Lecture
Topic 1. Subject and objectives of the discipline. The essence of communication
1. The subject and objectives of the discipline «Communication Theory». The connection of the course with other disciplines.
2. Communication as an object of research. Functions of communication.
3. Differences between communication among people and animals.
4. Models of communication.
5. Laws of communication.
Topic 2. Basic concepts of communication theory
1. Basic concepts of communication theory: speech act, communicative act, speech genre, communicative goal, communicative intention, communicative strategy and tactics.
2. The concept of performative and non-performative utterances. The essence of the performative in J. Austin's teaching.
3. Speech acts and communicative acts as units of communication. Components and structure of communicative acts.
4. Classification of speech acts.
5. Communication channels and their varieties. Communicative noise.
1. The subject of study of the discipline «Communication
Theory» ‒ specific acts of communication within the framework of communication
theory, which was formed in science on the basis of
psychological activity theory, linguistic
pragmatics, sociolinguistics, and text linguistics. Speech
communication is regarded as a multilevel phenomenon ‒ in its
social, communicative, psychological, and
linguistic aspects.
The main goal of the discipline ‒ to develop in students
a holistic understanding of communication as a field of
theoretical research; to develop basic
linguistic concepts, supplementing them with terminology from
communication theory; to form skills in conducting oral
and written communication based on systematic knowledge
of communication theory.
The academic discipline is connected with such humanities
disciplines: with philosophy (namely, the theory of knowledge,
analytical and communicative philosophy), with logic, with
semiotics (the science of sign systems), sociology,
psychology, and pedagogy.
As a component of linguistics, communication theory
interacts with all branches of traditional
linguistics, with related disciplines, in particular with
rhetoric.
2. The discipline «Communication Theory» (hereinafter ‒ CT)
is among the newest disciplines, whose introduction is
due to: 1) the advancement of innovative
linguistic research, 2) urgent
applied tasks – new (communicative)
approaches to teaching and studying native and
foreign languages.
The object of research of CT ‒ human (primarily
verbal) communication, which is a condition for the
existence of each individual person, as well
as of human society as a whole. From the abundance of definitions
of communication, the main ones can be distinguished: 1) communication ‒ a type
of independent human activity; 2) communication ‒
an attribute of other types of human activity;
3) communication ‒ interaction of subjects.
Along with the word «obshchenie» (communication), the term
«kommunikatsiya» (communication) is also used (from English communication, from Latin communicare ‒
«to be in connection, to take part, to unite»).
The term «communication» is preferred because of: a) its
prevalence in the industrial and technical
sphere; b) the ability to form derivatives
(communicative, etc.).
Communication can be verbal or
non-verbal. Verbal communication ‒ is our
usual use of language for the purposes of communication,
non-verbal communication is carried out without
the use of linguistic means.
Verbal (speech) communication has a more
systemic, more structured character.
Non-verbal communication is not as clear-cut, but
it also carries quite a lot of information.
Functions of communication:
1) contact (establishing an atmosphere of mutual
readiness to transmit and perceive messages and
maintain the connection until the communicative act is completed);
2) social (formation of a certain level
of cultural speech competence, which allows one
to exist in society);
3) informational (exchange of information, questions and
answers);
4) inducive (motivating the partner, the audience or
oneself to perform certain physical,
physiological, intellectual, spiritual and other
actions);
5) coordinating (mutual orientation and
coordination of the actions of communication participants in their
joint activity);
6) cognitive (adequate perception and understanding
of the meaning of the message, as well as mutual understanding of intentions,
attitudes, experiences, and states of one another);
7) emotive (an «exchange» of emotions, arousing in
the partner or audience certain experiences,
mental states);
8) pragmatic (awareness and establishment of one's own
place in the system of role-based, status, business,
and interpersonal relations);
9) influential (aimed at changing the state,
behavior, and value-motivational sphere of the partner:
intentions, views, opinions, decisions, ideas,
needs, activity level, tastes, behavioral norms,
evaluative criteria).
3. Communication occurs in human and
animal systems. Communication systems in the animal
world are more primitive and primal than in
the human one, and are defined as a biologically
expedient joint activity aimed at
adaptation to the environment, and regulated, in particular, by signals.
The main differences between human and
animal communication:
1. Animal communication is biologically relevant, that
is, significant in biological terms (this is not only
the transmission of a message, but also a link in the biological cycle), while
human communication is biologically irrelevant.
The biological irrelevance of human communication
manifests itself in the fact that the form of linguistic signs
is unmotivated in relation to their meaning.
