Communication Theory as a Field

Robert T. Craig
1999 Communication Theory  
Communication Theory as a Field This essay reconstructs communication theory as a dialogical-dialectical field according to two principles: the constitutive model of communication as a metamode1 and theory as metadiscursive practice. The essay argues that all communication theories are mutually relevant when addressed to a practical lifeworld in which "communication" is already a richly meaningful term. Each tradition of communication theory derives from and appeals rhetorically to certain
more » ... nplace beliefs about communication while challenging other beliefs. The complementarities and tensions among traditions generate a theoretical metadiscourse that intersects with and potentially informs the ongoing practical metadiscourse in society. In a tentative scheme of the field, rhetorical, semiotic, phenomenological, cybernetic, sociopsychological, sociocultural, and critical traditions of communication theory are distinguished by characteristic ways of defining communication and problems of communication, metadiscursive vocabularies, and metadiscursive commonplaces that they appeal to and challenge. Topoi for argumentation across traditions are suggested and implications for theoretical work and disciplinary practice in the field are considered. Communication theory is enormously rich in the range of ideas that fall within its nominal scope, and new theoretical work on communication has recently been flourishing.' Nevertheless, despite the ancient roots and growing profusion of theories about communication, I argue that communication theory as an identifiable field of study does not yet exist.2 Rather than addressing a field of theory, we appear to be operating primarily in separate domains. Books and articles on communication theory seldom mention other works on communication theory except within narrow (inter)disciplinary specialties and schools of thought.' Except within these little groups, communication theorists apparently neither agree nor disagree about much of anything. There is no canon of general theory to which they all refer. There are no common goals that Copyright 0 1999 International Communication Association 119 Communication Theory unite them, no contentious issues that divide them. For the most part, they simply ignore each other.4 College courses in communication theory are increasingly offered at all levels, and numerous textbooks are being published. However, a closer look at their contents only further demonstrates that, although there exist many theories of communication-indeed, way too many different theories to teach effectively in any one course-there is no consensus on communication theory as a field. Anderson (1996) analyzed the contents of seven communication theory textbooks and identified 249 distinct "theories," 195 of which appeared in only one of the seven books. That is, just 22% of the theories appeared in more than one of the seven books, and only 18 of the 249 theories (7%) were included in more than three books. If communication theory were really a field, it seems likely that more than half of the introductory textbooks would agree on something more than 7% of the field's essential contents. The conclusion that communication theory is not yet a coherent field of study seems inescapable.s Although communication theory is not yet a coherent field, I believe it can and should become one. A field will emerge to the extent that we increasingly engage as communication theorists with socially important goals, questions, and controversies that cut across the various disciplinary traditions, substantive specialties, methodologies, and schools of thought that presently divide us. In this essay I argue that all communication theories are relevant to a common practical lifeworld in which commtinication is already a richly meaningful term. Communication theory, in this view, is a coherent field of metadiscursive practice, a field of discourse about discourse with implications for the practice of communication. The various traditions of communication theory each offer distinct ways of conceptualizing and discussing communication problems and practices. These ways derive from and appeal to certain commonplace beliefs about communication while problematizing other beliefs. It is in the dialogue among these traditions that communication theory can fully engage with the ongoing practical discourse (or metadiscourse) about communication in society (Craig, 1989; Craig & Tracy, 1995) . Succeeding sections of the essay develop the following points: 1. Communication theory has not yet emerged as a coherent field of study because communication theorists have not yet found a way beyond the disabling disciplinary practices that separate them. 2. The potential of communication theory as a field can best be realized, however, not in a unified theory of communication but in a dialogical-dialectical disciplinary matrix, a commonly understood (though always contestable) set of assumptions that would enable productive argumentation across the diverse traditions of communication theory. I20 Communication Theory as a Field 3. A disciplinary matrix can be developed using a constitutive metamodel of communication that opens up a conceptual space in which diverse first-order models can interact, and a conception of communication theory as theoretical metadiscourse productively engaged with the practical metadiscourse of everyday life. 4. Based on these principles, a tentative reconstruction of the multidisciplinary traditions of communication theory can appear as seven alternative vocabularies for theorizing communication as