Communication and human world
By: Anisa Shabbir
Communication is the act of conveying intended meanings from one entity or group to another through the use of mutually understood signs and semiotic rules. The root of word communication accurately portray its purpose.in communication the speaker is attempting to “be one” with the listener. In the process of “being one “we develop a communion, a transaction, a dialogue. Communication represents an essential and very important human need. Without having the possibility to communicate and talk to other people, no individual, community, group or any other institution would be able to exist, or prosper. . Strictly speaking the ability to communicate make it possible to exchange points of view. Consequently communication makes people who and what they are.
The relationship between the communication and the human society is immense. They have achieved a huge growth during their long partnership. Humans simply could not achieve this kind of development and growth without the existence of communication. In our society, all relationships and social connections rely on the communication. Humans understood the importance of communications after their arrival on earth and developed different communication methods and processes. The development of these processes gave a great boost to the development of human society. This is continuing process as people always want to develop new communication methods and processes. This process in-return automatically develops the human society.
Humans need of communication depend on things
In the early stages of life on this earth humans needs some means of communication for the survival of their self, race, community. They felt the need of some tools through which they communicate to the community or single person for the basic needs of their life. The history of communication dates back to ancient times, speech which revolutionised the human communication was developed some 200,000 years ago; symbols were developed about 30,000 years ago while writing about 7,000. Humans started using signs and non-verbal communication to communicate with fellow humans. Major technological innovations affecting communication and human society in this period were: portal system, telegraph, telephone, newspaper, photograph etc. and onward. These are the necessary things for the survival of the of human. The swift development of the human abilities made way for the better development of communication and human society. Communication is considered extremely important for the growth of human civilisation, culture and society. It plays a cardinal role in the existence and development of human society. With the advancement of time new technologies develop for better means of communication. Prominent ones are: Radio, Television, Computer and most advance none other than internet.
Internet During the world wars of twentieth century, new mediums of communication were discovered. These discoveries not only helped the war efforts but also played important role in the development of nations participating in these wars. The events and developments during these wars were made known to humans with the help of radio and newspapers. Just before the start of World War 2, Television was introduced to general public in 1939 and was quickly made an important tool for development of society by Americans. Television played an important role in connecting the people of Western hemisphere with that of Eastern. To show the landing of Neil Armstrong, first man on moon, special broadcasting arrangements were made by America. This move made people of the earth realise that they all are living on the same planet, thus giving feeling of oneness and unity everyone. In the last quarter of 20th century, cell phones and internet made its way into mainstream of life. This rapidly changed the global scene as it made communication between different parts of the world easier than ever. These new ways of communication opened new chapters in development of human society. It made development in the rural sector much more convenient as resources could be easily mobilised for effective development. Great progress was made in the field of education due to advancement in communication techniques. The flow of information and knowledge has been made much easier. Researches, new studies and improved techniques are being shared by using advanced means of communication. Now, a researcher living in Canada can easily share his study or research with people living in South Korea, that too without physical movement. Internet has made it easy for the people living in first-world and third-world countries to interact; the gap between the two has been narrowed. Different tools of communication have been used to create awareness and public understanding of the harmful things such as AIDs and drug-abuse. Communication also helps in transfer of heritage from old generation to new generations so that it can be preserved for the coming generations. Today, communication is used for transfer of ideas, education,
The need of communication after survival is the propagation of nations and their self for the better survival in the future. The need of propagation is for the safety of owns ideology race and economy to make an impact on the world and for the better future of their next generation. For the propagation different nations use different strategies and in this strategies digital media play an important role and many nations take this advantage and propagate their self’s. E.g. china In order to improve its global image and cultivate an international environment that would facilitate China’s continuous rise in the world, the extension of the global outreach of its technology and media has become an essential component in the effort to propagate the country’s international image.
Now people use all these tools and their improvisation forms to full fill their needs for survival of their life, their race etc.
IMPACT OF COMMUNICATION Tools ON SOCIETY
The ability to communicate can be deemed the most powerful attribute a human being possesses. It may also be regarded as a strict disciple, serving to educate, and inform society. Today, a higher level of learning and knowledge are maintained due to the volume of communication we are exposed to. Thus, communication may be regarded as a specialised function, as it encompasses our everyday lives, and helps us function more efficiently and productively. Communication insures understanding and provides knowledge of information. As a society we have all come to understand communication and in particular how technology, has radically helped to improve the way information is transmitted.