2. Communication promotes the development of a human as a
social being. In the process of communication, a person
develops communicative competence, which
correlates with the individual's level of socialization, with the level
of manifestation of intelligence and other human
qualities.
3. Human communication, unlike animal communication,
is connected with cognitive processes. Communicative
processes in animals do not participate in reflecting
the surrounding environment; orientation occurs by means
of the sense organs, whereas human communication is connected with
cognition: memory functions predominantly on the basis of language,
and speech plays an exceptionally large role
in thinking.
4. Verbal (speech) communication of humans
is characterized by exceptional richness of content.
Animal communication only conveys expressive
information about the internal, physiological state
of the sender of the information.
5. Human language has a layered structure and consists of
units of different levels. Unlike human speech, in
biological communications semiotics has no units
of different levels, that is, complex and simple ones.
4. To date, many models of
communication have been developed. A communication model reproduces
the constituent elements and functional characteristics in
the form of a system. The content of a model depends on the concept
of the scholar who develops it, on the needs of the
field of science in which it appeared, and so on.
There are linear and nonlinear models.
Linear models include the models
of H. Lasswell and C. Shannon.
1. Harold Lasswell presented a communication model in the form
of a series of questions: Who? → Says what? → In which channel? →
To whom? → With what result? This formula is considered
classic.
2. Claude Shannon, one of the founders of cybernetics, in
the work «A Mathematical Theory of Communication» (1948) presented a model
of communication that contains five elements: source
of information, transmitter, transmission channel, receiver, and
the final destination. In addition to these elements, Shannon introduced
the concept of communicative noise.
3. R. Jakobson's model: verbal communication
involves an addresser and an addressee, from the first to the second
a message is sent, written using a code,
the context is connected with the content of the message and the information
being transmitted (the referent), the concept of contact is connected with
the regulatory aspect of communication.
Referent (Lat. referre – to report,
to name, to relate) – this is the information, the object
of extralinguistic reality that is spoken of in
the message.
Addresser – this is the sender of the message (the speaker,
the author).
Addressee – the recipient of the message (the listener,
the reader).
The message is understood as the process and result
of speech generation, that is, the text (discourse).
Contact – this is the interaction as a result of which
communication, the exchange of information, becomes possible.
Code – this is the sign system (sign systems) by
means of which communication is carried out.
5. The laws of communication were described by the scholar I.A. Sternin.
The law of mirror development of communication: one interlocutor
imitates the communication style of the other in the course of communication.
The law of dependence of the result of communication on the amount of
communicative effort expended: the more communicative
effort expended, the higher the effectiveness of communication.
The law of progressive impatience of listeners: the
longer the speaker talks, the more inattention and
impatience the listeners show.
The law of the decline of audience intelligence with an increase in its
size: the more people are listening to you, the lower the average
intelligence of the audience. This phenomenon is sometimes called
the crowd effect: when there are many listeners, they begin to
«reason» worse, although the personal intelligence of each
individual person is, of course, preserved.
The law of primary rejection of a new idea: a new,
unfamiliar idea communicated to an interlocutor is rejected by him at the first
moment.
The law of the rhythm of communication: the ratio of speaking and
silence in each person's speech is a constant quantity.
This means that every person needs, during the day,
a certain amount of time to speak and some time to remain silent.
The law of verbal self-suggestion: the verbal expression of
an idea or emotion forms that idea or emotion in
the speaker.
The law of rejection of public criticism: a person
rejects public criticism directed at him.
The law of trust in simple words: the simpler the speaker's thoughts and
words, the better he is understood and the more
he is trusted. Simplicity of content and form in communication is the key to
communicative success.
The law of attraction of criticism: the more a person
stands out from those around him (the crowd), the more
he is gossiped about and his actions criticized. A person who
stands out always becomes an object of increased
attention and «attracts» criticism to himself.
The law of communicative remarks: if an interlocutor in
communication violates certain communicative norms,
the other interlocutor feels a desire to make a
remark to him, to correct him, to make him change his
communicative behavior.
The law of the accelerated spread of negative
information: negative information, capable of causing changes in
people's status, spreads faster than
positive information. This is connected with
people's heightened attention to negative facts due to
the fact that the positive is quickly perceived by people as
the norm and ceases to be discussed.
The law of information distortion during its transmission («the
telephone game law»): any information transmitted
is distorted directly in proportion to the number of persons who
pass it on. This means: the more people pass on some
piece of information, the greater the probability of distortion
of the information.
