture, Society . 5th ed., edited by David Crowley and Paul Heyer. Pearson, 2007, pp. 23–30.
Salutin, Rick. “Last Call from Harold Innis.” Queen’s Quarterly, vol. 104, no. 2, 1997, pp. 244–59.
Chandler, Daniel. “Technological or Media Determinism,” 2002.
Unit 2
Ong, Walter. “Orality, Literacy and Modern Media.” Communication in History: Technology, Culture, Society . 5th ed, edited by David Crowley and Paul Heyer. Pearson Education, 2007.
Finnegan, Ruth. Excerpt from Literacy and Orality: Studies in the Technology of Communication . Basil Blackwell.1988, pp. 140-61.
Bloch, Maurice. “Literacy and Enlightenment.” Literacy and Society . Akademisk Forlag, 1989.
Street, Brian. “The ‘Autonomous’ Model: II Goody.” Literacy in Theory and Practice . Cambridge University Press, 1984.
Neuliep, James. “The Systems-Interactional Approach.” Human Communication Theory: Applications and Studies . Allyn and Bacon, 1996.
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. “Communication in the Middle Ages.” Communication in History: Technology, Culture, Society . 4th ed, edited by David Crowley and Paul Heyer. Pearson Education, 2003.
Eco, Umberto. “A Medieval Library.” Communication in History: Technology, Culture, Society . 4th ed, edited by David Crowley and Paul Heyer. Pearson Education, 2003.
Manguel, Alberto. "The Silent Readers." A History of Reading . Viking, 1996, pp. 41-53.
Wittmann, Reinhard. “Was there a Reading Revolution at the End of the Eighteenth Century?” A History of Reading in the West , edited by G. Cavallo and R. Chartier. Translated by L. Cochrane, University of Massachusetts Press, 2003, pp. 190–223.
Illuminated Manuscripts - Stuzy Southas
Unit 4
Snowden, Collette, and Kerry Green. “Media Reporting, Mobility and Trauma.” M/C Journal: A Journal of Media and Culture , vol. 10,
MacDougall, Robert. “The Wire Devils: Pulp Thrillers, the Telephone, and Action at a Distance in the Wiring of a Nation.” American Quarterly , vol. 58,
Sawhney, Harmeet. “Wi-Fi Networks and the Rerun of the Cycle.” Info , vol. 5,
Buck, George H. “The First Wave: The Beginnings of Radio in Canadian Distance Education.” Journal of Distance Education , vol. 21,
Lacohée, Hazel, Nina Wakeford, and Ian Pearson.“A Social History of the Mobile Telephone with a View of its Future.” BT Technology Journal , vol. 21,
Tenhunen, Sirpa. “Mobile Technology in the Village: ICTs, Culture, and Social Logistics in India.” Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute , vol. 14
Unit 5
Williams, Rosalynd.. "Dream Worlds of Consumption." Communication in History: Technology, Culture, Society . 5th ed., edited by Dvid Crowley and Paul Heyer. Peason, 2007, pp.169-75.
Fulford, Robert. "Introduction," "The Greatest Show on Earth," and "An Exultation of Form and Structure." This Was Expo McClelland & Sterwart, 1968, pp. 8–44.
Klaffke, Pamela. "Consumers and Consumerism." Spree: A Cultural History of Shopping . Arsenal Pulp Press, 2003, pp. 26–39.
Sontag, Susan. "In Plato's Cave." On Photography . Delta, 2003, pp. 3–24.
Early Cinema, Timeline
From http://earlycinema.com/
Unit 6
Lowery, Sharon, and Melvin L. DeFleur. "The Invasion from Mars: Radio Panics America." Milestones in Mass Communication Research: Media Effects . Longman, 1983, pp. 58–84.
War of the Worlds .
Vipond, Mary. “British or American?: Canada’s ‘Mixed’ Broadcasting System in the 1930s.” The Radio Journa, vol. 2,
Soley, Lawrence. “Radio: Clandestine Broadcasting, 1948–1967.” Journal of Communication , vol. 32,
Bosch, Tanya. “Radio as an Instrument of Protest: The History of Bush Radio.” Journal of Radio Studies , vol. 13,
Supplementary Listening
Cayley, David. "The Radio League." Turning Points in Public Broadcasting: The CBC at 75 . Ideas . CBC, 2011.
Supplementary Reading
Gwyn, Robert J. “Rural Radio in Bolivia: A Case Study.” Journal of Communication , vol. 33, no. 2, 1983, pp. 78–87.
Audio
Morse Signal for "CQD." Dave Aton, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
Unit 7
Newcomb, Horace M., and Paul M. Hirsch. "Television as a Cultural Forum: Implications for Research." Quarterly Review of Film Studies , 1983, pp. 45–55.
Paglia, Camille. "SHE WANTS HER TV! HE WANTS HIS BOOK!: A (Mostly) Polite Conversation about our Image Culture." Harper’s Magazine 282,
Gruneau, Richard. “Introduction: Why TVTV?” Canadian Journal of Communication , vol. 21,
Available at https://cjc.utpjournals.press/loi/cjc
Znaimer, Moses. “TVTV Talks Back: A Rebuttal.” Canadian Journal of Communication , vol. 21,
Squire, Corinne.“Empowering Women? The Oprah Winfrey Show .” Feminisim and Psychology , vol. 4,
Nichols, Bill. Excerpt from "At the Limits of Reality TV." Blurred Boundaries: Questions of Meaning in Contemporary Culture . Indiana University Press, 1996, pp. 51-60.
Boorstin, Daniel J. "From News Gathering to News Making: A Flood of Pseudo Events." The Image; Or What Happened to the American Dream . Weidenfield and Nicolson, 1961, pp. 7–44.
Unit 8
Foucault, Michel. “Panopticism.” Discipline & Punish: The Birth of the Prison .
Brignall, Tom III. “The New Panopticon: The Internet Viewed as a Structure of Social Control.” Theory & Science
Manguel, Alberto. "The Library as Shadow." The Library at Night . Vintage. 2006, pp.107–27.
McLuhan, Marshall. "The Gadget Lover: Narcissus as Narcosis." Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man. McGraw-Hill, 1964, pp. 41–47.
Note: Scroll down to item #4 found approximately in the middle of the page.
McMahon, Kevin, and David Sobelman. McLuhan's Wake . National Film Board of Canada, 2002.
Unit 9
Manovich, Lev. “How Media Became New.” The Language of New Media. MIT Press, 2001, pp.21–26.
Bolter, Jay David, and Richard Grusin. “The World Wide Web.” Communication in History: from Stone Age Symbols to Social Media . 7th ed., edited by Paul Heyer and Peter Urquhart. Routledge, 2018, pp. 303–10.
Marwick, Alice E. “A Cultural History of Web 2.0.” Communication in History: from Stone Age Symbols to Social Media . 7th ed., edited by Paul Heyer and Peter Urquhart. Routledge, 2018, pp. 311–13.
Standage, Tom. “Social Media Retweets History,” Communication in History: from Stone Age Symbols to Social Media . 7th ed., edited by Paul Heyer and Peter Urquhart. Routledge, 2018, pp. 317–21.
Tupper, Jennifer. “Social Media and the Idle No More Movement: Citizenship, Activism and Dissent in Canada,” Journal of Social Science Education , vol. 13, no. 4, 2014, pp. 87–94.
Course Resource
