The Communicative Construction of Reality [1 ed.] 103208474X, 9781032084749

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The Commuriicative Construction of Reality

This volume advocates a shift from the social constructivism found in the work of Thomas Luckmann and Peter Berger, to a communicative constructivism that acknowledges communication as an embodied form of action in its own right, according to which social actors, in engaging in communicative action, construct a material social reality that guides, delimits, and enables actions. A study of the importance of understanding the role of communication in an age in which digitization and mediatization have extended the reach of communication to a global level and brought about the emergence ofthe communication society, The Communicative Construction of Reality shows how communication society does not merely replace modern society and its hierarchical institutions, but complements it in a manner that continually results in conflicts leading to the refiguration of society. As such, it will appeal to scholars of sociology with interests in the sociology ofknowledge, communication, and social theory.

Hubert Knoblauch is Professor of Sociology at Technische Universität Berlin, Germany. He is the author of Powerpoint, Communication, and the Knowledge Society; the co-author of Videography: Introduction to lnterpretive Videoanalysis ofSocial Situations; and the co-editor of Culture, Communication, and Creativity: Reframing the Relations of Media, Knowledge, and Innovation in Society, and Social Constructivism as Paradigm: The Legacy of The Social Construction of Reality.

Knowledge, Communication and Society Series Editors:

The Communicative Construction of Reality

Bemt Schnettler Universität Bayreuth, Germany Hubert Knoblauch Technische Universität Berlin, Germany Michaela Pfadenhauer University o_f Vienna, Austria Alejandro Baer University ofMinnesota, USA

Hubert Knoblauch

Knowledge, Communication, and Society: Contributions to the New Sociology of Knowledge seeks to revive the academic collaboration and debates between European and Anglo-Saxon currents of thought in the social sciences that characterized the middle of the last century, and provide a forum for the development of a new sociology ofknowledge. A space for transatlantic discussion, it includes original works and translations of central works by contemporary European social scientists and is committed to an empirically grounded program of developing social theory.

Titles in tbis series Social Constructivism as Paradigm? The Legacy of Tue Social Construction of Reality Edited by Michaela Pfadenhauer and Hubert Knoblauch Erving Gotfman From the Perspective ofthe New Sociology ofKnowledge Jürgen Raab The Communicative Construction ofReality Hubert Knoblauch

For more information about this series, please visit: https://www.routledge.com/ sociology/series/KCS

1~~?io~;~~n~~~up LONDON AND NEW YORK

First published 2020 by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OXl4 4RN

Contents

and by Routledge 52 VanderbiltAvenue, New York, NY 10017 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an ieforma business © 2020 Hubert Knoblauch

The right of Hubert Knoblauch to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with sections 77 and 78 ofthe Copyright, Designsand Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part ofthis book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe.

List of diagrams Preface I

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library ofCongress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

ISBN: 978-1-138-36465-3 (hbk) ISBN: 978-0-429-43122-7 (ebk) Typeset in Times New Roman by Deanta Global Publishing Services, Chennai, India

Introduction

1. Science and theory 2 2. Scientific language and discourse 4 3. Theory 5

British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data

Names: Knoblauch, Hubert, author. Title: The communicative construction of reality / Hubert Knoblauch. Description: Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon; New York, NY: Routledge, 2020. 1 Series: Knowledge, communication and society 1 Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2019043308 (print) 1 LCCN 2019043309 (ebook) I ISBN 9781138364653 (hardback) I ISBN 9780429431227 (ebook) Subjects: LCSH: Social constructionism. 1 Communication-Social aspects. 1 Knowledge, Sociology of. Classification: LCC HM1093 .K66 2020 (print) 1 LCC HM1093 (ebook) I DDC 302.2,-dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.Ioc.gov/2019043308 LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019043309

vii viii

II

From social to comtnunicative construction

13

1. Social action, intersubjectivity, and communicative life-world 14 2. From language to empirical communication research 32 3. Tue Social Construction ofReality and its critics 38 III

Social theory: Communicative action

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7.

