ENGL316 Computer-mediated

Communication

IntroductionIntroduction

ENGL316 Computer-mediated

Communication

IntroductionIntroduction

04/09/23 2

1.What is communication? Who communicate?

The interactions/communication of people: “Who does what, when, where and how"

Who communicate? Human beings, animals, birds, fish, insects…

To attract mates, defend territories, maintain coordination in groups…

What is communicated? Give or demand information

statements, question Give and demand goods-&-services

offer, demand

04/09/23 3

When, where and how?

Real-time or delayed?

Face-to-face or distant?

Spoken, written, computer-mediated?

Text or multimodality?

04/09/23 4

2. Communication and technology

The history of communication always involve the development of communication technologies

04/09/23 5

Emergence of written language in the Middle West

Oracle bone inscriptions

bamboo slips; papyrus rolls and parchments

Human messengers, postal system; paper (105)

Printing press (305)

Movable type (1049)

Modern media: newspaper

Typewriter (1867); telephone (1876); telegraphy (1884)

Radio (1902); television (1927), cell phone (the 70s);

Computer (the 80s); Internet (the 90s)

1900s

0

3500 B.C.

1500s B.C.

Pictograph

Inscription

Handwriting

Typing & printing

Digital writing and printing

Pictograph

Inscription

Handwriting

Typing & printing

Digital writing and printing

ideograph

Text

TextAudioVideo

Multimodality

ideograph

Text

TextAudioVideo

Multimodality

Elitist education

Mass education

Elitist education

Mass education

Language &

society ?

Language &

society ?

04/09/23 6

3. What is CMC concerned about?

Computer-mediated communication (CMC) is the use of an application computer to control multimedia interactive and message-based communication to provide more effective ways of doing things.

(Rob Walters) Computer-Mediated Communication is a process of

human communication via computers, involving people, situated in particular contexts, engaging in processes to shape media for a variety of purposes.

(John December)

04/09/23 7

3.1 CMC Involves People

The CMC contexts for human participation follow the offline human communication contexts: individual, group, mass; organizational, or societal. At the individual level, people use Internet tools to retrieve

information, and communicate with others. Electronic mail is probably the most prevalent form of this kind of communication.

There's a wider range of activity in group communication on the Internet. Electronic mail, and other forms of text, audio, and video means exist.

To communicate at the mass level, it is often simply a matter of taking the tools from the group or individual level and applying them to larger numbers of people.

04/09/23 8

People go online for one reason or another. It may be “to work”, "to play," "to kill time," or even "to be cool," but there is a reason.

Moreover, the purposes people give for using the Net and Web relate to their context, with factors such as peer pressure and social context influencing online behaviour.

Con’t

04/09/23 9

3.2 CMC Involves Processes Online

People might: Create meaning by writing emails, posting

articles to Internet, writing in real-time chat environments, creating websites, and preparing multimedia files.

Disseminate meaning through point to point communication (email), point to multipoint (Internet Relay Chat, email lists, Web forums, Web sites), and multipoint to multipoint (within email lists, Chat, or IRC when many people are involved in a discussion).

04/09/23 10

Con’t

Perceive meaning in text and multimedia on Web sites, email, Usenet, etc.

Continuously participate in forums for communication that begin to exhibit characteristics of community--including a shared sense of purpose, norms for behaviour, and traditions.

04/09/23 11

3.3 CMC is Situated in a human context

All acts themselves are situated in a social context.

The human relationships surrounding CMC.

No particular act of CMC can be understood without considering the social systems in which it takes place.

04/09/23 12

Communication components

Context: place, time, technology race, age, social status

etc

MessageSenderReceiver

Personal: person-person

Communal: person-group

Mass: accessible to everyone

Mode: Spoken/written/picture/video/sound/animation/emoticon, etc

Style: Formal/informal

Language: monolingual, bilingual, or multilingual

Synchronous/Asynchronous

Media types: oral, grass, stone, paper, electronic.

Recording method: drawing, handwriting, printing, digital, etc

04/09/23 13

Context for communication

Field The topic being communicated

Tenor The participants, and the relationship between

them

Mode The channel for communication: spoken, written

or multimodal

04/09/23 14

4. Synchronous vs. asynchronous

The exchange of information can be real time or synchronous communication; this means that people are communicating with each other at the same time.

