The Brutchen Theory and Practice
of Human Communication
“The best things cannot be told, the second best are misunderstood. After that comes civilized conversation; after that, mass indoctrination; after that, intercultural exchange. And so, proceeding, we come to the problem of communication: the opening, that is to say, of one’s own truth and depth to the depth and truth of another in such a way as to establish an authentic community of existence.” (Joseph Campbell)
Introduction
Human communication is something that we all have been involved with and those who have come before us. Littlejohn and Foss (2005) note “Communication is one of those everyday activities that is intertwined with all of human life so completely that we sometimes overlook its pervasiveness, importance, and complexity.” (p. 2).
One could say that human communication is pervasive in its reach since it involves all of us who are living now, have lived, and will live in the future. Littlejohn and Foss express this well when they write, “Every aspect of our daily lives is affected by our communication with others, as well as by messages from people we don’t even know--- people near and far, living and dead.” (p.2).
Human communication is personal because it is something we engage with in our family, our friends, and fellow professionals. It is how we connect with those important to us at home, at work, and professionally.
Basically, one could say that human communication is how we engage the world and allow it to engage us.
But to effectively and efficiently do this requires understanding and awareness on
my part and on the part of others. Consequently, this means that for me to be able to be a better human communicator I need to become intimately aware of what my theory and practice of human communication are so that I can continually improve myself and help others in this regard.
My Theory of Human Communications
My colleague Julie Flinn observes that “Definitions of human communication may differ from every person,” so when I look at the abundance of theories out there the variety and breadth are astounding.
To give an idea of what I mean, if one counts the number of theories listed in the front of Littlejohn and Foss you will find they number 106 and I would say that it is likely this list is incomplete. Part of this difficulty, as Littlejohn and Foss note, “communication is not easy to define” (p. 3); hence, many approaches, opinions, and theories. The good thing is that with so many theories to choose from there should be enough to appeal to most everyone.
For me I find that there are four theories that form the basis for my theory of human communication. These are the sociopsychological, the sociocultural, the cybernetic, and Wenger’s theory of negotiation of meaning (Wenger, 2002, pp. 51-70).
I find the sociopsychological theory useful because it describes how we, as humans, process and filter information. The sociocultural view is also useful since it describes how the context, environment, and people as a group influence how we process and use information. Cybernetic theory acts, in my view, to tie the other two to a process, i.e., a system that represents the human communication process. Finally, I include Wenger’s negotiation of meaning because he focuses on the importance of the negotiation of meaning in this whole process of human communication. In fact, I believe Wenger says this well in his book when he states, “Human engagement in the world is first and foremost a process of negotiation of meaning.” (p. 53).
Wenger describes negotiation of meaning in terms of two complimentary processes, participation and reification. He describes participation as an active process that is both personal and social as we interact as members of social communities and from which we draw our inputs. Reification is the process that Wenger describes as giving form to our experience by producing objects that turn this experience into a concrete thing in our minds and by doing so provides us with an anchor point that we can utilize to negotiate meaning for the inputs. I believe this fits well with how some classmates view the importance of the social aspect. For example, my colleague, Rajeev Karki notes, “We communicate because we are social beings and communication allows us to evolve and continue our existence.”
So now that I have given the basis for my theory I need to describe it.
In my theory, we can receive inputs from many sources. Based on many factors that can influence, weight, and filter these inputs I arrive at an internally negotiated meaning for that input. This process is illustrated in Figure 1 with the output being the meaning to me, the assigned meaning.
Based on the systematic view shown in Figure 1 the possible outcomes of the communication process are shown in Figure 2.
If my assigned meaning matches up with the intended meaning of the message or input then I have successful communication. However, if there is not a match then I have communication failure as shown by the outcomes in the upper branch of Figure 2.
attitude emotion
\ /
other factors \ culture / environment
\ \ | / /
\ \ | / /
\ \ | / /
inputs ---------------------> internal negotiation of --------------> assigned
- people _ meaning for the inputs _ meaning
- books / | \ [the meaning to me]
- sounds / | \
- pictures experience | knowledge
- speech context
- touch
- movement
- many, many
other things Figure 1
Outcomes
- End Communication
/ - Faulty Communication
/ - Seek Feedback & Renegotiate Meaning
/
Does not match
intended meaning
/
/
assigned meaning -----|
\
\
Matches intended meaning
\
\____Successful Communication
Figure 2
The first simply means that with no matching of meanings no communication has resulted and communication is ended.
The second item, and probably one of the worst outcomes, is a faulty communication where the assigned meaning is thought to match with the intended meaning when it does not.
Finally, the last outcome shows recognition that there was not a congruence of meaning which results in a solicitation for further input which begins the communication process again.
To me the better I can understand why I see human communication as this process and better understand what makes up the inputs, and how I undergo negotiation of meaning the better communicator I will become.
My Practice of Human Communication
So now that I have a theory how can I improve my practice so that I and the other communicator can come to a significant negotiated shared meaning?
In reading Littlejohn and Foss and other references and also based on my experience I would suggest that the following are some of the ways I could do this.
First, one of the important parts of the human communication process is making sure that you have good inputs. There are two things that I see I could do to improve verbal inputs. In regards to spoken inputs, improving my listening skills would be beneficial. This appears to be an important area since my colleague Denise Hile writes, “Human communication involves active listening,” and Tom Peters (1987) in his book Thriving on Chaos says “Effective listening is engaged listening” (p. 437) and “Engaged listening is strategic” (p. 438).
Another avenue to improve my skills is working to better my questioning skills.
As for better understanding how I arrive at negotiated meanings and to see if there are mismatches I can seek to improve my critical thinking skills and also seek to better understand the sociopsychological filters I impose on the communication process.
Conclusions
My theory of human communication is just one more added to the divers of the ones already in existence but it is the one that helps me to understand what I am doing as I engage in human communication.
By having my theory I can work to better understand how I communicate and can identify ways I can improve my process of human communication.
Finally, by better understanding my theory and practice of human communication I can assist others in better understanding their theories and their practice of human communication. What more could one ask than to help others grow.
References
Campbell, Joseph, Creative Mythology, Penguin Books, NY (1991) p. 84.
Flinn, Julie, http://www.cicsworld.org/blogs/jeflinn/2007/09/human_communication_a_definiti.html#more
http://www.cicsworld.org/blogs/jeflinn/2007/09/human_communication_a_definiti.html#more
Hile, Denise, http://www.cicsworld.org/dehile/2007/10/defining_human_communication_i_1.html#more
http://www.cicsworld.org/dehile/2007/10/defining_human_communication_i_1.html#more
Kakri, Rajeev, http://www.cicsworld.org/blogs/rajeev_karki/2007/09/defining_human_communication.html#more
http://www.cicsworld.org/blogs/rajeev_karki/2007/09/defining_human_communication.html#more
Littlejohn, Stephen W. ; Foss, Karen A., Theories of Human Communication, 9th ed., Thomson Higher Education, 10 Davis Dr., Belmont, CA (2005).
Peters, Tom, Thriving on Chaos, Alfred A. Knopf, NY (1987).
Wenger, Etienne, Communities of Practice, Cambridge University Press, NY (2002)
http://search.barnesandnoble.com/booksearch/isbnInquiry.asp?z=y&EAN=9780521663632&itm=9