54

Communicative action 55 Reciprocity, relationality, and positionality 72 Body, sensuality, and affectivity 84 Working, performance, and performativity 99 Objectivations, objectifications, and signs 110 Signs and communication 122 Social reality, communicative life-world, and subjectivation 126

IV.A Theory of society: Time and sequentiality

1. Sequences of communicative action 136 2. Genres, institutions, and communicative forms 155 3. Social structures 170

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Contents 4. Discourse 178 5. Legitimations 188 6. Others, censorship, and social power 203

IV .B Theory of society: Space and media

Diagrams 207

1. Space 208 2. Presence, situation, and mediation 211 V

Diagnosis: Communication society

233

1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

From discursivation to the communication society 235 Communicatization 242 Infrastructure 249 Translocalization 258 Storage, de-structuration, and new boundaries of knowledge 262 6. Double subjectivation 264

VI

Conclusion: Tue refiguration of modemity

1 2 3 4

268

1. Beyond modernity and postmodernity 270 2. Figuration and refiguration 273 3. Refigured modernity 274 References Index

279 307

5 6 7 8

Types of action, validity claims, and worlds in Habermas' theory Triadic relation of communicative action Course of argument Continuation of communicative action according to Habermas/Luhmann Chiasmus ofmotive chain (following Husserl) Structures, forms, and communicative action Culture and structures (of communicative action) Media, signs, and communicative action

62 79 88 139 144

175 200 221

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Preface

Preface

"Socia!ity is the capacity ofbeing several things at once" G.H. Mead, The Philosophy of the Present

More than 20 years ago I wrote a book about the "Culture of Communication" that was subtitled The Communicative Construction of Cultural Contexts. When I chose the title for this book, The Communicative Construction of Reality, I by no means intended a mere continuation, removal, or revision of this older text. Just as I tried in the first book to develop some theoretical concepts from selected empirical studies and integrate them into a basic theoretical framework, so too is this new book preceded by a wide range of empirical studies - on topics ranging from religion and science, through PowerPoint presentations, to death visions and corpses. However, these studies, conducted over the past two decades, are not explored in this book. This is not an empirical study but a purely theoretical book. The focus on theory is, of course, related to empirical studies, and concems the fact that the arsenal of theoretical notions available seemed to me less and less adequate for empirical research. I therefore began to develop a theory because I was no longer satisfied with the current state of the theoretical discussion in sociology, or, for that matter, in the social sciences in general. As much as my own theoretical background seemed in need of further development, so too did other more recent propositions appear to me to be both unsatisfactory and redundant. Moreover, I felt that theory also needed to take into account the social changes that have occurred since the turn ofthe 1990s. In particular, communication, the central subject of this book, has changed. Tue digital age was making its first steps at that time - in 1990, I sent my first "attachment" from a Unix workstation - so communication has changed dramatically since, transforming society and social reality. These changes in social reality are the subject matter of this book, which deals with communication as a process of constructing society. Because and inasmuch as actors are getting involved in this construction creatively, I will talk about communicative actions rather than communication, and since communicative action creates a social reality that guides, delimits, and enables actions, we are dealing with the "communicative construction ofreality".

