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THE INEVITABILITY OF THE ALIENATION OF COMMUNICATION IN THE
ERA OF GLOBALISATION
Tatiana Leshchenko
Lomonosov Moscow State University, Leninskie Gory, Moscow, 119991, Russian Federation
[email protected]
Irina Sokolova
Russian State Social University, Wilhelm Pick str., 4, Moscow, 129226, Russian Federation
[email protected]
Liubov Teplova
Lomonosov Moscow State University, Leninskie Gory, Moscow, 119991, Russian Federation
[email protected]
ABSTRACT
The paper analyses the problems of the global transformation of communication processes
associated with the pervasive influence of the various communication systems on the
economy, politics, culture and social system as a whole. The superfluity of such influence has
given birth to a phenomenon of “the alienation of communication”, which is regarded as an
objective entity of social reality. The authors adduce a typology of the alienation of
communication occurring in a variety of communicative situations at any level of the social
structure. This typology is primarily based on the specificity of the “clash” of individual and
social in determining the meaning of communication: the original sense and the following
reading of this meaning; the intention and the degree of the twisting of the meaning due to the
mismatch of social needs, interests and values of the subjects of communication; the impact of
this clash on the nature of social interaction. It is specified that in the social and cultural
diversity context the processes of social adaptation, socialisation and resocialisation become
of paramount importance for sustainable development of society. However, omnipresent
phenomenon of the alienation of communication inhibits these processes significantly. Mass
media contribute to an effect of the fractal proliferation of alienation that leads to its
transformation into an indispensable attribute of the information society. The authors come to
a conclusion that the reality of alienated meanings inevitably comes into existence and
becomes the bellicose element of social environment, which explains a necessity of scientific
conceptualisation of the phenomenon. The approaches to the study of the alienation of
communication are suggested.
Keywords: Alienation of Communication, Fractal, Reality of Alienated Meanings
1. INTRODUCTION: GLOBAL TRANSFORMATION OF COMMUNICATION
PROCESSES AND ALIENATION
Substantial growth in the amount of communication, the complexity of their structure and
their increasing influence on all social processes and relationships are obvious facts.
However, despite the variety of its real manifestations social communication is a well-defined
integrity. Being social and cultural system by its nature, social communication is a dynamic
entity which is constantly changing immanently and has an ability to form its own “destiny”.
This self-determination was called by Pitirim Sorokin “the principle sui generis which
predetermines the disclosure of immanent potentialities of the system” (Sorokin, 2006, p.
815).
It is important to clarify that the authors understand the system of social communication as
the totality of communication inherent in the modern human society at the interpersonal,
group, and societal levels. Of course, here we refer to a conscious communicative interaction,
exchange of meanings and values, and not to the information and communication
infrastructure. Even more important is the aspect relating to the term “social”, which is taken
as the general characteristics of communication in the sense mentioned above. This is not a
special case or an approach used by many authors to refer to communication in the field of
social work with those in need.
So, following our line of reasoning, the social communication problems arising in the course
of continuous human activity are the problems of the system itself. This does not mean that
we exclude from the research the impact of the environment on the system. The environment
can impact the system of social communication in a variety of ways but the latter will react
only due to the built-in ability to digest the impact (be it a requirement or an offer)
irrespective of the type of interaction whether it is a cooperation or a conflict. In a globalising
world, the communication system meets all the challenges of globalisation and becomes an
interface of both globalisation and glocalisation as its antipode, only modifying the shape.
Mass communication is nowadays the most broad and obvious phenomenon of social
communication, which has drawn attention not only of humanities and social sciences but also
of technologies, especially in the context of the information society (Carey, Adam, 2008;
Curran, Fenton, Freedman, 2016; Orlova, Osipova, Sokolova, 2014). The problem is that the
studies of the phenomenon of the mass media are focused on answering the question “How do
the mass media and communication affect the person and society?” This question was
answered by Niklas Luhmann (Luhmann, 2000). Meanwhile, more significant is the question
“Why?”. We will find a lot of attempts to explain the latter by means of an answer to more
specific questions: “Who?” and “What is the purpose?”. The actual problem lies in the fact
that there is practically absent the more correct formulation of the question “What is going on
with the whole communication system and how does this affect its functioning?”. What
Luhmann has called the reality of the mass media, is currently becoming “the reality of
alienated meanings” (Leshchenko, 2015), evident in the media discourse (Matheson, 2005,
pp. 18-19). But not only there.