The law of deflection of public criticism: when someone
is publicly criticized for some reason in
the presence of another person who has similar
shortcomings, this person almost always
distances himself from the criticism, believing that «his own case is completely different».
The law of detailed discussion of trivial matters: people tend
to focus on discussing insignificant issues
and are ready to devote more time to this than to discussing
important problems.
The law of emotional reinforcement: a person's emotional
exclamations reinforce the emotion he is experiencing.
The law of emotional absorption: the verbal description of an emotion
being experienced is absorbed in the process of speech and
disappears. This is why it is recommended to talk about unpleasant
experiences and emotions — this way a person gets rid of them
faster.
The law of emotional leveling of logic: under conditions
of emotional arousal a person speaks poorly and understands
poorly what is being said to him.
1. In communication theory (CT) the terms «communicative act»
(CA) and «speech act» (SA) are used, and their meanings almost
coincide.
A speech act is an utterance (a speech action) or
a set of utterances (speech actions)
carried out by one speaker with regard to another.
A communicative act is a set of speech
acts carried out between communicants.
A speech genre is a thematically, compositionally, and
stylistically established type of message — a carrier
of speech acts united by the purpose of communication, the speaker's
intent, taking into account the addressee's personality, the context, and
the situation of communication. According to the theory of speech genres, at
the origins of which stood the well-known Russian
scholar M.M. Bakhtin, human speech in typical situations
is embodied in certain ready-made forms of speech
genres. They are characterized by a threefold unity:
1) thematic content, 2) style, 3) composition
of the utterance.
Communicative intention (intent) is the desire
to enter into communication with another person. The message's
design is information in its original form, which
the author wants to convey to the addressee — a project, an idea of a future
message.
Communicative goal is the strategic result
toward whose achievement the communicative act is directed.
Goals in communication vary:
a) informational — to convey one's
information to the interlocutor and receive confirmation that it was received;
b) practical — to obtain, learn, or change something
in the interlocutor's behavior;
c) communicative — to form appropriate
relations with the interlocutor.
2. According to John Austin, there are two types of
utterances: performatives and constatives.
Performatives (from the English performance — action,
deed, execution) are the linguistic components
of real situations, verbs whose use in
the corresponding form (most often in the first person
singular, less often plural, of the present tense)
constitutes the simultaneous
performance of an action.
Constatives describe reality without «interfering» with
it.
3. A speech act as a complex action has its own
structure. J. Austin presented the speech act as a unity of three
components:
1) constructing a grammatically correct utterance,
investing it with a certain meaning, a reference, that is,
a reference to the reality that will be discussed (locution and
the locutionary act);
2) give the utterance the desired communicative
orientation toward a specific reaction and consequences
(illocution and illocutionary act);
3) ensure the creation of a new situation through influence
on the consciousness or behavior of the addressee (perlocution and
perlocutionary act).
The perlocutionary effect ‒ is the influence that
an utterance has on the addressee, meaning not
the mere fact of the addressee understanding the meaning of the
utterance, but the changes that result
from this.
4. At present there are about 200
classifications of speech and communicative acts. The most
universal is considered to be John Searle's classification,
who classifies speech acts on the basis of the following
criteria:
1) the purpose (aim) of the speech act;
2) the direction of the act (assertions are directed from
reality to words, while promises and demands ‒ from words to
reality);
3) the expression of the speaker's psychological attitude;
4) the strength of the striving to achieve the goal;
5) the difference in status between the speaker and the addressee, etc.
Based on these criteria, the scholar identifies 5 main
groups.
1. Representatives ‒ these are informational speech acts,
during which the interlocutor is provided with information about
certain events, objects, or phenomena. They
testify to the speaker's intentions to convey
a certain body of information to the listener or to take
responsibility for its truthfulness.
2. Directives ‒ these are «imperative» speech acts, they
have an imperative illocutionary orientation.
The specificity of directives lies in the fact that they
oblige the interlocutor to take into account the wishes or
needs of the speaker.
3. Commissives ‒ speech acts of taking on obligations. They
place on the addresser (speaker) obligations
to perform certain actions in the future or
to adhere to a certain line of behavior.
4. Expressives ‒ speech acts expressing
the speaker's attitude toward real affairs, characterizing
the degree of their sincerity. These are acts of congratulation,
apology, condolence, etc.
5. Declaratives ‒ speech acts whose function
consists in the verbal formalization of various types of
social actions (for example, a wedding ceremony). The peculiarity
of declaratives lies in the fact that they can only be performed
by a person vested with certain powers.
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