Speaking into the air
Subtitle: a history of the idea of communication
By: John Durham Peters.
Edition: Pbk. ed.
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Published: 2000
Place of publication: Chicago
Language: eng
Number of pages: 293
ISBN-13: 9780226662770
Subjects: Communication -- Philosophy -- History.; Communication -- History.; Communication -- Philosophy.; Mass media -- Social aspects.; Communication -- Social aspects.; Communication -- Technological innovations -- Social aspects.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references and index.
Table of contents: title: Introduction : the problem of communication. The historicity of communication; title: The varied senses of "communication"; title: Sorting theoretical debates in (and via) the 1920s; title: Technical and therapeutic discourses after World War II. 1. Dialogue and dissemination. Dialogue and eros in the Phaedrus; title: Dissemination in the synoptic gospels. 2. History of an error : the spiritualist tradition. Christian sources; title: From matter to mind : "communication" in the seventeenth century; title: Nineteenth-century spiritualism. 3. Toward a more robust vision of spirit : Hegel, Marx, and Kierkegaard. Hegel on recognition; title: Marx (versus Locke) on money; title: Kierkegaard's incognitos.; title: 4. Phantasms of the living, dialogues with the dead. Recording and transmission; title: Hermeneutics as communication with the dead; title: Dead letters. 5. The quest for authentic connection, or bridging the chasm. The interpersonal walls of idealism; title: Fraud or contact? : James on psychical research; title: Reach out and touch someone : the telephonic uncanny; title: Radio : broadcasting as dissemination (and dialogue). 6. Machines, animals, and aliens : horizons of incommunicability. The Turing test and the insuperability of eros; title: Animals and empathy with the inhuman; title: Communication with aliens. Conclusion : a squeeze of the hand. The gaps of which communication is made; title: The privilege of the receiver; title: The dark side of communication; title: The irreducibility of touch and time.