Opportunities of Internet communication were first considered by users as a way to
individualise their own information space. Social networks have also emerged as a vain
attempt to create an alternative to an alienated media discourse. Today, social media discourse
with its often anonymous nicknames, informal vocabulary, lots of empty discussions and
meaningless cross fires is also becoming a variant of “the field of alienation”. There arises a
number of specific communication effects: “the absence of presence”, “ignoring behavior”
and others. All these are faces of “the alienation of communication” 1 . The meaning of
communication is losing sense and the first place is being taken by the form. Following the
paradigm of visual sociology (Sztompka, 2007) it is logical to assume that Instagram
appeared as a result of the growing visualisation of the communication processes. We
consider it to be the result of the growing alienation. The man is not physically able to
maintain meaningful communication to the extent that he is offered today by the society.
1
It is necessary to make the terminological specification. According to Hegel’s doctrine the authors understand
the concept as a process. It follows that now the concept of “the alienation of communication” proposed by the
authors is in the process of clarifying and determining its content. Single and universal moments of the alienation
of communication investigated by the authors are at the stage of forming definitive judgment. The concept of
“the alienation of communication” is not yet complete. It exists as an idea, which is the unity of the concept and
reality. The alienation of communication is estrangement from communication as understood by Marx. This is a
form of being under contemporary conditions.
Therefore, it is natural for the man to simplify communication, to turn it into objects and to
release it into the world, where the images created by man no longer belong to him. For the
selfhood it has much more significant consequences than materialised labor.
Why do we pay so much attention to the phenomenon of the alienation of communication?
First, communication is central to the process of association, alongside with the perception
and interaction. Second, the alienation acquires a total character thanks to the rise of the
“network society” (Castells, 2015) and network communication. And third, the alienation of
communication becomes the dominant type of social relations.
2. THE ALIENATION OF COMMUNICATION AS AN OBJECTIVE
PHENOMENON OF SOCIAL REALITY
Social communication is a part of the social world, its backbone element due to which the
social life is continually reproducing itself. In this sense, the concepts of “communication”
and “social communication” are identical. Communication is the only way to reproduce
society. Hence, social communication is a universal, objectively existing phenomenon, i.e. a
social fact. The very fact which can be seen as a thing (Durkheim, 1962, pp. 51-55). And as a
result of its sociality it can also be seen as a universal phenomenon of the “movement of
meanings in social time and social space” (Sokolov, 2002, pp.30-32).
If we turn to the understanding of the original meaning as an absolute transcendent selfhood
in a philosophical interpretation suggested by Alexey Losev, the thing is the embodiment of
this selfhood, but “one and the same thing requires or involves an infinite number of its
various interpretations” (Losev, 2008, p. 75). Communication, taken as a thing, is a grip of an
absolute meaning-sense, which in fact occurs in the form of a continuous movement of
verbalised meanings. “What comes first: the specified objectified sense, original meaning, or
the meaning given by consciousness in the communication process (including
autocommunication)?”. This question is removed with the help of dialectics. One does not
exist without another one; the thing in existence cannot be understood without its antipode. It
is therefore possible to assume that there is a unity of an absolute internal meaning and an
external one, demonstrated through endless interpretations. Here lies an understanding of
alienation as becoming of meaning. A deeper problem is in a correspondence of the senses
attributed to the objects of reality which become the objects of communication through their
verbalisation (naming). The higher is the degree of correspondence of the senses to the
objects the lower is their alienation potential when they later undergo multiple interpretations
and eventually acquire the quality of autonomous discourse, understood as “the meaning
field” of social communication.
According to a well-known five elements communication scheme (sender – encoding –
message – decoding – recipient) the point where twisted meaning (whether intentionally or
unintentionally) occurs in the social space can primarily be misinterpretation at the stage of
decoding and further reflection on the message. In objective reality any subject of
communication may be both the initiator of the information movement and the recipient
(often there is a transformation, sometimes instant, of the recipient into the initiator), and the
interpreter, who connects to the communication process at any stage in an open and
unpredictable manner. He can perform both a function of enhancing the effectiveness,
adequacy of understanding of the original meaning and a function of noise or barrier. And in
some cases he can perform a function of intentional twisting of the meaning at the very
beginning of the message construction.
Social and cultural processes such as formation of value systems, spatial-temporal processing
of the meaning field, dynamics of social structure include a wide range of problems of social
communication at interpersonal, group and mass communication levels. Meaning making
transformation in the form of widely spread interpretations, “simulacra” (Baudrillard, 1995;
Deleuze, 1990, p. 46) becomes a communicative conduct activator for subjects of
communication (both the initiators-senders and primarily passive recipients), and affects the
functioning and internal integration of the elements of the system of social communication
which means it affects the strength of its impact on the social environment by which it is
generated. The environment counteracts and in the context of information society this
counteraction turns into the alienation of communication as the process, as a formed system,
and in fact as the opposite to understanding. Total misunderstanding is at the very heart of
uncontrolled social process from migration to terrorism. This is exactly the communication
misunderstanding, not always due to insufficient knowledge or culture, but mostly due to the
reluctance to understand.