Asynchronous communication means that people are communicating at different times. They can send and receive their messages at any time they want.

04/09/23 15

4. What’s needed for CMC?

For all of the CMC systems you will need a common computer, a network connection, and special software.

If you want to use audio conferencing or voice mail you also need a microphone and a soundcard.

For video conferencing you will need a video camera.

04/09/23 16

5.Multimedia

Text (letters, numbers, punctuation, special characters, and controls)

Graphics (lines, circles, boxes, shading, fill colors etc.) Images (still pictures, expressed as the colors of many

small individual picture elements (pixels), either photographs or paintings)

Audio (sound, including voice, music, and special effects)

Video (successive pictures presented sufficiently rapidly to give the appearance of smooth motion)

Animations, flashes, 3D…

04/09/23 17

6. Some CMC Systems

World Wide Web E-mail Newsgroups Instant Messengers Blog Computer conferencing Audio conferencing Video conferencing Whiteboard environments

04/09/23 18

World Wide Web

WWW is the part of the Internet that brings together all of the different kinds of online resources available (e.g.. File archives, remotely accessible databases, newsgroup discursions) via word processor-like documents.

Web documents, which can integrate text, graphics, sound, and motion, usually contain links to other Internet resources.

On the WWW, some communication facilities are available. For instance, it is possible to put your comments on a web-page in a synchronous or asynchronous manner and other people can add their comments.

04/09/23 19

E-mail The users produce, send and receive mail at

a computer. The messages will be stored on a server and the users can get their mail when they want to.

Usually the message will contain only text, but it’s also possible to attach files to the messages with images, audio, etc. although this feature isn’t supported by all email software.

04/09/23 20

Newsgroups

A newsgroup is a repository usually within the Usenet system, for messages posted form many users at different locations.

Newsgroups are public discussion on more than 100,000 different topics on the Internet.

With a newsreader program, users can read what others have written, respond publicly or privately to the article's author, and post new ideas, questions or requests to the newsgroup.

04/09/23 21

Major Newsgroups:  

These discussions cover the full range of human discourse and provide a fascinating look at evolving viewpoints, debate and advice on every subject from politics to technology. alt. Any conceivable topic.  news. Info about Usenet News...  biz. Business products, services, reviews...  rec. Games, hobbies, sports...  comp. Hardware, software, consumer info...  sci. Applied science, social science...  humanities. Fine art, literature, philosophy...  soc. Social issues, culture...  misc. Employment, health, and much more...  talk. Current issues and debates...

04/09/23 22

Instant Messenger

Instant messenger is an interactive communication device.

A device for communicating with your friends in typing messages, webcam, microphone to have real chat.

It is getting popular as it has multi-functions. ICQ, Yahoo Messenger, Window Live

Messenger, and QQ are among the most popular instant messaging applications.

04/09/23 23

Blog

A blog is a personal web site, usually maintained by an individual with regular entries of commentary, descriptions of events, or other material such as graphics or video. Entries are commonly displayed in reverse-chronological order. "Blog" can also be used as a verb, meaning to maintain or add content to a blog. A person who is blogging is called a blogger.

04/09/23 24

Video conferencing

Is real time video and audio communication between people in different locations. A video camera, a monitor, and some features to control them are needed to send and receive the information.

04/09/23 25

Whiteboard environments

Are virtual meetings where each participant can use the mouse to draw sketches on the whiteboard.

As each user is drawing, every other user connected to the server sees the updates almost immediately.

Most whiteboard programs also have a chat window where participants can type messages to each other.

04/09/23 26

An example of whiteboard environments

04/09/23 27

Path of Learning in CMC Context

Learn about computer:

Computer

Learn through computer:

Mediated

Research on communication meditated with computer

Communication

Technological learning / computer literacy

Advanced learning / CMC discourse

04/09/23 28

Path of Learning in CMC Context

Learn about computer:

Computer

Learn through computer:

Media

(Mediated) Research on communication meditated with

computer

Communication

Learn out of necessity, e.g. the operation of computer; the use of softwares, Internet etc

Applied/pragmatic learning, e.g. online communication, online searching library, online gaming, etc.

Critical learning, e.g. exploring, appraising and evaluating the impact of CMC on the social relationships, social values, language, etc