The Importance Of Representation In Communication

“Representation connects meaning and language to culture” (15). It is key to understand the importance of representations role, and how essential it is when understanding communication. In Hall’s “The Work of Representation Discourse and Power,” he discusses the different theories of how language’s representation reflects society. While briefly going over the reflective and the intentional approaches, he spends most of his time breaking down the constructionist approach. Then the constructionist method is comprised of two variations, the semiotic and discourse. Semitic and discourse analyses are similar in consideration to the constructionist approach; however, when breaking each topic down the differences become apparent. The semiotic and

As technology has taken prominence in the lives of people today, one may look back and wonder what it means and how it started. Technology is considered a form of communication and when looked at there are benefits well as disadvantages. From gaining knowledge of the theory of communication, one centered around technology rather than society had more significant impacts. In articles written by McLuhan and Williams, it is apparent that technology-driven communication has profoundly changed history and culture. Over multiple decades technology has done many things, in Williams article “The Technology and the Society” he discusses how television specifically altered the world. When breaking it down, he separates televisions impact into cause and effect, the social history of television as a technology and the social history of the uses of television

After agreeing with how technology had begun the change of society and the world in Williams article, McLuhan’s article “The Medium is the Message” becomes clearer with his point of view. His articles title says It all, McLuhan spends the entire time discussing how the medium is the message. He quotes “The restructuring of human work and association was shaped by the technique of fragmentation that is the essence of machine technology” (1). Restructuring and shaping humans through technology is comparable to Williams point of cause and effect. Technology has molded society and directly impacted people. Something that is centralized is then taken to individual homes which gives a private communication, however, makes people apart of the masses. Williams discussed how technology has altered society and changed the relationship of the world when McLuhan writes about movies this is seen. “To a highly literate and mechanized culture, the movie appeared like a world of triumphant illusions and dreams that money could buy” (4) according to McLuhan. This statement is correct, the technology of movies communicates a fake reality to audiences and transports them to the world of illusions. Movies have changed the ways societies communicate, the film is the medium, and the film gives the