week of december 6-8 question 3

What I liked about this class is the fact that I never had an online class before. It was very different than any other class I have taken in my college education. Even though it is online, when we do are online blogs we get to comment on our classmate’s blog entries. I never had a class where we turn homework we get to comment on our classmates work. I like the fact that this class makes the homework more relevant to our lives by having us do journals. What the journals does it helps us analyze a social interaction that we had with someone who experiences the world differently than we do. Or it could help us analyze a conflict that we had with a loved one. Because if the journals it gets us as a class to see what we did right or wrong in a social situation. I don’t feel that this class needs any improvements. I feel that even though it’s a online class I felt that I could communicate with the instructor if I wanted to.

week of december 6-8 question 2

Another concept in communication that I feel needs further discussion is the concept of mass communication, mostly the functions of media. The book discusses the functions being surveillance, correlation, cultural transmission, and entertainment. I feel that all of these functions are important and I will tell you why. I feel that the first two are very important because it gives us information about what is going on in the world around us. But there is a downside to this function. The thing about it we as a nation cant accept the news that is put out at face value. We need to dig deeper other than just accepting what we are told. Cultural transmission is important because it allows us to learn about other people’s culture. It allows us to see the world at the comfort of home. The last one is entertainment. Need I say more. Entertainment gives us joy in our life and that’s one of the most important things.

week of December 6-8 question 1

One of the most interesting concepts I found in the book is the subject of nonverbal communication. I find this fascinating due to the fact that you can tell if someone is mad or happy based on their stance. I find it fascinating about how you can read a situation without the other person saying a single thing. Due to this class I could tell if someone is mad at me. Characteristics of someone being mad and trying to identify these using nonverbal cues are easy for me now. When someone you love is mad at you they tend to use only one word answers. For example when you ask how they are doing, they say “fine”. If you say that you love them, they say “ok’. But also you learn to read the whole situation instead of going with your gut. If you think that someone is mad, you must first ask what the weather is. It might be cold and the other person is cold, but they don’t want to say anything.

Chapter 11 question 3

When it comes to the function of media, in the book it describes that it had four functions which are surveillance, correlation, cultural transmission, and entertainment. The first on to show info, the second is the analysis of info, the third is education, and the fourth is to entertain people. I feel that all of these are important for media, but I feel that the most important are correlation and entertainment. The reason why we engage in media is to be entertained. It doesn’t matter what program you watch or listen to ranging from Howard Stern to Oprah, we watch them because we find their programs interesting and entertaining. Correlation is analyzing the info that we are given and we must decide if the info we are given is accurate. I feel that this is a good function of the media to expose lies because the fact of the matter is that we aren’t taught to question media that much, we tend to go on face values, instead of trying to find the truth. That’s what news is all about, trying to find the truth, and I think that media does a good job with these functions.

Chapter 11 question 2

When it comes to Marshall Mcluhan’s theory that the medium is the message I totally agree with that theory 100%. The reason why I believe this is because he does explain his theory clearly. In the example in the book he says that print media tries to be rational and television tries to makes it more sensational. Most newspaper just tries to give the facts and if someone wants to express their opinion it is in the editorials. Television news doesn’t try to separate opinion with news. CNN always tries to just deliver facts, but other cable news station such as MSNBC and Fox news put their opinion in when telling the stories of the day. The problem with this is television host such as Glenn Beck and Sean Hannity try to appear as legitimate news anchor, but they are more like personalities. They are paid to give their opinion about a certain matter, not tell the facts. So people like Glenn Beck will only talk about matters that he knows he could spin it in his favor. So yes where something is broadcasted can change the message.

Chapter 11 Question 1

When it comes to the world of networking on the internet I really haven’t made friends with anyone online. It’s not like I feel that I am better than anyone, but it feels that you could fool anyone on line. Anyone could pretend to be anyone on line. I am a 5’10 male from California, but online I could be 5’4 supermodel women. Because of this aspect I really don’t try to find friends online.
When I talk to people online it tends to be with people I know. But thanks to social networking sites you are able to communicate with people that you aren’t able to communicate with on a regular basis. An example of this could be a someone that you met long ago and you forgot their number, but thanks to sites such as myspace and facebook you are able to get into contact with that person.
When it does come to making friends online, I chose not to make friends based on that aspect.