Meanings are a product of human consciousness, and through communication they can
become consensual and universal. In the mental layer of culture they are “pressed together”
into a set of a priori values, archetypes, behavioral patterns, phraseological units and so on
(Kotsyubinskaya, Teplova, 2014) . They manifest themselves to individuals in the process of
socialisation, as collective consciousness, objectively existing system of values and norms to
be absorbed. This “meaningful matter” is alienated in the process of social relations
development. As noted by Jurgen Habermas, “in the forms of communication through which
we reach an understanding with one another about something in the world and about
ourselves, we encounter a transcending power” (Habermas, 2003, p. 10). Does this mean that
the alienation of communication is inherent in the very nature of communication? In fact, we
can analyse the message (a letter, an online post, a book, a picture, etc.) as a form of thought
which has been turned into an object and then alienated. And it is alienated intentionally and
voluntarily. But the recipient is dependent. And in the era of globalisation, people are
increasingly becoming the recipients (and your computer constantly reminds you of this
through contextual advertising).
So, the alienation of communication is objectively conditioned by two main factors: the
nature of communication and the dependent position of subjects who are deprived of the right
to initiate communication, which leads to antagonistic contradiction-unity of communication
and alienation, in which the latter is growing due to the increase in global communication.
3. WAYS TO COGNISE THE ALIENATION OF COMMUNICATION
3.1. A tentative typology of the alienation of communication
Discussion on the typology of the alienation of communication requires some prior
clarification, first of all, with regard to the approaches to the typology construction. In one
approach, the typology is based on some theoretical positions. This involves creating an ideal
model of the object under consideration, which is approached as a system with certain
structural levels and structure forming connections between them. In addition, generalised
attributes of an object set are selected and a principle of description of this set is determined.
This approach to the typology is a method of cognising which operates with an idealised type
as an abstract construction. In our case this idealised type is a type of the alienation of
communication.
Taken as an eternal ideal essence this type precedes communication, exists in its depth and
appears as its prototype. Following this line which roots back to Plato and Aristotle, the
prototype of communication is the alienation of meaning, as the need in the movement of the
meaning initiated by a subject: personal, social, or substantial one. By sphere of
consciousness, such as that described by Mamardashvili and Piatigorsky (Mamardashvily,
Piatigorskii, 2011). Any variability here is the becoming, the intermediate stage, imperfection
of the meaning.
Methodologically the type of the alienation of communication allows one to reconstruct the
most significant characteristics of the elements of the social communication system under
consideration. In this case attribution of the alienation of communication as the dominating
type of communication interaction makes it in theory a representative of the entire set of these
interactions. The typology of the alienation of communication is an abstract structural
typology, which, above all, allows us to analyse the relationship of alienation between
communication elements. This approach is not intended to be an exhaustive mapping of the
system of the social communication, as a theoretical typology can contain comparative and
historical, generative or other criteria, but it has, according to the authors, the most relevant
potential for the study of processes of the alienation of communication.
In another approach, the typology is based on an empirical position. At its core is the ascent
from the concrete to the abstract through the generalisation, systematisation and data
interpretation. The empirical typology of the alienation of communication makes it possible to
examine the indicators, functions, and connections between elements of the social
communication systems as objects of reality, to compare them, to describe and classify them
typologically and by this to verify the above methodological assumption.
Probably it is not for the first time that researchers ask whether it is possible to create an
integral typology in general and the integral typology of the alienation of communication in
particular. On the one hand, a type of the alienation of communication is a sort of a structure
of communication being, it is an abstraction. On the other hand it is an empirically observable
kind of communication. The approach to communication as an event leading to the coexistence, allows the authors to take as a principal criterion for the typology the nature of the
“clash” of individual and social in determining the meaning of communication: the original
sense and the following reading of this meaning; the intention and the degree of the twisting
of the meaning due to the mismatch of social and communication needs, interests and values
of the subjects of communication; the impact of this clash on the nature of social interaction.
“The twisting of the meaning” can be a short name for this criterion.
