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and Human Knowing. Vol. 24 (2017), no. 1, pp. 9-32

Building From Cybersemiotics

Carlos Vidales1

Since its as an academic field, communication sciences have had a major problem defining what communication is, what communication is about, and what it describes in natural, human and mechanical contexts. The mechanistic view tends to see communication as natural, physical, chemical or biological phenomena and it has defined communication as a process of exchange, while the humanistic view has proposed more restricted that consider communication as defined by human and production. In this second view, communication is restricted to the human scope. Moreover, communication is a that cannot be reduced to one definition, because it seems to explain different phenomena and to describe many things in many different fields. In this sense, despite the clear interest that both perspectives have had in communication, it is possible to identify that in fact, both explain different things. In the mechanistic view, the idea of communication is grounded in Shannon’s proposal of informational exchange between a sender and receiver (signals), a proposal that has been considered the foundation of the transmission, or informational model of communication (Craig, 1999) and that continues to dominate contemporary communication , despite all the critiques that it has received over the years, mainly the consideration of communication as a linear process and the problem this approach has to take into account the meaning making process (Peters, 1986; Carey, 1989; Shepherd, 1993; Ritchie, 1991; Vidales, 2010, 2011). According to this view, communication has been defined as the process of sending and receiving messages or transferring information from one to another. In the humanistic view, communication has been associated with the human process of meaning production and signification () as well as with the cultural process of production and signification (Eco, 1979; Danesi, 2004, 2007; Kress, 2010; Leeds-Hurwitz, 1993; Jensen, 1995; Bergman, 2004; Vidales, 2013). From this perspective, communication can be defined as a meaning-making process. Thus, we stand in front of two paradigms—among many others—(Craig, 2013, 1999) that have been very influential in communication research; however, none of them has functioned as common ground for theoretical construction, a problem that can be explained by the separation we still have between the mechanistic and humanistic views which makes it very difficult to find a common definition, a common concept or to identify what is or what is not a communication phenomenon. As a result, communication has been defined as a process, as a social and natural condition, as an academic field, as a point of view and, in more extreme positions, as a transdisciplinary framework; these multiple conceptualizations have contributed to the theoretical problem of defining what communication is or what its main object of study is. What defines a particular research as communication research? Is communication research defined by its object of study, by its theoretical approach or by the particular social, biological, or physical phenomena that studies it? The problem of defining a particular research as communication research has also generated the problem of identifying communication as an academic field. As Robert T. Craig (2008, p. 676) has argued, “the field of communication is highly diverse in methods, theories, and objects of study. What, if anything, unites the field as a coherent entity?” While Craig’s answer to this question is his proposal of a meta-model of , my intention is to answer the question through the consideration of communication as a transdisciplinary concept, mainly because I consider Craig’s proposal maintains the separation between the mechanistic and humanistic views of communication and as a consequence, communication is restricted to the

1. Department of Social , University of Guadalajara, Mexico. Email: [email protected] 10 Carlos Vidales

human-social processes. In doing this, I take into account two proposals that could be helpful in organizing the theoretical scope of communication. The first one is Robert T. Craig’s proposal of communication as practice in which he suggests the need for a constitutive model of communication or a metamodel capable of organizing the theoretical discourse already produced to define communication based on the consequences communication theory may have in practice. The second one is Søren Brier’s cybersemiotics, a transdisciplinary framework of , information and communication that includes some of the most important theories proposed to explain communication as natural and human phenomena. This second proposal is, in fact, a general communication theory. Then, the present work is focused in the analysis of the implications of both proposals have in the development of a general theory of communication. Key Words: Communication Theory, Cybersemiotics, Metamodel, Cybernetics, Meaning.

A Note on Theory in Communication Studies

In his opening address for the annual meeting of the International Communication Association in 2005, Wolfang Donsbach pointed out that, despite the fact that communication as a field of research has seen the highest growth of probably all academic fields over the past thirty years, it is still lacking and losing identity, even at the time when the discussion revolved around the very nature of communication as a scientific endeavor. For some academics, communication is in fact an academic field, for others, it is an integrative science, a synoptical science, and even an interdiscipline. However, “All three terms have a slightly different : As an integrative science, we would use the theories and methods of any discipline that has something to offer in order to describe our object of communication. As a synoptical science, we use the knowledge of any discipline. As an interdiscipline, we would do both. But whatever term we use, it does not save us from the problem that we have no clear identity” (Donsbach, 2006, p. 439). In addition, for Robert T. Craig (2008) disciplines are conversational communities with a particular tradition of argumentation, which are all involved in a wider conversational community with its own traditions of argumentation, so that these disciplines are not based on fixed categories of knowledge, but are discursive formations that emerge, evolve, transform and dissipate in the ongoing among disciplines. In the case of communication studies,

what mainly explains the field’s disciplinary emergence is its significant relationship to communication as a category of social practice, and it is … by reconstructing its intellectual traditions around the category that the field can best hope not only to become more intellectually coherent and productive but more useful to society as well. (Craig, 2008, p. 9)

Thus, the need for a more systematic reflection about communication theory and research is not only related to the problem of the field’s identity as Donsbach pointed out, but also to the social and academic need for new ways to approach contemporary communication processes as Craig suggests. While communication studies have focused on several objects of study, many of which are closely linked to , 32 Carlos Vidales

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