Chapter 6 question 1

When it comes to the controlling of a relationship it could be damaging to a relationship. There are three patterns of this called, rigid complementary, competitive symmetry, and submissive symmetry. For complementary it is when one partner is in control. The competitive part is when two individual compete for top position, and submissive is when both people don’t want control. Even though I find problems with some of these positions I feel that rigid complementary is the most difficult to change. I feel that submissive is also damaging, but the thing about that is neither one of the partners tries to take control. No one is trying to one up each other.
I feel that the rigid complementarity is to most difficult to change. It takes a big person to relinquish power. To give up power and become an equal takes a big person to do. I feel this is damaging to an individual due to the fact the other person might not feel equal.

Chapter 6 question 3

When I get into an argument with someone, doesn’t matter if it is a close one or a complete stranger, I tend to try, key word try, to control myself. Out of anger we as people just got out of emotion, not really thinking about the consequences till later. It might be able to save the relationship, but sometimes that just isn’t enough. To be able to be great communicators we need to be able to control ourselves during arguments.
Some of the ways to control yourself during a argument is withdraw. That is where you leave when things start to heat up, but the problem with this is due to you let the anger builds and the argument might get more intense. Other positions could be forcing in which you go for the win, you don’t care about the others positions.
But I feel the most positive way to get done with arguing is to compromise. We need to put our ego away and realize that we need to learn how to communicate with each other.

Chapter 6 question 2

Finding someone to mess around with or just have a one night stand you really don’t have to be picky about them. The only test they need to pass is if they are attractive enough to be with you. But to build a relationship with someone that is a different scenario. For me personally I need a girl to have a sense of humor. That’s a must for me due to I don’t want to be with someone that takes themselves serious all the time. They must be attractive, at least in my eye. But one of the most important parts is that the girl needs to be an individual, some one that does things their own way. What I find unattractive is constantly being serious, being uptight, or just someone that goes with the crowd. They could look like Paris Hilton for all I care, but if they are any of those things it just kills it for me.
For Duck’s theories on how relationships dissolve it does make sense to me. The intrapsychic is about how a person might feel that the other isn’t meeting their psychological needs as not being there emotionally. The dyadic phase is where the partners talk about their problems and decide if they want to continue with the relationship. The social phase is just announcing to loved ones that you two broke up, and the grave-dressing phase is just trying to determine what went wrong.
As far as social or pre-interaction cues I never used these to determine if I want to get to know a person. I’m not shallow, I really don’t care where someone comes from I just want to know who they are as people.

For the most part I don’t believe in the rationality and perfectibility premises. The reason why I don’t agree with the rationality premise is that I really don’t believe that most people are rational. Let’s take religion for example. When you are a religious fanatic your mind can’t be changed. Even when someone brings a rational argument they won’t budge from their beliefs, so no I don’t agree with the rational premise. I really don’t believe that we are born as sinners. When a baby is born what possibly can a baby do that could be considered bad. I’m not a big fan of the words good and bad. I believe that we chose to either be good or bad. We as humans have something that most being don’t have. We have free will. But I believe in the mutability premise. We are indeed shaped by our environment and that we could improve our physical and psychological circumstances. The first two I don’t believe, but for the mutuality I believe in. For the rationality premise I belive that most Americans believe in this. For the perfectibility premise I believe that christens believe in this. For the mutability premise, maybe Buddhism.

Chapter 12 Question 3

I feel that intercultural communication is necessary for all of us. The reason why I feel this way is due to the fact we need to communicate with other cultures to establish peace and understanding. We cannot stay isolated in our own cultures, believing that our set of norms and standards are superior to other cultures. Let’s take for example the gay culture. Right now they are fighting for there right to be recognized. Currently there are 6 states that allow gay marriage. You might not agree with the gay life style, but in order to keep peace we need to communicate. Both sides of an argument need to communicate, we can’t be one sided and ignore people based on they don’t have the same belief system as you do. When we communicate with people from another culture we grow as humans. We get to experience what some people will never get the experience to. We get to see things from another persons point of view.

Chapter 12 Question 1

Anthropologist Ruth Benedict stated that we are “creatures of our culture” and I believe this statement to be true. One example could be how we define beauty. In America we believe that beauty is tall and skinny, but in other cultures it could be something else entirely. But this belief is portrayed by Hollywood and this is what they call the standard of beauty. I believe that most of our beliefs are in fact shaped by our culture. When we are young we see how our parents act and believe and we absorb like a sponge what they tell us. We are told when we are younger that hard work pays off and I do believe that a majority of American people do believe this, so this could be another belief of culture.
How we as a culture could break through the limits is to question is what is going around us. Ask about beliefs about a culture and try to figure out if the idea in question makes any sense. We need to find the truth.

