COM 382 Lecture Notes - Lecture 3: Talcott Parsons, Harold Lasswell

• School: URI
• Department: Communication Studies
• Course: COM 382
• Professor: Abran Salazar

Document Summary

A functional approach to the study of human communication. Biologist"s definition of system: set of interrelated parts that come together to create a unified & coherent whole. Explains why people communicate with each other and why they communication becomes patterned. One of the best known proponents of functional approaches was talcott. What do functional approaches attempt to do. When we interact with somebody, communication can fulfill a vital function for the system. Any communicative act may function in more than one way. In large part the function / consequence of a communicative act is dependent on context. The same function may be brought about through different communicative acts. Aware of the fact that the are part of a larger social system. Means through which com allows a group to adjust to changes. For larger collectivities/systems (societies) -- harold lasswell & charles wright.