ix

By formulating a theory of the communicative construction of reality, I am building on an approach widely known as "social constructivism". This approach, as formulated by Peter Berger and Thomas Luclanann, provides the most important, albeit not the only, starting point for this book. In order to refine the basic categories, to specify the theoretical context and to identify the history of problems, I shall also draw on both classic and particularly more recent theoretical discussions in sociology as weil as social and cultural theory. On this basis, I formulate the thesis that society is constructed in communicative action. We become apart ofhuman society by acting communicatively, and society is changing to the extent that communicative actions are changing. In order to understand this notion of communicative action, it is necessary to liberate it from its limitation of merely relating to action based on language and signs, and of only being concemed with "talk about" action rather than "real" action for, in fact, even linguistically based action always implies a material carrier that needs to be produced and that leaves an e.ffect on the so-called physical world. This fundamental meaning of communicative action, as an elementary social process, constitutes the starting point for every social and cultural science and is, therefore, considered in detail in the first part of the book. Along with other sciences, sociology shares a specific interest in society as an empirical phenomenon resulting from the concatenation of communicative actions. In the outline of a general sociological theory, 1 first analyze the temporal dimension of this concatenation, before tuming to its spatial dimension. Starting from sequences of action, this will take us to the communicative forms, institutions, and social worlds that make up the basic components of different forms of societies. Societies are not only socially controlled action structures, rather they are interpreted, justified, criticized, and challenged in certain forms, which we call legitimation, by the participants themselves. With respect to these interpretations, language plays a decisive role. In the form of discourse, language and signs provide the legitimation for power and, thus, contributes to the process of the communicative construction. The reason why we need to address communicative actions lies in their growing importance. Communicative action is not only a largely situated fonn of action limited to the presence of actors. lt is also mediated in ways that connect it directly with society as a whole: in a spatial way, in a temporal way, materially, and meaningfully. This communicative character of action is becoming increasingly clearer, as, demonstrated, for example, by transformations in economic production, in politics, andin warfare. Unfortunately, communicative action rarely takes the form of the domination-free discourse Habermas connected with this term. Rather, it is subject to digital mediatization in a way that does not reduce it to instrumentality. This mediatization of communicative action turns society into communication society. Communication society does not substitute modern society but overlays it with a new communicative figuration so as to transform it into a refigured modemity. Communication society is also an empirical prerequisite for the revision ofthe basic social theory proposed in this book. I shall not present this argument as an empirical study. Rather, I shall refer to relevant empirical studies in passing and by way of the numerous references and

x

Preface

footnotes. Yet, even ifl promise an elaborate theoretical argument, I must beg the readers indulgence for the gaps that remain in the theoretical and empirical argumentation of the book. I would have loved, for example, to reconstruct the notion ofworking act (Wirken) in Schutz's and Husserl's writings which is so basic to understand reality (Wirklichkeit), and I would have preferred to be much more detailed in the diagnosis of what I call communication society. Yet I hope that this book motivates other students and researchers to continue the work on what I understand to be the open theory of communicative constructivism. The book is certainly much more difficult to read and challenging to the reader than its light-footed model, The Social Construction of Reality by Peter Berger and Thomas Luckmann. lt is, I have to stress, not aimed primarily at the public or even an educated public. As it deals in large parts with abstract social theories and theories of modern societies, the book addresses an academic audience of social science readers. If time permits, I may try to write a version that is more easily accessible. As much as the book's restrictions are a testimony ofmy other involvements, many of its merits are owed to the stimulating discussions with friends, colleagues, and students who have provided inspiration during the writing of this book. Surprisingly the presumed "grey" (as Goethe calls them) theoretical questions have triggered many lively discussions that have kept me working, they have encouraged me to pass through phases of doubt, and they have shown me that the text does find avid readers. I am particularly grateful to Ronald Hitzler, with whom I have led the longest dialogue of my life. His enduring incomprehension at the "communicative construction" was a constant challenge. Without Jo Reichertz there would be no academic movement of"communicative constructivism", and without the discussions with my students in Berlin and with colleagues at academic lectures in Austria, the Czech Republic, Germany, France, Poland, Switzerland, and the UK, the ideas would have remained much more immature and parochial. I especially thank Mathias Blanc, Lilli Braunisch, Johannes Finger, Meike Haken, Miira Hill, Christian Heath Arne Janz, Eric Lettkemann, Leopold Meinert, Trevor Pinch, Julia Rothenburg, Joshua Schroeder, Aksel Tjora, Michael Wetzel, and Rene Wilke. Cordial thanks are due to the intellectual friends and critics who selflessly read chapters ofthe book and added important ideas: Gabriela Christmann, Reiner Keller, Dirk vom Lehn, Martina Löw, Michaela Hutter, Manfred Prisching, Jo Reichertz, Bernt Schnettler, Jan Slaby, Boris Traue, and, of course, Rene Tuma (who hopefully read the text not only out of professional duties). For the diagrams, I would like to thank Philip Graf. I have translated the quotations from books which are published other languages than English myself (there will be no reference, such as "transl. by HK", in order to avoid an additional extension of the text). To indicate that many persons next to me were involved in the writing of this book, I use the first person plural. Everyone who strives to understand the text may also feel included in this "we", which should sound like a pluralis modestae, instead of a pluralis majestatis. To cope with academic bureaucracy while writing this book would not have been possible without Felicitas Heine. Lars Mojem, Louis Schiekiera, and Andrea