To put this construct into a multidimensional social space, it is necessary to determine the set
of essential features of the alienation of communication that identify a particular character of
social communication relations as conditioned by the type of the alienation of
communication. Two phenomena that have already been studied in science can serve as
illustrative examples: the “new generation gap” (Weiss, Schneider, 2014) and the Internet
addiction (Varlamova, Goncharova, Sokolova, 2015). The above mentioned gap is associated
by its authors with the very fact that “digital natives often neither see nor hear their elders
because, from a communications standpoint, digital immigrants and digital natives are
literally “not in the same room” (Weiss, Schneider, 2014). In the second case, Internet
addiction is directly related to a negative transformation of social ties up to their rupture (see
Appendix).
Both phenomena, on closer examination, may be interdependent. It is important for us to fix
them as markers of the alienation of communication which gradually becomes the primary
cause of rejection and exclusion of any other. Increasing social estrangement manifests itself
today at all levels of the social structure and in all spheres of reality. Among the growing
trends there are divorce, alienation of parents and children, teenage suicide, involvement in
virtual relationships, alienation of otherness, of “the other”, of “the unlike”, i.e., the so-called
“HIV carriers” in the post-Soviet countries (Leshchenko, 2016), international conflicts,
migration flows, information warfare and many other social facts. All these social and cultural
processes are largely due to a variety of social estrangement, such as the alienation of
communication. Consequently, all this can be considered as its markers.
The features and then the types of the alienation of communication can be classified on
various criteria. Here are some of them. Following the aforesaid authors’ criterion of “the
twisting of the meaning” it is necessary to identify the degree of misunderstanding between
the subjects of communication and its critical level, the achievement of which leads to social
change. When dealing with any communicative interaction whether at an interpersonal, group
or mass level, the authors find it important to pay attention to its character. What it is: an
imitation, a dialogue or direction? The degree of understanding is, of course, influenced by an
attempt to control communication (in the sense of its (not) adequate understanding), and
therefore, the meaning and the nature of its movement. The lack of control and regulation has
the same effect. The “meaninglessness of communication” is one of the types of its alienation.
It may also be conditioned by imitation. “Purposeful twisting of the meaning of
communication” is another type. It can be formed in the process of a dialogue, when the
original focus on the achievement of mutual understanding is undergoing a transformation
into a conflict.
It is evident that features of both types can be observed at all levels of the social structure.
The scope of this article does not allow the authors to give a detailed picture, so we define
only reference points that can be markers of the alienation of communication: communication
deficit – communication gap – deviant behavior – anomie – social passivity; unreliability of
communication – disbelief – rejection – abruption – aggression; redundancy of
communication – communication stereotyping – communication addiction – transformation
of mass consciousness – transformation of values. These reference points are not always in a
rigid linear sequence, a “tree” (fractal) structure is also possible. These series will be further
refined through specific empirical studies. The authors argue that finally they may be reduced
to two main types of the alienation of communication: the meaninglessness of communication
and purposeful twisting of the meaning of communication.
3.2. The approaches to the study of the alienation of communication
Global communication system generated by an absolute sociogenic need is inherently able to
undergo any changes dictated by its self-sufficiency and development. The reality, with new
people coming into the world time and again, reproduces this need incessantly, but the formed
communication system satisfies this need in a different way. The reality of signs is replaced
with the reality of alienated meanings.
The emergence of this “reality” is a consequence of a pervasive, and in a sense, infinite
phenomenon of the alienation of communication that has become the dominant type of social
estrangement and has acquired the quality of autotelia. The world of alienated meanings is in
opposition to a community of interacting people, forcing them to adapt to its own laws and
dictating them its rules. This secondary world, which is in fact simulated, is rapidly gaining
superiority. The trends in the transformation of the alienation mentioned by the authors
address the issue of the very foundations of the human existence and are embodied into the
alienation between the state and society and into the alienation between the individual and the
society. The latter is a direct consequence of a failed socialisation, resocialisation,
acculturation, which are deformed due to the alienation of communication. There is almost a
direct indication of the relationship of alienation and social communication in the dichotomy
of “anti and pro-social communication” (Kinney, Porhola, 2009).
It is obvious, that the study of the phenomenon of the alienation of communication requires a
multidisciplinary approach. The inseparability of the essence and existence of the alienation
of communication requires, first and foremost, a harmonious connection of philosophical and
sociological foundation in a scientific comprehension of its subject field. In a search of a
compromise or grounds for integration likely paradigmatic areas for this might be: the
philosophy of communication, social philosophy; theoretical or historical sociology. George
Gurvich insisted that philosophy and sociology should not be confused, as it leads to the
dissolution of them in each other. According to him these subjects are in relationships of
dialectical complementarity and implication, and only dialectics allows for a systematic
approach to studying “total social phenomena” (Gurvich, 2001, pp. 288-289). After George
Gurvich and Alexander Zinoviev (Zinoviev, 2002; 2006) the authors support this position on
the heuristic capacity of dialectics in cognition of the alienation of communication.
