contemplating digital orality

Vaitkus, S. (2000). Phenomenology and Sociology. In Bryan S. Turner (Ed.). The Blackwell Companion to Social Theory. Second ed. Malden, Massachusetts: Blackwell Publishers.

In this chapter from the larger text on social theory, Vaitkus discusses phenomenology in general and specifically, the sociological approach. He details phenomenology as originating with Edmund Husserl and explains the difficulty in clearly defining it, since it is seen by different scholars as different things from a philosophy, a paradigm, a school, and even “a general orientation or style of methodological thinking in systematically analyzing the world” (270). Other key scholars of phenomenology include Merleau-Ponty (see Phenomenology of Perception), Sartre, and Heidegger. Read the rest of this entry »

Kock, Ned. “The Ape That Used Email: Understanding E-Communication Behavior through Evolution Theory.” Communications of AIS 5 3 (2001): 29.

In September 2009, I published posts on media richness theory and media synchronicity theory. (Be sure to check out this week’s posts continuing the discussion on each of those, as well.) Additionally, I discussed media naturalness theory . While that post provides a decent overview of the theory, including why he finds media richness and media synchronicity insufficient, I want to expound more on this article/theory.

A motivating factor behind Kock’s development of media naturalness theory is his observation that the existing theories that try to explain “e-communication” fall under either technological theory or under social theory. Read the rest of this entry »

SIPT explicitly assumes that individuals are motivated to form impressions and develop relationships of some kind, no matter what medium they are using (394).

Walther, Joseph B., Leslie A. Baxter, and Dawn O. Braithewaite. “Social Information Processing Theory.” Engaging Theories in Interpersonal Communication: Multiple Perspectives. Eds. Baxter, Leslie A. and Dawn O. Braithewaite. Thousand Oaks, CA US: Sage Publications, Inc, 2008. 391-404.

Earlier this year, I touched on the Social Information Processing Perspective (SIPP). However, this post delves a bit more into this theory of Joseph Walther.

In this 2008 article (Chapter), Walther references his 1992 Social information Processing Theory (SIPT) of Computer-Mediated-Communication (CMC) with special focus on the development of relationships online. “The SIPT of CMC explains how people get to know one another online, without nonverbal cues, and how they develop and manage relationships in the computer-mediated environment (Walther, 1992)” (391). Because the relationships he discusses are largely based on textual interaction, this work is not directly relevant to my research on online video conversation. However, it is not without relevance and worth. Read the rest of this entry »

Short, J. A. Effects of Medium of Communication on Experimental Negotiation. Human Relations. 27 3 (1974): 225-34

This 1974 article details a study that John Short conducted to determine the effects of communication medium on experimental negotiation. While it was written over 35 years ago, it is foundational to social presence theory that Short later developed. The study was conducted due to what Short saw as a move to decentralize business and a greater difficulty of having face-to-face (FtF) communication, an occurrence far more relevant to the globalization of business and education in our current era. Read the rest of this entry »

[C]ultures which do not reduce words to space but know them only as oral-aural phenomena, in actuality or in the imagination, naturally regard words as more powerful than do literate cultures” (112).

Ong, Walter J. The Presence of the Word: Some Prolegomena for Cultural and Religious History. The Terry Lectures. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1967.

That words are powerful is a common idea, meaning that words can hurt, words bring knowledge, words bring action, etc. However, for early man and oral cultures, words actually bring physical power.

It is a commonplace that early man, strongly if by no means exclusively oral-aural, experiences words–which for him typically are spoken words–as powerful, effective, of a piece with other actuality far more than later visualist man is likely to do. A word is a real happening, indeed a happening par excellence. (111).

Read the rest of this entry »