a social practice. In conclusion, I suggest applications and extensions of the matrix and implications for disciplinary practice in the field of communication theory. Roots of Incoherence The incoherence of communication theory as a field can be explained by communication theory's multidisciplinary origins and by the particular ways in which communication scholars have used and too often misused the intellectual fruits that continue to pour from this multidisciplinary horn of plenty. Multidisciplinary Origins One of the most interesting facts about communication theory is that it has cropped up more or less independently in so many different academic disciplines. Littlejohn (1982) , in what may be still the closest thing we have to a comprehensive schematic overview, traced contributions to communication theory from disciplines as diverse as literature, mathematics and engineering, sociology, and psychology.6 Budd and Ruben's ( 1972) anthology of communication theory included chapters representing 24 disciplinary approaches in alphabetical order from anthropology The communication discipline initially tried to set itself up as a kind of interdisciplinary clearinghouse for all of these disciplinary approaches. This spirit of interdisciplinarity is still with us and deserves to be cultivated as one of our more meritorious qualities. The incorporation of so many different disciplinary approaches has made it very hard, however, to envision communication theory as a coherent field. What, if anything, do all of these approaches have to do with each other? Developed within various disciplines to address various intellectual problems, they are, in Kuhn's (1970) sense of the term, incommensurable: They neither agree nor disagree about anything, but effectively bypass each other because they conceive of their nominally shared topic, communication, in such fundamentally different ways. Dance (1970) reviewed 95 published definitions of communication that had appeared in the 50s and 60s.' He concluded that the definitions differed in so many ways (he distinguished 15 conceptual compo-to zoology. Communication Theory spectives has its own ways of explaining certain aspects of communication. Psychological theories explain, for example, the cognitive processes by which people are able to create messages (Berger, 1997) . A communicational perspective, however, completely turns the explanatory tables. Communication, from a communicational perspective, is not a secondary phenomenon that can be explained by antecedent psychological, sociological, cultural, or economic factors; rather, communication itself is the primary, constitutive social process that explains all these other factors. Theories about communication from other disciplinary perspectives are not, in the strict sense, within the field of communication theory because they are not based on a communicational perspective. All genuine communication theory acknowledges the consequentiality of communication (Sigman, 1995b); it acknowledges communication itself as a fundamental mode of explanation (Deetz, 1994) .'" Deetz points out that new disciplines (in the sense of fundamentally new modes of explanation) "arise when existing modes of explanation fail to provide compelling guidance for responses to a central set of new social issues" (1994, p. 568). Today, the central social issues have to do with who participates in what ways in the social processes that construct personal identities, the social order, and codes of communication. Against the traditional informational view of communication that takes these elements for granted as a fixed framework that must be in place in order for communication to occur, Deetz endorses an emerging "communication perspective" that focuses on "describing how the inner world, outer world, social relations, and means of expression are reciprocally constituted with the interactional process as its own best explanation" (1994, p. 577). Especially noteworthy is that the arguments advanced in support of a constitutive model of communication, as the passages just quoted from Deetz (1994) illustrate, most often are not purely theoretical. The changing social situation in which communication is theorized, it is said, calls for new ways of thinking about communication. The constitutive model is presented as a practical response to contemporary social problems, such as those arising from the erosion of the cultural foundations of traditional ideas and institutions, increasing cultural diversity and interdependence, and widespread demands for democratic participation in the construction of social reality. Just as a transmission model can be used to bolster the authority of technical experts, a constitutive model can hopefully serve the causes of freedom, toleration, and democracy.' I Although I largely agree with these arguments for a constitutive model of communication, I favor a pragmatic interpretation that does not necessarily reject other models, such as the transmission model, for practical purposes. That is, I take the constitutive model to be a metamodel that opens up a conceptual space in which many different theoretical I26 Robert T. Craig is an associate professor in the Department of Communication, University of Colorado, Boulder. Portions of this article were presented in earlier versions as the Second Annual Author ' For a far from complete sample of recent books presenting original work explicitly on general communication theory, without regard to disciplinary origin but excluding work on more specific topics like media effects or interpersonal relationships, see
doi:10.1111/j.1468-2885.1999.tb00355.x fatcat:54xehqwvtjg6jkbkfyxvkltjxy