Question 3

I thought it was interesting in chapter 5 when it was discussing dress and how it serves three functions which are comfort-protection, modesty, and cultural display. I never really thought about it but it is true. Our clothes give off nonverbal gestures that tell strangers who we are. But that also has its fault. Just what you wear doesn’t tell who you are as a person. Also clothing is used to establish if a person has credibility. A good example of this could be a lawyer. If a lawyer would come to court just in a t-shirt and shorts with sandals he wouldn’t be taken seriously. I’m not saying a lawyer that would do that isn’t smart and professional, but others could interpret this to be bad. So yes I do believe that clothing tells society about us, but it is not the entire truth. But we shouldn’t judge people on what they wear.

Question 2

Nonverbal messages just based on what culture you come from could be mistaken by other people. The example of miscommunication in the book is about giving what we Americans call the “OK” sign. We may be used to giving that sign over here but in other countries that sign could have different meanings that we don’t intend to give out. According to the book in some countries the “ok” sign is meant to say that something is worthless. Or in some countries giving the “Ok” symbol refers to the female genitalia. So what we as American consider to be a non verbal message saying that we are ok, in other countries has an entirely different meaning altogether. To be fair I never really had a bad experience with communicating with someone from another culture. I know in some cultures it is a sign of disrespect to show the bottom of you shoe. But I feel that to communicate with other people we should always show respect.

Chapter 5 Question 1

Nonverbal messages and gestures could be misinterpreted, let me give you one example. One day I was hanging out with my friend Alba and we went to go get something to eat at 3am. We started talking about what we did over the weekend and I told her I was hanging out with my friend Mario and his girlfriend. She asked if there were any other girls and I told her no, but immediately she told me that I was lying. This puzzled me because it truly was my Friend Mario and I and his girlfriend. I tried to argue, but I realize that it was going nowhere. I promised her that I was telling the truth. She said alright, and then I noticed she started to cross her arms and immediately thought she was angry and trying to mask the fact she was angry. I immediately thought that she was angry but then I noticed that it was 3 am in February and was extremely cold, and she wasn’t wearing a jacket. When I noticed this I offered her my jacket and she was happier at this gesture. I believe that how we could improve on interpreting nonverbal messages by analyzing the whole situation. We shouldn’t act right away, but look around and see if there could be other explanations.

Why listening is important

We talk about listening, but I feel that most of uses really don’t do it. I believe that we hear, not listen. For example in a class when the professor is giving a lecture we tend to sometimes zone in and out. But to become more effective as students and people we truly do need to enhance are listening skills. In the book it said that 60 percent of business errors are due to not listening. If we focused are attentions on what the boss tells us instead of what we are going to do tonight we could get work done. But it is also in are personal life as well as professional life. When we come in from a long day and we just want to relax and are significant other comes in and starts to tell us about their day we sometimes just zone out or give one word answers. When we do this is gives our significant other the impression that we don’t care and cause a fight. But we do.

Question 1

When it comes to perceiving others in my own personal opinion I believe to a certain extent we tend to judge people. I’m not saying that we all gather around and criticize people for the fun of it, but it tends to happen. But I don’t believe that all judgment and categorizing is essentially bad. In some cases it is like racial profile or judging a persons character based on the way the dress or look. But sometimes it’s innocent. A good example of this could be we see an athletic individual in their sports uniform. Based on their appearance we could assume that they are on a sports team. How we could make our judgments fairer is that we need to realize that we truly don’t know some of the people that we judge. We need to remind ourselves that that maybe we’re not normal and that we should be fairer when judging.

Question 2 Men and Women

On the position that women and men use language differently, I totally 100% agree with that statement. I like the example in the book about three friends that are lost and the males refuse to stop and act for directions. I think if the woman wasn’t there they would stop and ask for directions. But men in the company of women sometimes have such an ego they can’t admit confusion. I do agree that women like to talk about feelings and emotion more than men. Men don’t like to like to discuss feelings with other men, but with women involved it’s another story. But one thing that both men and women don’t use the same language is when they are in a relationship. Both partners tell their friends about a certain argument or conversation and could have two totally perceptions of what just took place. With your friends they could agree you are in the right, but with her friends you are in the wrong. So, yes men and women use language differently.

