Symbol as an intellectual construct is shared with every academic discipline from theology to organic chemistry. Nonetheless, it is the central construct for communications research. Around symbol and culture, all communications scholarship finds common purpose and direction. Symbols appear early in creation, according to Genesis, and persist into the eschaton. God uses symbol for the transmission of meaning, as do all other sentient beings.
Humans are symbol manipulators.
While other species communicate, sometimes in complex ways, only humans manipulate symbols for the purpose of inventing, narrating, and explaining themselves. As one noted scholar in the field has observed, dogs bark, but not about barking. This symbol-using capacity is reflective of the imago Dei granted by God to the last formed and most beloved among his creatures. My territory of scholarship and writing within this broad domain is history, ethics, law, and more recently, international applications and developments in those areas. With respect to history, I gravitate to the story of communicative freedom.