Communication Language

Prof. Joshi started the class talking about form and content in context of emergence of cinema and Television. He said that content, on any medium, is affected by form. A serial on television is going to be different from theatre because the form is different.

Radio is the true mass media while cinema still doesn’t have that reach and impact. He spoke about Devaki Nandan Pandey who, in a sense, introduced Indians to TV News had a lot of impact on the way news was presented.

He said that ‘message is encoded in Language by people’.

He spoke about the birth of computer that came in as a replacement for calculator and has reached a point today where it has led to convergence of various media including TV, cinema and print. He mentioned the evolution of GUI (Graphic User Interface) as started by Apple and how it led to a revolution in print because the digitalisation of pictures became easier. He proceeded to talk about ‘Internet as the super-information highway’.

He said the new media in interactive while the mass media has not been able to bring this feature. This is influencing the way media is functioning. For example, Radio and TV are trying to bring in interactivity by introducing phone-ins. New media is also influencing language. People write differently on different media.

He gave an interesting example of form affecting content by mentioning how E.E. Cummings, who used typewriter, wrote his name in small caps- ee cummings. He also said that Subtitling is a specialised art. 

He said that English media functions differently in different countries and in this respect, sociology of language must be extended to sociology of media.

Addresser àMessage à Addressee.

In the above, ‘Addresser’ has a conative function. He said that conative functions are instructional and persuasive in nature.