Question # 2

I have no doubt that the pragmatic perspective has a certain degree of validity. About how a relationship with another individual is sort a game. Anyone that has ever been in a romantic relationship could concur with this fact. An example could be you and your significant other got into a fight. It could be about a big thing or a small thing, but it really doesn’t matter. They get angry and you get angry, it’s an endless cycle. Each party is waiting for the other to cave and admit fault. So I do agree this perspective to a certain extent. The problem with this perspective it doesn’t take feelings and certain cultures into account. But for the most part I do feel that communication with other could be considered a game. But this perspective does have things different than a game. A game has a winner. But in life there doesn’t always have to be a winner. Sometimes just losers.

Question #1

The Social Constructionist is an interesting perspective. The book defines it as “communication is not something that goes on between individuals, but is something that surrounds us and holds the world together”. I do believe this to be true. Most of the news that we get is from mass media such as newspapers, the internet, and television. We as people don’t for the most part see news happening, but sometimes we do. For the most part we depend on mass media to inform us as a society. How we as a society “build worlds” is we relay info through the mass media. We build worlds by communication. In the book it says that what we learn about other people’s culture is not first hand, but we learn by communicating with others. Some of the things that we have in our culture that some other cultures do not have could include freedom of speech. Some other cultures do not have this. It is kind of bitter sweet. Some speech we might agree with, but some other forms of speech are dangerous. But as a whole I think freedom of speech is great thing to have. You may not agree with what I am saying, but you have the right to challenge my beliefs, and that is the most important part of all.

Question # 3

One of the most fascinating parts of Chapter 2 in my opinion is the use of symbols in communication. The subject in general in Chapter2 is just briefly discussed in the beginning and I find this fascinating. Let me give you an example. Lets say I go to a foreign country like Germany or Russia. I am not there with someone that speaks the native tongue and basically I have no idea what’s going on. Even though I might not speak the native tongue, I know a circle with a cross in the middle means not to do the act in question or I could tell what a stop sign looks like. You might not speak the native language but by doing simple gestures to the natives’ the message can be received. Another example could be you’re at home and you see a family member sick on the couch. You ask them if the are ok and the give you the ok sign. This is what I find fascinating. This is an example how you could say so much by doing so little.

Question # 3

In my opinion one of the most important facts about chapter one was about evolving nature of communication during the medieval and Renaissance era. The two most important ways of convincing others were in the form of preaching and reading. Due to the fact that most people back in the day couldn't read or write it was important to have at least one person there that was educated. A king would have someone on staff that knew how to write and would have that person write laws that the kingdom had to obey.
The second important way of convincing others back in the good old days was preaching. Since many people were illiterate a preacher was needed to interpret the bible. So this was a powerful position, due to the fact that they could basically tell their audience what they believe to be the true interpretation of the bible. which might be a falsehood.

In my own opinion one doesn’t need to have any morality to be able to persuade others as an orator. The only quality one must have is the ability to get people to hang on one’s every word. I’m not saying that to be a great orator you have to have no ethics, but if you look at such dictators such as Adolf Hitler or Joseph Stalin they were fantastic orators, and had no ethical values. The only quality is you need to appeal to the audience that your talking to. One must give a message or a plan to what the audience feels is the correct course. In my opinion there is no correlation between truth, good, or public communication. An example of this could be religious figures. They use such a positive as not judging people or basically be good people to each other. But they could flip that message to spread hate or to settle a vendetta. So no I don’t believe this to be true.

George Carlin

One speaker than i admire is considered to be one of the greatest stand-up comedians of all times, George Carlin. But he was more than just a stand-up comedian, some could say that George Carlin was a philosopher. His ability to persuade people was from logos. When he would make a point he would apply logic to his theories that he had on the subject on question. George Carlin would take things that we never really question and would break it down. Even if you removed all the jokes from his comedy there is still message that is worth listening to.
For my own style of persuasion I feel that I fit into the logos category. I try to use logic when trying to make any argument. I don’t try to persuade people through emotion or fear. An example of this is just turn on Fox News any time and they try to make points by scaring their audience.
I feel that Aristotle’s communication model does work for Carlin because he uses Logos so well. In his act do he does ethos because he is known to tell it like he sees it.

Hello everybody my name is Orson weary and i am currently studying radio teleivision film here at San Jose State University. Ever since i was a little boy my goal,or dream as it were, to be involved in the entertainment industries. I look up to such performers as George Carlin, Richard Pryor, Johnny Carson, David Letterman, etc. what i hope to achieve with this class is to obtain a high profiencey in communications, where i could evolve beyond my educational years. This is what i hope to attain in this school year. With hard work i know that i could achieve this goal.