Preface

xi

Coleman turned the manuscript into a handsome text with complete footnotes and references. Gratitude does not suffice to express what I owe to my family, Barbara, Delia, and Urs. They are the life in which my work only makes sense. The book is dedicated to Thomas Luckmann, who died while I was working on the German version of this book. He was my teacher in sociology, in social theory, and in thinking. Although he was critical about anything related to "ism", I hope that his thoughts also live on in this book. Berlin, Spring 2019

I

Introduction

Shortly after the release of Berger and Luckmann's The Social Construction of Reality, the philosophers Kamlah and Lorenzen tried to take philosophy in a new direction with their Logical Propaedeutic, published in 1967 (Kamlah & Lorenzen 1994). The book was one ofthe founding documents ofwhat came tobe called "methodological constructivism", revolving around the question of where and how logic begins and, with it, rational thinking by means of language. The authors saw the solution to this "problem of the beginning" in a straightforward way: the act of referring or, to be more precise, of pointing. Pointing, to them, is the bodily process of "predication". Predication, in the sense of assigning attributes to an object, requires that we refer to an object. In the deictic act of pointing, reference is made to something in the world in a way that corresponds to predication - without language. ·On this basis, Kamlah and Lorenzen then developed a systematic and formal logic. Pointing will serve .in this book, too, as a recurring example of what we call "communicative action", because pointing with a finger illustrates paradigmatically that we can produce a clear reference using our bodies and, without using language, it demonstrates the bodily aspects of communication. One does not even need language in order to be logical and rational; the bodily act of pointing suffi.ces as an "empractical" performance oflogic. On the basis ofthis act, one can derive a logical system that is as general as the ability ofpointing. Trying to characterize logic, rational thinking, and even science without relying on the basis of language is an approach not taken very often, it would seem. From a sociological point ofview, there are good reasons to not consider language as a neutral means for the analysis of society, as languages differ widely and vary between cultures and societies. If one started from a particular language in order to look for a general theory of logic or any other analytical system, one may easily fall prey to an ethnocentric perspective, in other words, the "world view" built into every language. Logic, on the other hand, corresponds to the implicit rationality of all human thinking and action. Moreover, as pointing demonstrates, this rationality is not only restricted to language. WoMan is not only a l:;qiov A6yov sxov, a creature with language. Where, we must ask, can we find this form of rationality if not

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Introduction

Introduction

in language? Tue answer can be found in Kamlah und Lorenzen's analysis of pointing. Pointing is not a solitary act by which one actor or thinker confronts the world, identifying objects by means of this act. Rather, the act of pointing implies not only that there is something eise to be pointed to, but also that there is someone else to perceive the pointing. Pointing is a fundamental social process. Pointing only makes sense within a social relationship: if a subject is pointing at something to another subject. Although Kamlah and Lorenzen mention this fundamental sociality of pointing, the impact of this insight is accounted for in sociology, in the sociology of knowledge andin science studies ratherthan in philosophy. 1 Tue communicative act ofpointing makes it clear, in fact, to what extent knowledge and thinking are social: pointing is founded on a relationship between at least two subjects, who refer to a third element in a way that makes sense to them. If we consider pointing to be a basic act, we must also consider its basic sociality. lt is the most general thesis of this book that communicative actions, such as pointing, are the fundamental social process by which society and its reality is constructed.

1. Science and theory Today it is sometimes argued that such an attempt to look for the "basis" of the social resembles a form of "theoretical fundamentalism" that ignores the differences and diversities ofsocial reality (see Marchart 2013). 2 The effort to subsume sociality under the common denominator of a Western, ethnocentrically defined, rational "order" is certainly thrown into question for good reason, as, particularly over recent decades, "rationalities" other than just Western scientific ones have moved into the center of an increasingly globalized awareness of intellectual traditions: This development toward modernity seems to incorporate African, Asian, Black, and Latin American traits, and even highly enlightened authors concede that religions have made a reasonable contribution to the "post-secular age" (Eisenstadt 2002; Habermas & Ratzinger 2006). But it is exactly this increasing diversity which demands that we try to look for commonalities. Therefore we start here with a gesture as simple as pointing, which we all perform in everyday life as a matter taken for granted. Tue fact that we are approaching this common denominator with the analytical tools of the social sciences does not mean to exclude other cultural perspectives. While we acknowledge that social sciences are based on a Western-influenced tradition and history, they by no means exclude the perspective of "others" or even "strangers", as feminist, postcolonial, and post-humanist authors quite rightly fear. However, as well-founded as their fears ofunification and premature generalization may be, these authors also base their arguments on some kind of

