Communication Science Class 5 PDF

Communication Science Class 5 Prof. Dr. Thomas Jacobs Lasswell’s formula (1948) What? To Whom? What content? What is the Who is the public? To whom meaning of the message? is the message addressed? What are the Who?...

Communication Science Class 5 Prof. Dr. Thomas Jacobs Lasswell’s formula (1948) What? To Whom? What content? What is the Who is the public? To whom meaning of the message? is the message addressed? What are the Who? characteristics of the Which individuals audience? Which organisations? Why? What is the (intended and actual) effect of the message? What does the message (try to) achieve? And How? Which channels are being used? What technology is being deployed? How is the message conveyed?  05 Mass society & Mass media Crowds, publics, masses, audiences Mass media First examples of ‘media studies’ as a form of social-scientific inquiry coincided with rise of mass media on a societal level during the 19th century Early mass media theories are more theories of the masses, mass society, and crowds, than theories of media per se ○ Very ‘ideological’ and conservative, driven by fear of masses and crowds, not based on empirical research ○ Cultural theory rather than social-scientific theory in the ‘theory of theories’ Þ strong focus on crowd psychology, control, propaganda These mass society theories would have a huge impact on the development of early media studies  Societal upheaval Late 19th and early 20th century period of massive social change Industrialization  Societal upheaval Late 19th and early 20th century period of massive social change Industrialization Urbanization  Societal upheaval Late 19th and early 20th century period of massive social change Industrialization Urbanization Political unrest  Societal upheaval Late 19th and early 20th century period of massive social change Industrialization Urbanization Political unrest Changing social relations  Societal upheaval Late 19th and early 20th century period of massive social change Industrialization Urbanization Political unrest Changing social relations rise of a new, working, urbanized, uneducated, politicized ‘underclass’ A proletariat? A mass? A crowd? Societal upheaval Fin-de-siècle ambivalence ○ Socialism, communism as optimistic, ‘Promethean’ theories ○ Elite fear for democracy as a dictatorship of the majority Depression, resignation Debauchery Conservatism (slow down/halt/undo change, focus on the pernicious effects of social change) Liberalism (checks and balances, fundamental rights,…) Fear of mass media as part of a wider fear of the ‘masses’ and the social change that they could drive ○ WWI and WWII: blow to the optimism, boost to the pessimism Anxieties over the power of ‘new’ media 1870s-1930s: popularization of film, radio, newspapers,… Mainstreaming in all sectors of society (politics, economy, culture,…) at a fast pace Anxieties over the power of ‘new’ media 1870s-1930s: popularization of film, radio, newspapers,… Mainstreaming in all sectors of society (politics, economy, culture,…) at a fast pace ○ Anxieties not based on scientific observation, but rather on awe and amazement over the immense popularity of new media ○ Early ‘mass media’/’mass society’ theories believe very strongly in the power of these media to change popular opinions, beliefs, behaviour the power of ‘new’ media confirmed Governments and businesses start using and harnessing the power of these new mass media ○ Self-fulfilling prophecy, confirmation bias Power of mass media ‘confirmed’ by first research: Lazarsfeld’s Radio Project; Frankfurt School ○ Strong influence of social psychology (e.g. surveys, experimental methods) ○ Educational programs warning people about the dangers of propaganda (Laswell and the Institute for Propaganda Analysis; Frankfurter School) Problem: stimulus-response model of communication remains implicit Gemeinschaft And Gesellschaft One of the debates in which mass media would come to play a crucial role, was the debate about community and society between Tonniës, Weber, and Durkheim Capitalism drives the evolution from a community (Gemeinschaft)… ○ Strong affective ties, willingness to connect with other members of the community ○ Social groups in which people live their lifes remain small-scale ○ Interpersonal interactions as the dominant form of communication ○ Friendships, close family, and convivial communities such as village life and religious community structure social life Gemeinschaft And Gesellschaft … to society (Gesellschaft) ○ Strong economic ties between actors, intense economic competition ○ Interactions are more indirect, based on the performance of impersonal (economic, social, political roles), formal values and beliefs ○ Social life is structured by large-scale organizations, division of labour, urban environment (‘functional differentiation’ – Durkheim ○ Heavily scorned by romantic and nationalist thinkers Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft Tonnies: corporatism can save the natural way of life from being rooted out Durkheim: organic solidarity can now replace mechanistic solidarity Weber: merely historical idealtypes and patterns Anxieties over the power of ‘new’ media Rise of mass media understood as one element of Vergesellschaftung ○ Primary and intermediary group relations are dissolved, only secondary relations