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Volume 33, #4 (2014) Centre for the Study of Communication and Culture Volume 33 (2014) No. 4 IN THIS ISSUE Wilbur Schramm: Beginnings of the “Communication” Field Emile G. McAnany Santa Clara University A QUARTERLY REVIEW OF COMMUNICATION RESEARCH ISSN: 0144-4646 Communication Research Trends Table of Contents Volume 33 (2014) Number 4 http://cscc.scu.edu Wilbur Schramm :: Beginnings of the “Communication” Field . 3 Published four times a year by the Centre for the Study of Communication and Culture (CSCC), sponsored by the Introduction . 3 California Province of the Society of Jesus. Copyright 2014. ISSN 0144-4646 1. Challenge from the Inner Circle: The Field is “Withering Away” . 3 Editor: Emile McAnany Managing Editor: Paul A. Soukup, S.J. 2. How a New Field Was Created: Begin at Iowa and Go to Illinois . 4 Subscription: Annual subscription (Vol. 33) US$50 3. The Changing of the Guard and the Move to California . 6 Payment by check, MasterCard, Visa or US$ preferred. For payments by MasterCard or Visa, send full account 4.The Final Stage: East-West Center in Hawaii number, expiration date, name on account, and signature. and One More Institute . 7 Checks and/or International Money Orders (drawn on 5. The Intellectual Legacy: USA banks; for non-USA banks, add $10 for handling) Schramm’s Writings in Communication . 8 should be made payable to Communication Research A. Defining the new field Trends and sent to the managing editor of (mass) communication . 8 Paul A. Soukup, S.J. B. Journalism, responsibility Communication Department and public broadcasting . 9 Santa Clara University C. Media for instruction and education for all . 9 500 El Camino Real D. Communication for development Santa Clara, CA 95053 USA and social change . .10 Transfer by wire: Contact the managing editor. Add $10 6. Assessing the Role of Schramm for handling. in the History of the Field . .10 A. The remembered history: Address all correspondence to the managing editor at the Schramm as founder . .10 address shown above. B. The contested history: Tel: +1-408-554-5498 Culture, capitalist structure, and critique . .11 Fax: +1-408-554-4913 email: [email protected] 7. Conclusion: What is the Legacy of Wilbur Schramm? . .13 The Centre for the Study of Communication and Culture (CSCC) is an international service of the Society of Jesus References . .14 established in 1977 and currently managed by the California Province of the Society of Jesus, P.O. Box 519, Book Reviews . .16 Los Gatos, CA 95031-0519. Briefly Noted . .40 2— VOLUME 33 (2014) NO. 4 COMMUNICATION RESEARCH TRENDS Wilbur Schramm: Beginnings of the “Communication” Field Emile G. McAnany [email protected] Introduction referred to currently, needs to reflect upon itself so This review is not a history of the beginning of that it can justify its rationale for being a large and communication study as that probably goes back to the flourishing part of global university study. It is often development of speech among humans or at least to the criticized as being without a core set of theories and time of the Aristotle and Plato. Rather this is a review of methodologies to justify itself as a social science or some of the literature in our field about the man some of being too undefined, all-inclusive, and even chaot- have called the founder (Rogers, 1994) or the definer ic to justify its standing as a discipline at all. As we (Tankard, 1988) of the field. There are many accounts will see subsequently, all of these issues were with about this beginning surrounding Schramm and others the field from the beginning of “communication” who have a claim to the beginning of what is now called studies in the early- to mid-20th century when Communication Studies or, less recently, Mass Schramm attempted to move the established depart- Communication. What is clear historically is that Wilbur ments of journalism and speech (rhetoric) into a sin- Schramm made significant contributions to institutional- gle communication department or school. That he did ly establishing the field of communication as it is not entirely succeed is still evident in the U.S. at least defined and practiced in universities in the U.S. and indi- by separate departments of mass and interpersonal rectly with the establishment of similar studies around communication. But he did succeed in placing “com- the world. As is common in this review, the article will munication” as an important identifier for what had present the published record surrounding this beginning been very separate studies within the American acad- in the U.S. at mid-20th century that concerns Schramm’s emy. But before we approach the story of Wilbur role in the establishment of the field, and the remem- Schramm as an important figure in the field, we bered and the contested accounts of this