1 In philosophy, "Social epistemology" has recently adapted this idea of sociality. 2 Yet even Marchart (2013: 13) concedes that the "fundaments of sociality" do not disappear.

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Diagram 7 Culture and structures (of communicative action)

100 Schutz discusses imagination under the title "various worlds ofphantasms". He refers to a whole group of "fancies or imageries" (1962a: 234), the "innumerable provinces of meaning", among others "the realms of daydreams, of play, of fiction, of fairy tales, of myths, of jokes". Each of these sensory provinces "originales in a specific modification which is the paramount reality everyday life undergoes". Just as Husserl's fantasy is through and through a modification oflived experiences, so also für Schutz: imagination has its basis in everyday life, it is a "derivation" of the reality of everyday life. The basis for the derivation of imagination or imagined worlds is the ability to fantasize.

202

Theory of society: Time and sequentiality

This imagination builds on the kind of transcendence implied in all objectivations. Since it is based on the incorporation ofknowledge, it is a this-worldly transcendence: whatever syrnbols may refer to, this reference must be performed by the subject itself in order to speak of a syrnbol. This process can be performed in the imagination we create in our minds, by means of literary encodings and conventions. Tue imaginary can also be created by visual means. For example, cinematic models guide the subjective experiences of apocalyptic visions (Schnettler 2004). 101 We can therefore follow the suggestion made by Iser (1993) to link fiction and imagination: while fiction is the performance of signs, we need imagination in order to translate the fictitious into a subjective perspective. However, we must not reclaim the imaginary as something that is a universal province of meaning in the subjective mind. Its symbolic character does not lie on one side of the consciousness, but on the reference performed by way of the symbol as a sign. 102 And it is precisely in this way, according to Schutz, that we can discover the special transcendence that is linked to symbols: it is the fact that syrnbolic reality is fundamentally elusive; it escapes from the social reality that makes it symbolic. Whether we consider the dream as an experience communicated by gods or (as in psychoanalysis) by our subconscious; whether we consider some bodily reactions as a consequence of magical powers or as the profane effects of causal effects; whether Beethoven's Ninth Symphony refers to the idea ofthe entire transcendence ofhumanity, or simply to a popularized musical motif - all this may well be interpreted very differently. However, if it is experienced as a reference, we are dealing with a symbol. As already discussed, symbols are not limited to "language". Symbols can be carved in stone, like gothic church buildings in which beliefs are symbolically petrified. Duby (1978) exemplified this type of"petrified" symbolization of Christian theology in his description ofReims Cathedral. Symbols, however, also appear as communicative forms with different complexity. They can be theaters, stages, or images; jokes, sermons, or the "History of the World since the Big Bang" on nine DVDs. As Goffman (1974) has shown, such symbolic realities are framed in particular ways. Frames also include "interactions" as well as the objectivations that indicate the respective frame of reference. Frames consist of rules ofbehavior, communication, and interpretation, as well as various physical, material, and tecbnical objectifications (stigmata, curtains, toys).

101 In this understanding of experience, it should always be remembered that we are dealing with communicative actions, even in the most passive case. Mere experience is such a form of nonaction (as discussed above). This applies, for exarnple, to ascetic self-control when listening to classical music, where one still suppresses the faintest cough reflex. lt also applies to the monkish silence ofthe Quakers (R. Bauman 1983) or the inner emptiness of Zen Buddhist meditation (Preston 1988). 102 The transcendence of historical religions is therefore not simply an "aggrandizement" of "small transcendencies", but a symbolic construction that presupposes sign systems and is accordingly collective.