remain ○ Pessimist take: this creates a ‘mass society’ in which people aren’t directly tied to one- another, but constitute a ‘mass’ of isolated individuals that are easily manipulated ○ Optimist take: this creates opportunities to constitute a collective subjectivity based on collectivity and solidarity, that can leverage ‘mass power’ through ‘mass support’, ‘mass movements’, and ‘mass action’ Pessimist take dominates political thought and the emerging ‘media studies’ ○ Negative connotations (McQuail): amorphous, lacking individuality, base, unsophisticated, undifferentiated Psychology of crowds, publics, and masses Idea that masses threaten the status quo drives attempts to understand (& control & manipulate) them Very first attempts to understand masses equate them with crowds (gathering of a large number of people, often violent and unruly) Three types of explanation of crowd behaviour during the late 19th century ○ Crowd behaviour is driven by mental derangement (psychological explanation) ○ Crowd behaviour is driven by criminal tendencies (criminological explanation) ○ Crowd behaviour is driven by the disintegration of social elements (sociological explanation) Psychology of crowds, publics, and masses First to equate ‘masses’ and crowds was Gustave LeBon: more « scientific », but still driven by fear of crowds and democracy (Paris Commune 1871) ○ Sought to develop a ’collective psychology’ that would allow governments to lead and control crowds better ○ Core idea: crowds are made up of normal individuals, who get transformed in and affected by the psychological process of crowd formation (transformation hypothesis) Psychology of crowds, publics, and masses LeBon rejects the idea that individuals in a crowd are completely crazy or criminal loose canons, but maintains that crowds are highly irrational collective entities ○ Conscious personality can disappear under conditions of perceived Anonymity Individual unaccountability Cumulative sense of invincibility ○ In these circumstances, an unconscious personality emerges, dominated by primitive instincts Psychology of crowds, publics, and masses Traces of LeBon’s theories can be found in ○ Freud’s theory of personality (Es-Ich-Uber Ich) ○ Early 20th century propaganda efforts, public relations LeBon believed crowds to exhibit increased suggestibility, exaggerated sentiment, impulsiveness, irritability « which are almost always observed in beings belonging to inferior forms of evolution – in women, savages, and in children, for instance » ○ Processes of hypnosis and contagion Psychology of crowds, publics, and masses ○ Pop science social psychology Ceaușescu, Nica Leon, & Timisoara Football hooliganism Psychology of crowds, publics, and masses LeBon worried about the newspaper cycle ○ Penny press monitor the crowd and try to reflect the opinions of their readership for commercial purposes ○ This makes newspapers into a way for elites to measure the mood of the masses ○ Fearful, the elite follow the shifts in public opinion, and let themselves be guided by it ○ This way, the negative base impulses of the crowd become policy Newspapers are a medium through which the masses influence statecraft Problem: no difference between diffuse and proximate crowds Psychology of crowds, publics, and masses Tarde: more optimistic, more pluralist, distinction between ‘crowd’ and ‘public’ ○ Notion of ‘multiple publics’: people can only be present in one crowd, but they can be part of several publics at the same time Crowds & masses: old mode of human association, its members share a physical presence (Gemeinschaft) Public: members are physically dispersed, but share an ideational coherence ○ Publics facilitate critical discusssion, and create room for difference of opinion and heterogeneity, crowds only stimulate uncritical homogeneity (// Durkheim) Psychology of crowds, publics, and masses LeBon: era of crowds is commencing Tarde thought crowds were getting replaced by publics ○ Publics create space for pluralism, debate ○ Opposition of two publics less dangerous to social peace than opposition of two crowds Psychology of crowds, publics, and masses Tarde: optimistic view of newspapers, believes they are key in the creation of ‘publics’: ○ Transform conversation from small talk about daily life (crowd) to more abstract topics outside realm of immediate experience ○ People that are sociologically and geographically far apart take part in a streamlined conversation ○ Brings together opinions and consolidates them into a ‘public opinion’ that not everyone has to agree with to the same degree, but that is treated as something ‘objective’, something that ‘is and exist’ ○ Does not harm or replace local community or family attachements Psychology of crowds, publics, and masses Robert Park: public interaction takes the form of discussion… ○ Critical attitudes ○ Factional ○ Issue-focused ○ Opinions clash, get modified and moderated … whereas crowd interaction takes the form of ‘milling’ ○ Uncritical, no reflection ○ No factions, move towards a single, collective impulse that dominates all members of the crowd (crowds // masses) ○ Diffuse, unfocused, emotional ○ No opinions are shared, an impulse is expressed, can be highly radical Psychology of crowds, publics, and masses Blümer: individuals get transformed in a crowd (// pessimism of LeBon, Park) ○ Loss