Communication, Culture and Confrontation (Communication Processes Series)  (Paperback, Bernard Bel, Jan Brouwer, Biswajit Das, Vibodh Parthasarathi, Guy Poitevin)

The third and final volume in the series on Communication Processes, Communication, Culture and Confrontation is a bold attempt at breaking conceptual and methodological impasses which stifle communication studies. Departing from established frameworks and dated technological metaphors such as ‘transmission’, the present volume explores and analyzes different forms of communication media in relation to the cultural configurations and contending forces that permeate them. Positioned at the interface of culture and communication studies, the discourse in the book engages with multiple voices, bringing together academic scholars and grassroot social animators. Exploring seven different popular cultural forms, such as rituals, songs, narratives, calendar art, pamphlets, and so on, through 18 case studies, it goes on to suggest a complex model of communication. In this framework, cultures cannot be viewed as items exchanged in the hegemonic space of global communication. Cultural configurations display themselves as ‘evolutive’ forms of social communication that weave human beings into collectives and bind these collectives with one another—all permeated with the power parameter. Cultures ‘perform’ viable collectives when they come to be apprehended in a field of contending forces: a milieu of exchange, encounter, confrontation and possibly conflict. This volume will be invaluable for students of communication, culture studies, sociology and journalism.