Common-ground
The fist step to a successful relationship, whether it is professional or personal, is to find a piece of common ground. Finding common ground can also help solve disagreements between two parties. Once common ground is found people are able to relate, and that leads to more open mindedness. Finding common ground in disciplines opens up a multitude of new thesis’ and resolutions to previous problems. It is easy to see how communication plays a role in Family and Human Development but not as easy to see it in the reverse. Finding common ground between the two helps to understand it better.
Both Communication and Family and Human Development have been studied over many years. The study of Communication and its theories can be seen as far back as Aristotle with his scholarly novel, Rhetorica (1686). Humans knew communication was a valuable thing to man, and deserved to be studied and documented. In fact language is the most important sign system of human activity.
Family studies can arguably date back to biblical times with the recordings of what families went through such as siblings Kane and Able, and parents Mary and Joseph. Recordings of how families dealt with situations in the past aid us in researching how we have evolved to and from the nuclear family. Some cultures believe there is nothing more important than the family unit.
On account of Communication and Family and Human Development being such broad disciplines many subcategories have been created to take a more specific look at the different dynamics that make up each one. Communication Studies, Mass Communication, Speech and Rhetorical Studies, Organizational, and Communication Theory are just to name a few that have stemmed from the study of communication. Sociology of marriage, Sociology of Motherhood, Sociology of Fatherhood and Childhood, are just a few of Family and Human Development subcategories.
Different societies and cultures also play an imperative role in both studies. Some theories such as Alexander’s model of encoding and decoding takes into account background experiences, symbols, and referents when creating successful communication. As long as we have similar cultures, backgrounds, and experiences, we are able to gain common ground when our referents match to out communication concept. Sapir-Whorf’s thesis argues that language determines our thought and language was merely labels applied to already existing concepts.
Communications in different cultures differ simply in the languages that they speak. What one word is in English could be completely opposite in Japanese. Some languages such as Korean have words that cannot even be translated into any other languages.
Family units are also heavily influenced by the societies and cultures they belong to. Families in America differ from families in Russia just as the word “family” is different in both languages. Culture can determine how large the family is or how long they reside under one roof. Some cultures value their elderly much more than others and some place more importance on fathers than they do their mothers.
These examples are just naming a few instances of common ground, through history/importance, theories, and society and culture. Since I have been taking such a closer look at my disciplines my thoughts on my future career path has changed. I have become much more interested in the production of communication and knowledge and how I might be able to incorporate that knowledge into the development or “production” of a successful, functioning family unit. I now am contemplating returning to school after I graduate in July to further my education in Family Policy. I want to be able to do research on how better, and different types of communication would have a positive influence on different types of families. I would like to then take that research and create family policies that provide families with communication classes and therapy sessions where they are able to practice what they have learned. I believe that different families require different forms of communication and culture and society play a role on both the family and the type of communication that should be used. Being able to put your feelings and experiences into symbols of language that is understandable amongst others is in-fact the ultimate goal of successful communication. Successful communication is key to a successful family, no matter what type it may be.
I would also like to look into what classes I could take to further my education in the study of Communication as Knowledge Production. I would like to take a deeper look at the different types of theories on how communication is encoded and decoded and how language plays its role in different aspects of life. It was surprising to realize how much we as subjective human beings take for granted our objective world. I want to learn more about why we do this and if it is purely subconsciously or if it is something to do with our cultures and societies. I think that our American culture also takes for granted how much family can impact our lives. We as Americans are raised by our parents to be sent off into the world as successful contributors to society. After we reach a certain age we “leave the nest”, with the thought in the back of our minds that our family and home will always be there to come back to. Sometimes unexpected life events happen and this is no longer the case. We don’t seem to realize how much our family means to us until they are gone or estranged from our lives. I believe there might be common ground as to why we take our knowledge of communication for granted along with other important components of our lives as human beings.