Further deployment of the multidisciplinary subject field of research into the alienation of
communication includes the following aspects of the phenomenon: a) origin, essence and
manifestations forms of the alienation in the social communication system; b) regularities of
formation and development of this synthetic phenomenon, its impact on the social structure,
the individual and public consciousness; c) updating, clarifying, designing general and special
categories and concepts in the process of reflection on this phenomenon; d) features of
structuring and functioning of an alienated communication environment as an actual and
virtual reality; e) humanitarian expertise and social forecasting.
A possible explanatory model of this subject field can be “a fractal of the alienation of
communication”. Its topological qualities are a twisted meaning and a modified character of
the movement of meanings. In the information society these qualities are easily reproduced in
all branches of the self-similar figure, because the traditional media and new media contribute
to multiple reproduction of twisted meanings. Structuring communication chaos a fractal of
the alienation of communication seems a protective mechanism of alienation, and its concrete
manifestation. And at the same time it is a mechanism for systematic changes of social
communication.
The fractal of the alienation of communication is a special case of the fractal of
communication, the basis of which is the meaning making. It is the fractal of communication
that allows for tracing the movements of unit of meaning from the consciousness of the
individual through the totality of social relations to public consciousness, and finding out how
the system of social communication works. Through the fractal approach any problem in this
area is classified as characteristic, aspect, intermediate or final result of the functioning of this
self-reproducing system.
4. CONSLUSION
Taking into account the substantial negative impact of the alienation of communication on the
social structure of the information society, the authors believe the research into formation
processes of alienated meanings to be an important preventive measure for a well-timed
reduction of large-scale social problems, such as the destruction of public, national or cultural
identity, uncontrolled migration, social aggression. This will help avoid the devastating
effects and make the social changes which are inevitable in the era of globalisation less
disruptive.
5. BIBLIOGRAPHY
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Kinney, M. Porhola. (2009). New York: Peter Lang Publishing Inc.
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Cultural Materialism (First Edition). MI: University of Michigan Press.
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Edition: Essays on Media and Society (Second Edition). New York: Routledge.
4. Castells, M. (2015). Networks of Outrage and Hope: Social Movements in the Internet
Age (Second Edition). Cambridge: Polity.
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Curran, J., Fenton, N., Freedman, D. (2016). Misunderstanding the Internet:
Communication and Society (Second Edition). New York: Routledge.
Deleuze, G. (1990). The Logic of Sense (Revised ed. Edition). New York: Columbia
University Press.
Durkheim, E. (1962). The Rules of Sociological Method. New York: The Free Press of
Glencoe.
Gurvich, G. D. (2001). Dialectics and Sociology. Krasnodar: Kuban State University.
Habermas, J. (2003). The Future of Human Nature (First Edition). Cambridge: Polity.
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Leshchenko, T. (2015). The Philosophy and Sociology of the Alienation of
Communication. Education and Society Journal, 5 (94), pp. 117–119. Orel: The
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Luhmann, N. (2000). The Reality of the Mass Media: Cultural Memory in the Present.
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Mamardashvily, M., Piatigorskii, A. (2011). Symbol and Consciousness. Moscow:
Azbuka: Azbuka-Atticus.
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Orlova, I., Osipova, E., Sokolova I. (2014). The Sociology of Mass Communication.
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Varlamova, S., Goncharova, E., Sokolova, I. (2015). Internet Addiction of Youth in
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APPENDIX
0.6
0.1
0.4
2.7
96.2
No Internet addiction
Low Internet addiction
Heavy Internet addiction
Total Internet addiction
Medium Internet addiction
Figure 3. The Breakdown of Different Types of Internet Addiction Among Youth in the
Megacities Worldwide (% of total respondents) (Varlamova, Goncharova, Sokolova, 2015)
Total Internet addiction
16.7
83.3
Heavy Internet addiction
Medium Internet addiction
Low Internet addiction
81.3
18
20
9.3
6.3
23.3
15.6
20
No Internet addiction
12.5
33.7
60
100
Considerably fewer friends in real life
Slightly fewer friends in real life
About the same number of friends on the Internet and in real life
Slightly more friends in real life
Considerably more friends in real life
Figure 5. The Correlation of the Number of Friends in Real Life and on the Internet Among
Youth in Megacities (% of respondents in each group) (Ibid)