establishment. might well begin with the first major crisis that One reason why this history is important is that Schramm had to face after the study of mass commu- the field of Communication Studies, as it is often nication had barely begun in the U.S. 1. Challenge from the Inner Circle: The Field is “Withering Away” Many students, in the U.S. at least, know the state is withering away” (p. 1). He went on to reference to a 1959 article by Bernard Berelson, one describe the work of the previous 25 years by politi- of the original researchers who helped begin the field cal scientists, sociologists, experimental and social of mass communication research (Berelson, 1959) at psychologists as doing communication research that the beginning of the 1940s. Berelson began his chal- was the foundation of the field that Schramm had lenge with an opening shot that might have unnerved identified and had inaugurated at the University of Wilbur Schramm and the whole emerging field of Illinois in 1948. Now, 11 years later, one of the early mass communication. He began his article with the thought leaders in the field (Lazarsfeld, Berelson, & pronunciation of a death knell for the field: “My Gaudet, 1944) was saying that the field was dead. theme is that, as for communication research, the What was at stake, however, was not the field but COMMUNICATION RESEARCH TRENDS VOLUME 33 (2014) NO. 4 — 3 Berelson’s career in the field. He was leaving the gram immediately after World War II that would train University of Chicago where he had been for many graduate students in an interdisciplinary program in years to take Paul Lazarsfeld’s place at Columbia communication research that was close to the one University. Recently, two researchers have helped to Schramm was to create three years later. The problem clarify the Chicago background to Berelson’s gloomy for the program was that it was never established as view of the field. Pooley (2008a) argues that there a department but remained only a program that was a split between the sociologists like Lazarsfeld depended on faculty interest. Berelson refers to the and other early pioneer researchers in the communi- closure of the program at the University of Chicago cation field because communication studies in the where he had been a strong proponent. His leaving late 1950s were more concentrated on media audi- Chicago might have been a sad farewell to his career ences and attitude change (more psychological orien- in communication which he argued was true of the tation); moreover, the funding for sociological field itself. Schramm (1959a) in the same issue research in communication was drying up. Another argued quite the opposite, and the subsequent history author, Wahl-Jorgensen (2004) makes another kind of communication study would be on his side. The of argument. She shows how the University of decade-old field was not “withering away” but was Chicago had originally begun a communication pro- showing signs of growth. 2. How a New Field Was Created: Begin at Iowa and Go to Illinois The contribution of Schramm to founding the 1935) and quickly rose to prominence in the communication field was that he recognized that if it Department of English. In 1939 he took over a creative were to become a recognized field of study in the U.S., writing class and became the founder and first director it had to take its place along side of other recognized of the still famous Iowa Writers Workshop. In fields within university structures. In other words, it December 1941, he volunteered to work under had to be a department or school with the name “com- Archibald McLeish in the Office of War Information munication” attached to it. As Wahl-Jorgensen (2004) but also was assigned to work with Robert Sherwood pointed out, the University of Chicago’s Committee on as a speech writer for President Roosevelt. In the Communication, begun in 1947 with a MA degree, was course of 15 months, Schramm began to meet many of only an interdisciplinary program and did not survive the recognized social scientists who were working to (it closed in 1960). Schramm’s achievement was that help Washington win the propaganda war (Rogers, he was able to take a journalism program and turn it 1994). It marked the start of his immersion in the new into a communication program. He accomplished this communication research field. When he returned to partially at the University of Iowa (Cartier, 1988) after Iowa in 1943, he was offered the deanship of the he returned from serving during the war for 15 months School of Journalism. Here was a new beginning for (1942–1943) in Washington D.C. But it was a hybrid the high energy new administrator, but it ran into limi- program that did not escape from its journalism identi- tations of budget and a lack of vision about the creation ty.
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