Comment

Conversation
A return to communication

Hanno Hardt

While technological innovation continues to produce more sophisticated and versatile new electronic media faster and cheaper for mass markets, growing demands for alternative media suggest a declining popularity of reception as a form of participation. The notion of a passive audience has become increasingly inadequate. Instead, it seems that the introduction of new media promotes rather than replaces older communication practices, like talk, whose rediscovery accompanies a renewed appreciation of what it means to be an individual. Thus, people are beginning to find themselves engaged in conversation, this time, however, in a contemporary manner.

Since the times when new communication technologies, like photography and film or television, were a perceived threat to the survival of the printed word, until today, when mass communication sets the agenda of the public discourse, directs its content, and determines its ideological thrust, conversation has been under siege. In the meantime, however, two generations of a media-saturated existence have taken their toll on the progress of mass communication. Once considered the source of a democratic existence, and, according to Gabriel Tarde, the most important force governing modern conversation, media encounter a decreasing trust in journalism and commercial propaganda in an atmosphere of fading credibility among the public.

What emerges instead is the realisation, if ever so vague, that an ideologically constructed democratic system of communication rests on concrete ideas of individual control over what is being said, or where and how, as well as to whom. In the face of dominant theories of mass society and the dire consequences of globalisation, communication is being reconstituted in conversation as a confirmation of communal life and an expression of an individual's right. While the former is one of the major distinctions between the richness of traditional oral cultures and the poverty of a mass mediated life in modern societies, the latter recognises the individual as an actor in the process of communication, which is the process of life itself.

Conversation is the key to participation, and being in conversation with others is an expression of freedom and individual empowerment. One is reminded of Machiavelli's remarks that culture must be learned through conversation among equals, or of Walt Whitman's notion of democracy as a society of 'free readers', whose creation of a 'daily communion' with writers or editors confirms mutual interests and sympathies, which contain the seeds of conversation. But it is the equality in talk, which makes conversation what it is, namely a social event and a method of arriving at some kind of truth through talking back to the other, exposing rather than hiding differences, instructing as well as being instructed.

Not unlike reading, conversation is a private affair placed beyond external control and, therefore, free to be claimed by anyone for experimentations with ideas. Conversation occurs between individuals, who have knowledge of each other and who realise that real living is meeting, to speak with Martin Buber. And there are always moments of equality even under the most authoritarian systems of government. Consequently, conversation also has the potential of undermining the power of (state) authority and to become a threat to security, as recognised in recent attempts by the US administration to legitimise wiretapping and eavesdropping on citizens caught in the act of conversing.

But the reach of authority has always been rather limited despite its threat to democratic principles with a variety of (even unconstitutional) practices; conversation will continue to help overthrow governments and create new utopias, as it becomes an attractive alternative for the weary consumer of media fare.

Conversation suggests dialogue, and dialogue is the path to the self. To become human relies on being made human by others and to recognise the self, means being in the presence of others. Thus communication constitutes relatedness and relatedness ultimately constitutes society. This process of becoming selves is based on a commitment to communication; thus conversation as a method of knowing oneself and knowing to be understood by others is a fundamental practice, which shapes reality. It is a reality of relations between individuals, individuals and nature, or individuals and society, in which communication plays a decisive role. When Berger and Luckmann suggest that conversation is the most important vehicle of reality-maintenance, they mean that any disruption or discontinuity of conversation becomes a threat to a subjective reality. Being deprived of dialogue, therefore, means isolation, alienation, and a condition of nothingness.

In the absence of personal conversation, mass media provide a form of reality-maintenance. They offer the spectre of a pseudo-dialogue to the anxious individual, but the result is an assertion of 'facts' or 'truths', which produces uniformity or standardisation, rather than an exchange of ideas between equals, which ultimately breeds individuality.

In fact, media have undergone significant changes as agents of public conversations, from editors acting with personal knowledge and interest in readers to media managers constructing audiences as consumers or collective recipients of a one-way flow of information. Conversation as an expression of mutual interests in knowing and learning from the other has been replaced by a hierarchical process of talking to rather than conferring with audiences. Consequently, reality emerges from an interaction between the self-interest of the media and the desire of the individual to remain in touch with the world, while mutuality is redefined as an economic or political operating condition rather than a social or cultural process of understanding.

When media become indifferent or insensitive to the desire for conversation, however, people feel abandoned and will turn from the use of traditional media to engaging more creatively in talk. Encouraged by older traditions and newer technologies, individuals will seek recognition and distinction in the practice of conversation.

The success of mobile telephones, which cater to the desire to communicate and satisfy the urge to be heard and therefore to be recognised, is but one indication of a search for new forms of communication, which cherish privacy and reinforce independence from the public discourse. Another one is the return to conversation in public places, like pubs or coffee houses, for instance, where television screens have often been reduced to decorating walls with moving images. And finally, the search for a meaningful conversation has reached the theatre, which is benefiting with increased attendance from a public disillusioned with the one-dimensionality of ordinary mass media fare.

Not since the invention of the telephone over one hundred years ago have so many people enjoyed almost unlimited access to partners in dialogue. But it is not the technology itself, from mass transport, which speeds people to desired destinations, to the mobile telephone, which overcomes any distance, but individual action. In the meantime, traditional media of social communication have lost their claims to accuracy, truth, or relevance. Audiences, instead, have begun to look for alternative sources of self-knowledge and means of identification with the social, economic, or political environment. They discover the potential of conversation and the power of initiating and sustaining the ritual of talk. Breaking the silence becomes a liberating act of reclaiming one's identity in mass society.

Several examples of using talk as a means of persuasion to serve commercial or political interests have been emerging in the United States, where the idea of freedom of expression persists as an ideological cornerstone of democracy as much as the subjugation to consumption as a way of life.

For instance, recognising the diminishing trust in the conduct of the mass media, their theoreticians have introduced the notion of 'public' journalism, which addresses audiences and promotes meaningful journalistic work. The public engages in conversations with journalists for the benefit of maintaining a reality that relates to the community of readers. In an apparent reversal of contemporary media practices, 'public' journalism signals a return to a traditional understanding of the relations between the press and its public, which is based on equality and shared interests in the welfare of the community. The real purpose, however, is to serve specific economic interests.

Also, while millions of dollars are being poured into political television advertising, in particular, it is hardly a secret that face-to-face encounters between candidates and their constituencies have proven to be more effective and are the people's preferred method of meeting politicians. Thus, walking across the state of Iowa, for instance, has helped presidential candidates in the past making lasting impressions and winning primary campaigns after engaging individuals in conversations on the way. Meeting and conversing are still considered meaningful activities by individuals, tired of media hype, who typically are too far removed in their daily lives from the national political scene.

And finally, a recent meeting of the Word-of-Mouth Marketing Association in Florida concluded that advertising is obsolete. Instead, attendees learned about the power of word of mouth, or the revival of a traditional form of communication that has been updated with the aid of new technologies, like blogs, podcasting and online message boards. Touted as the most honest advertising medium, word of mouth exploits the notion of sharing knowledge about new products through private talk or conversation with equals, like friends, family or colleagues. While making specific information meaningful to the individual, the force of attention and personal trust advance commercial goals and reinforce the climate of consumption.

In every instance, talk is the critical medium, and the individual the active participant in the process of conversing. Whether these strategies of communication to capture or recapture individuals, as audiences, voters or consumers will be successful may be in doubt, since the market continues to determine the manner of communication. What is important, however, is a growing public realisation that conversation, as a fundamental human activity, remains irreplaceable and essential to understanding and confirming one's own subjectivity and its relations to the world.