Introduction to Theories of Communication is a course designed as a core study of the communications discipline. A master of this discipline must know and understand the value of theories of communication as well as the history and context in which they are often used. Students in this field must also be able to use the theories of communication correctly. A strong understanding of communication theory will produce successful practice of the communication fields.
Theories of communication classes provide the students with an in-depth introduction into the study of communication. There is not one general theory that applies to communication. The study of theories of communication contains a number of approaches in order to explain the communication behavior. The course is an attempt to expose students to the variety of theoretical statements about communication by touching as many of the approaches taken as possible throughout the class.
The primary topics discussed in Theories of Communication classes are various viewpoints in which communication falls. These catagories include the mechanistic, psychological, constructionist, systemic and critical viewpoints. The mechanistic view considers communication as a perfect transaction of a message between two people. The psychological view considers communication as the act of sending a message along with the feeling and thoughts of the message. The social constructionist view considers communication to be the sharing and creating meaning and known as how you say something determines what exactly the message means. The systemic view considers communication to be the new messages created as the message travels through people. The critical view considers communication that is a source of power and oppression of individuals and social groups.
Theories of communication can be studied using three additional frameworks. The ontology framework poses the question, what exactly it is the theorist is examining and the answer will fall in one of three catagories, depending on whether the phenomena is seen using a realist, nominalist or social constructionist view.
One of three axiological approaches guides most communication theory. The first axiological approach believes that the values influence theorist’s intrests but at the same time the values must be set aside when research starts. The second axiological approach goes on to reject the idea that values can be eliminated from any stage of theory development and therefore is uninfluenced from outside factors. The third axiological approach furthers the first two by rejecting the idea that values can be separated from research and theory but it also rejects the idea that they should be separated from the research, making this approach completely inhuman in approach.
The two most common books used to teach the Theories of Communication classes are the Communication for Today book by David Crowley and The Fundamentals of Convolutional Coding IEEE Series on Digital & Mobile Communication by Rolf Johannesson and Kamil sh. Zigangirov.
Thinking that the class Theories of Communication is simply forming words to send or speak to another person, it is not that simple and should take good Theories of Communication notes in order to have the upper hand in daily and business communications in order to be successful.