of self-control, collective excitement ○ Direct response, lack of interpretation Publics are distinct from crowds (// optimism of Tarde) ○ Issue-focused, advances an interest or an opinion ○ Drives political change, essential to liberal-democratic politics ○ Ideal of rational discourse ○ Link with ‘bourgeois’ and party-political newspapers in particular Psychology of crowds, publics, and masses However, no longer associates the ‘mass’ with the crowd, but rather with the public!!! ○ The mass is the subject of mass media (first and foremost the newspaper) ○ Sociologically and geographically heterogeneous (// public) ○ Anonymous, amorph, afunctional ○ No group consciousness, no feeling of collectivity, no bonds People in the mass can (but don’t have to) be influenced ○ Influence mostly happens on issues not covered by local group traditions ○ This way, mass media can pull people out of provincialism Crowds, publics, masses today Rejection of the ‘transformation hypothesis’ based on logical and empirical criteria (McPhail 1989), abandonment of the notion of crowd in mass media research ○ The feeling of ‘safety in numbers’ and ‘invincibility’ requires self- awareness, ‘suggestibility’ requires interpretation ○ Circular reasoning/selection bias: a problematic case of collective behaviour (riot, stampede) is explained through more general theories of collective behaviour, instead of by reference to something external to the crowd’s behaviour ○ Participants in a crowd are usually neither alone nor anonymous ○ Humans rarely exhibit diminished cognitive ability even in the most extreme situations (and even then usually shock and paralysis) Crowds, Publics, masses today Ongoing discussion about whether masses as a social bond and about the power and the effect of mass media (powerful vs limited effect) The ‘mass’ can be a useful concept, but needs to be striped of its pejorative, ideological connotations (today often: audience) Rather: masses as diffuse crowds that grow, disintegrate, renew, shift, and reproduce as attention shifts ○ Shifting compositions, changing boundaries ○ E.g. social media users … or masses as aggregates, averages that do not share a common goal, cannot be reified ○ Distinction between masses and publics: former are unorganized ○ Lacks self awareness, self-identity, collective and organized agency, does not act itself but is acted upon (cfr. manipulation) ○ E.g. public opinion Þ Move from an agential to a structuralist view of masses Crowds, Publics, masses today ○ Anonymity exists within this mass (but other collectivities endure where this anonymity isn’t guaranteed) ○ Mass is heterogeneous in that it is dispersed and diverse and its members unknown to each-other and to whoever brought the audience into existence, but homogeneous in its choice for a particular object of interest, and in the perception of those who want to manipulate the crowd Neutral term that is used today in most communication-scientific research: audience Crowds, publics, masses today Optimism remains: belief that mass society expands the discursive universe, stimulates individualism, forges new social connections Common anxieties over ‘mass society’ and ‘mass media’ persist as well, Mass media still often seen as dangerous and potentially destructive (media-centric theory of social change) ○ Need for elite (conservative) or democratic (liberal- democratic) control ○ Worries about propaganda and public relations  « Mass communication was, from the beginning, more of an idea than a reality. The term stands for a condition and a process that is theoretically possible, but rarely found in any pure form. Where it does seem to occur, it often turns out to be less massive, and less technologically determined, than it appears on the surface » (McQuail 2010, 57) Crowds, publics, masses today Enduring worries that media tap into basic instincts of isolated individuals, triggering a stimulus-response effect ○ Receivers accept media messages passively, without criticism (behaviourism) ○ Ordinary people are vulnerable, because they are isolated and cut off from traditional and organic structures (// Tonniës) ○ Mass society inherently chaotic ○ Link with cultural decline, mass media as the anti-thesis of high culture (Frankfurter Schule) Mass communication’s modern definition Five characteristics of ‘mass communication’ (Thompson) Technological component "commodification of symbolic forms“: goal is commercial ○ sender is an organization that is represented by a professional communicator that gives someone access to its medium Information is produced and received in different context ○ Its audience is understood as a larger aggregate of more or less anonymous consumers ○ Great reach both in time and in space "[I]nformation distribution" ○ a ‘one-to many’ form of communication, whereby products are mass- produced and disseminated to a great quantity of audiences Mass communication: a modern definition Content is manufacted in a standardized fashion (« mass produced »), and can be re-used and repeated in an identical form ○ Asymetrical: one direction, one-sided, impersonal message, which is marked by a lack of uniqueness and originality ○ Commodification, reproduction, overuse (Frankfurter Schule) ○ Messages are products with an exchange value in the media market and a use value for media consumers (Marxism)