Theory of society: Time and sequentiality

203

Empirically, framing is performed by the use of special "keys" or "transformation signs". Transformation signs refer to the initial markings of the beginning and end of a new "frame" with its own reality. Examples of this can be found in forms ofreligious communication. Thus, Samarin (1987) emphasizes the special linguistic meaning of religious communication, indicating where, how, and when religious communication is perfonned. This can be in buildings (churches), with ritual objects (monstrance), and, in some cases, it may simply be acoustic sounds, such as "om" in Hinduism (Wilke & Moebius 2011 ), or a range of specialized communicative genres, sermons, and intercessions in Christian worship (Honko 1968). Since frames themselves are already performative, perfonnances play a special role in symbolic communication. In addition to their fundamental significance in communicative action, they turn situations into events if they become the focus of a collective. However, in his study of rituals in simple societies, Turner ( 1989) makes it clear that perfonnative demonstrations can create a symbolic character through their sequential structure: in their "liminal phase" they fonn a counterstructure of society as a whole, which indicates ex negativo their "nonnal" order. As Alexander et al. (2006) argue, this syrnbolic dimension of performances can also be demonstrated in present society. Events include the more or less everyday demonstrations of art - from street musicians to the concert hall. Events also include mass ceremonies led by the Pope or the opening game of the football World Cup. In modern times, events are strongly mediatized using mass media and, more recently, interactive and digitized media. Tue present reconstruction of legitimations from classifications to symbolic realities should not give the impression that the legitimations necessarily take on a consistent or coherent order. Thus, in events, signs can be mixed with different symbolic realities, such as in Protestant religious pop music or the mediatized football game. How much the legitimatory order can be unified is very much dependent on the power ofthose who construct and control legitimacy.

6. Others, censorship, and social power Theories of discourse have particularly addressed how language exerts a special kind of power. lt creates a reality by means of the structure of signs, their syntactic rules and their semantic references. This, of course, also applies to linguistic classifications. In their basic logic of association and dissociation, linguistic classifications divide, delimit, and demarcate. Classifications do create order and, simultaneously, the "Other" and the "Alien" - and thus deviation from what is ordered. Sociologically, classifications are particularly important when they are legitimations and linked to social structures (Durkheim & Mauss 1993). Even though we have seen that communicative forms can still be fluid and must not necessarily follow a uniform differentiation logic of association and dissociation of structures, the combination of communicative actions and forms with significative classifications can create clear assignments and delimitations. Collective identity follows from this link when we are identified, for example, as "men", "members of family X", or "inhabitants of country Y''. From this logic of association and

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Theory of society: Time and sequentiality

dissociation, however, the differences between "we" and "you", "your own", and "the Other", and "identity" are created by classifications - as well as "the Alien", which is outside the classification. The creation of the Other and the Alien can be an active process of "othering", which may be generated, for example, by the well-known topoi ofthe "scapegoat". 103 Otherness, however, which is anchored in classifications and the differentiations resulting from them, cannot, in principle, be regarded as "enmity," as Schmitt (1927) suggested. Neither must the power of maintaining order necessarily mean combat and war. lt can also be expressed in other forms of "border work" which, as Merton (1949) stressed, can even contribute to innovation. However, the establishment of the link between legitimation and social structures is certainly one of the sources of the politics. Politics concerns the interests of actors, who, thanks to categories, can also be collective actors, and it is about the power with which the legitimations in structures can be altered or destroyed. If legitimations refer to social structures, such as families, clans, villages, and cities, then they already exert a social power by merely classifying things. They "make sense" out of power, as Luckmann (1985a) would say. 104 Codifications also create inclusion and exclusion, because they formulate rules and, at the same time make "rule-breaks" observable and therefore sanctionable. In the case of can;nization, negation is already part of the definition. Canonization is almost always censored. Without censorship canonization seems impossible. As Berger and Luckmann observe with respect to delegitimization and alternative legitimations, censorship does not only concern the "false doctrine", but also those who represent it. Like classifications and codifications, delegitimizations are means of exercising social power and "will depend more on the power than on the theoretical ingenuity of the respective legitimators" (Berger & Luckmann 1966: 127). The concept of power draws attention to the question of how and which legitimations are enforced and institutionalized. To emphasize this aspect of power, Foucault speaks of discursive control practices that attempt to tarne, control, and organize discourses. Among these practices of discourse control are exclusion, prohibition, tabooing, ritualization of speech situations, disenfranchisement of the mentally ill, demarcation between true and false, etc. Censorship affects the "contents" of legacies as well as their "carriers" (and it also negotiates their differences). Hahn (1987) thus determines "cognitive censorship" not only as deprivation of the plausibility of alternative interpretations, but also as excluding the representatives ofthese interpretations. This is also true in a lesser way in "cathectic censorship", because this concerns the exclusion of others as something ugly or ridiculous. Finally, "moral censorship" does not allow for the

