Two papers
on topics of interest in communication
theory are required. These papers should be a thinkpiece based upon library
research; seek out seminal books and articles.
Due Dates: The first paper is due
Wednesday, February 20th, and
the second paper is Wednesday, April 16th.
Requirements: Each paper
can be on a theorist or theory of your choice. Each paper should be in the neighborhood of
5-7 typed pages. For all reports
and papers written for this course, papers must be written in proper form and you must use
either APA or MLA documentation style. Each paper is a
serious research assignment, so get started now.
Each paper should be a well-written thinkpiece based upon library research; seek out seminal books and articles related to your assigned topic. Part of the assessment of your paper will be the quality of the research materials you are able to find. The content and references in Infante, Rancer, and Womack’s textbook are meant to be an initial springboard for your understanding of the topic, but I want you to try to find and read the original books or articles that introduce this theory or theorist to the world. Look in the citations and reference bibliographies of books and articles to find additional things to look at.
Your paper must be submitted in two forms:
(1) turn in a paper copy and
(2) send to johnca@csufresno.edu a file in Microsoft Word format as an attachment using e-mail.
From your individual reports, using these files, I intend to fashion a website for your use in surveying important communication theories.
Having an initial sense of what your paper will be about will help you find appropriate materials to read and think about. In the course of thinking about and writing your paper, here are some things that might be good to include:
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the general context of the theory—write about the significance of studying this aspect of communication |
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explication of the key elements of the theory |
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discussion of the place of the theorist in the scheme of things |
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exposition of criteria to be used in analyzing the theory |
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critical evaluation of your theory using this criteria |
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discussion of ways in which this theory can be helpful in addressing
problems or meeting practical needs in the real world |
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A Few Theorists &
Theories [see textbook for additional possibilities] |
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| Culture | Harold Innis, Marshall McLuhan, and Edmund Carpenter | |
| Basil Bernstein | ||
| Edward Hall | ||
| Everett Roger's Diffusion of Information | ||
| Symbols and Language | Osgood's Mediation Hypothesis | |
| Pearce & Cronen's Coordinated Management of Meaning | ||
| Umberto Eco's Semiotics | ||
| Doris Graber's Condensation Symbols | ||
| Conversation Analysis | ||
| Giles & Weiman's Communication Accommodation Theory | ||
| Social Change | Bowers & Ochs' Rhetoric of Agitation and Control | |
| Social Change: Burke's Dramatism | ||
| Social Change: Walter Fisher's Narrative Paradigm | ||
| Mass Communication | Agenda Setting | |
| Cultivation Analysis | ||
| Uses, Gratifications, & Dependency | ||
| Attitude Change, Persuasion, and Political Communication | Charles E. Osgood's Cognitive Dynamics | |
| Festinger's Cognitive Dissonance | ||
| Fishbein's Attitude as Behavioral Intention | ||
| Rokeach's Beliefs, Attitudes, & Values | ||
| Scott's Components of Attitude | ||
| Sherif, Sherif, & Nebergall's Social Judgment Theory | ||
| Theodore Newcomb's model of communicative acts | ||
| Organizational Communication | Hersey, Blanchard, & Dewey's Situational Leadership | |
| Networks | ||
| Tompkins & Cheney's Organizational Identification | ||
| Weick's Process of Organizing | ||
| Poole & McPhee's Structurational Theory of Climate | ||
| Small Group Communication | Bales' Personality and Interpersonal Behavior | |
| Collins & Guetzkow | ||
| Fisher's Interaction Analysis | ||
| Putman & Stohl's Bona Fide Group Theory | ||
| French & Raven's Sources of Power | ||
| Hirokawa's General Functional Theory | ||
| Janis's Groupthink | ||
| Interpersonal Communication | Altman & Taylor's Social Penetration | |
| Baxter et al.'s Dimensions of Dialectics | ||
| Berger's Uncertainty Reduction Theory | ||
| Timothy Leary's Interpersonal Circumplex | ||
| Watzlawick, Beavin, & Jackson | ||
| Carl Rogers | ||
| Information Theory and Cybernetics | Claude Shannon's Information Theory | |
| Norbert Weiner's Cybernetic Theory | ||
| Gleick's Chaos Theory |