For centuries verbal mediation served the function of informing and expressing information. Oral communication is present in our everyday lives, from the car radio providing the latest traffic reports, to a professor educating students in a lecture hall, all oral meditations serve to provide the same service: to inform and provide new information. Although oral communication seems most practical, there is a void between information and preservation of ideas.
With the evolution of the print press came the evolution of preservation. Ideas could now be stored for future centuries. Print mediation provided a society a way of preserving history and tradition, and also served as an independent learning tool. Communication must be understood as a process, which has evolved over time from these traditional meditations. Today, communication and the way we communicate have radically changed. Although, traditional means of communication will never be eradicated, it is important to understand that technology has aided in the way we interact. Technology assists in the transmission of information because it has the ability to surpass many boundaries.
Technology functions to improve our lives, and the way that we communicate. Information has the ability to span borders, allowing us to be interconnected in our global world. There are many avenues for communication via the internet. One program that is very popular that almost everyone that has access to computers uses is the MSN Messenger, yahoo and new invention g mail and Hotmail and many more. The other forms are social networking site like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and many social media websites where people share their information, views of different topics through comments, videos, hashtags and many more. People use these forms is of instant communication where physical space does not matter. Society and economy are the links of the same chain. Society fosters economy and economy in turn, fosters society and this relation is aided by the improved means of communication like information technology and other others technologies. . Starting from the hick level of training pigeons for serving as messengers, to taming the lightning fast invisible magnetic waves, the society has been ever evolving with it. Internet, mobile services and satellite services are all that surrounds us as we think of information technology today. The world economies today, could have never been so much interconnected in the absence of this medium. Be it banking, agriculture, mining, service industry, manufacturing sectors, health sector or even scientific researches; information technology (IT) either has an in-office or out-office or applications in both of them. The ease of connectivity has offered and encouraged the people at large to carry out economic participation and transactions in a flick, e.g. rail/air tickets, shopping, trading, DMAT accounts, embanking, video conferencing, real time market updates, entertainment, increase business options, education, knowledge, health etc. Overall communication is communication, and ideas, thoughts, and information will be transmitted by whatever channel they are transmitted over. It is important to note that communication is regarded as a form knowledge, and knowledge is thus, power.
Although, technology serves as an improvement in the way information is transmitted and received, we must also consider that the “digital divide” which draws a gap between individuals. The improvised version of the Communication technologies also have some adverse effects on the society. , technology by its self is not harmful to the society, but the way society uses technology to achieve specific goals is what results into negative impacts of technology on the society. Humans need to use energy to process products in factories, to run cars , to light homes and also run technological machines like computers, but the only way we can do this without affecting the environment and society , is by shifting from exhaustible energy sources to renewable and inexhaustible sources like Solar / Wind energy. Some of the prominent problems are;
Self-Centred Attention-Seeking
Short Attention Spans
Causing Distraction & Harming Productivity
Cyber crimes
Increase pollution
Authenticity of News
Mental Problems
Propaganda
Resource Depletion
Bring the far people close to you and vice versa and many more.
The technologies, does not produce effects by itself. Yet, it has specific effects in altering the capacity of the communication system to be organized around flows that are interactive, multi modal, asynchronous or synchronous, global or local, and from many to many, from people to people, from people to objects, and from objects to objects, increasingly relying on the semantic web. How these characteristics affect specific systems of social relationships has to be established by research, and this is what I tried to present in this text. What is clear is that without the Internet we would not have seen the large-scale development of networking as the fundamental mechanism of social structuring and social change in every domain of social life. The Internet, the World Wide Web, and a variety of networks increasingly based on wireless platforms constitute the technological infrastructure of the network society, as the electrical grid and the electrical engine were the support system for the form of social organisation that we conceptualised as the industrial society. Thus, as a social construction, this technological system is open ended, as the network society is an open-ended form of social organization that conveys the best and the worse in humankind. Yet, the global network society is our society, and the understanding of its logic on the basis of the interaction between culture, organization, and technology in the formation and development of social and technological networks is a key field of research in the twenty-first century.
We can only make progress in our understanding through the cumulative effort of scholarly research. Only then we will be able to cut through the myths surrounding the key technology of our time. A digital communication technology that is already a second skin for young people, yet it continues to feed the fears and the fantasies of those who are still in charge of a society that they barely understand.