103 For example, Dietze (2006) shows how the appearance of a "woman with a headscarf' changes the relation between white men and women (without headscarves) because they appear tobe "equal" in comparison. 104 Discourses are not basically unequal, but they do imply a logic of inclusion and exclusion.

Theory ofsociety: Time and sequentiality

205

"other". Discursive demarcation is thus not only a contribution to the creation of symbolic realities or functional systems, but also a decisive form of"othering": it generates a negative identity by negating the (own) identity, as something eise, in a moral sense, as evil. However, this production of the "Other" is not only carried out by those who distinguish themselves from it, as was probably the case in medieval witchcraft. Since the possibility of criticism arises from the sequence of symbolic, or at least linguistic, communicative actions, the excluded sides ofthe classifications, codifi.cations, and canonizations can be the basis for sociological alternatives to the hegemonic legitimation if they find social carriers: self-defined witches, selfdeclared Satanists, or the powerless who join forces. (This is already possible on the basis of the legitimatory sequence, because the critique itself takes place sequentially.) These "Others" can turn into social roles and institutions. If this happens, we will have to deal with counter-legitimation. In the case oflegitimacy, these can be potential alternative elites who may challenge the legitimated elites' power - a process that, according to Pareto (1961 ), can lead to a cycle of elites. Weber has already conceived of power as a relational concept: power refers to a relationship in which someone exerts an effect on someone eise. If we follow Weber, then power exists sequentially in the chance that someone can "carry out [one's] own will despite resistance" (Weber 1978[1921]: 53). Ifwe translate the very subjectivistic concept of will, we can interpret power as a sequence of actions characterized by a particularly pronounced form of asymmetry. Those who exercise social power no longer take communicative action as arbitrarily applicable but try to take a firm position in their asymmetry of motives. Tue inorder-to motive remains, so to speak, one-sided and subjective, but it is part of a sequence: the Other does what (s)he wants. lnsofar as these actions can be made permanent and institutionalized, power structures can be formed. Moreover, like any communicative action, power can also be mediated - monitoring systems, control facilities, and security roads are current examples ofthis. Because of the physicality of communicative action, power can always take the form of violence. lt is, so to speak, a corporeal means of producing reciprocity, for instance, as the enforced coordination ofbodies. In this sense, violence refers to changes in the body ofthe Other. This can, of course, extend to things that can equally be regarded as the Other or as belonging to the Other. However, violence must by no means be equated with "destruction". Because the body is essential for communicative action, violence, as a physical activity on a different body (which is independently communicating), cannot be regarded as an extra-social or pre-social dimension even if it appears "inexplicable", as in the case of a killing spree. Violence is one ofthe most common forms in which otherness is generated. Think, for instance, of the fate of "witches" in medieval Europe. However, the nihilation of social categories of which Berger and Luckmann speak can also be active. The incredible tragedy ofthe Jews in the Third Reich shows how this can happen in a cruel, physical way. Social power refers to the action ofthe body, the discipline ofthe body, and, of course, its formation by self-discipline or ascesis. lnsofar as the asymmetry of

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Theory of society: Time and sequentiality

power does not employ violence, we will call it, with Weber, authority. Authority can be exercised discursively, since it consists of"the probability that a command with a given specific content will be obeyed by a given group of persons" (Weber 1978[1921]: 53). Tuus, command and obedience also represent a very specific sequence (signified) of communicative action. Tueir particular institutionalization in the form of a social role can be illustrated by the aforementioned example, namely, the asymmetric relationship between master and servant. This domination is based on a sequence with permanently fixed asymmetries of motives, and is decidedly discursive, but the order is a regular speech act. Moreover, this relationship is relative, one position cannot exist without the other.

IV.B Theory of society Space and media

At the beginning ofthis chapter, we had to return to the basic level of social theory we discussed in Chapter III. After introducing the basic concepts, we considered the temporal dimension of communicative action, proceeding from the thesis that temporality finds its most direct expression in sequences of actions, rather than in single acts. From the notion of"sequences ofaction", we deduced some general empirical features of society. Society consists of the temporal continuation of sequences of communicative action. Even one-sided and "solitary" communicative acts can be understood as subjectivated communicative action sequences. After all, action sequences are, by their very nature, essentially, temporal structures of communicative action. They create temporality through sequentiality, they take on special forms in their mutuality, and they create social structures through their typicality and recursiveness, to which legitimations refer by means of signs. Yet because of the relation of the body: the corporeal body concerned, the embodied objectivation, and even the material objectifications, communicative action always has a spatial dimension. Communicative i:lCtion is, thus, not only put into effect in the diachronic succession of sequences; it is also always in a synchronous coexistence with others, the Other, and objectivations. Tuis means that communicative action not only expands and adds temporally in sequences of action to forms, institutions, and structures. In addition to this temporal order, communicative action also always has a spatial order. By considering space, we return to our basic re:flections on the social theory of communicative action. We could have explored these re:flections in Chapter III. However, in order not to interrupt the connection between the elementary temporal aspects and their social forms, we outline the social theory of space only here. We shall start with the premise that space is tied to the body's presence. For this reason, physical co-presence is often taken to be at the core of social space. We want to add however that media allow the mediation of communicative action beyond the co-presence of embodied actors. Media also allow for the expansion of social space. Technology is the means by which communicative action is mediated. Media differ analytically from technology as, in addition to mediation, they involve some kind of signs. Therefore, we distinguish different kinds of mediation and shall consider both technology and media, which are common

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forms of mediation. The concept of mediatization refers to the media change of communicative action. This change can be described structurally, but it can also be described historically, for example, as a process of increasing or decreasing technization, or an increasing or diminishing density of signs, objects, and infrastructures. In a somewhat general manner, we then sketch the historical process of mediatization. Its last phase of mass media and (mass) communication culture forms the background for our diagnosis of contemporary communication society, which we will discuss in the next chapter.

1. Space Tue spatial dimension of communicative action was addressed by the example of finger-pointing. The space in which the pointing occurs by no means pertains only to the subjective consciousness ofthe one who points; neither can it be reduced to a mere physical feature and its cognitive equivalent in the brain. Rather, pointing only makes sense when we take into account the standpoint ofthe other subject to whom something is shown. This relational reference is explained by the fundamental reciprocity of communicative action, which Schutz (1962: 316) calls the "interchangeability of the standpoints". This means that actors in communicative action are automatically able to reversely anticipate the visual and kinesthetic perception in the bodily executions they perform. Pointing does not simply mean pointing to something, it also incorporates showing it to someone eise, so that they can perceive it from their perspective: in my view, I anticipate the perspective of the other - for example, by making something visible so that others see it (and not hiding my pointing finger behind my back). lt is only against the background of this relation between subjects that the particular spatial aspect ofthe subjective, which we have designated as positionality, becomes plausible. lt is the interchangeability of the standpoint that makes the reciprocal relation of subjects with regard to space possible, so that the pointing by the other is also seen by me. In other words, with the possibility of anticipating the other standpoint, the positionality ofthe subject presupposes the very location from which reciprocal, and thus relational, pointing is carried out physically. Due to this kind ofreciprocity, the pointing finger opens the space to the position ofthe subject who points, and it also opens the interactive space to the subject being shown. As a model of communicative action, pointing exhibits a further relation. The finger is an embodied object that can be grasped as the third element of the triad, in other words, the objectification. Starting from the reciprocal relation, objectification is not only the third element that expands the relation spatially- it points to something eise which goes beyond the triad. This way, the triad expands into "open space". The interchangeability of the standpoints, as we have seen, is only one aspect of reciprocity that constitutes the relations between subjects and objectivations in communicative action. However simple it may be, it thus allows us to explain the relationality of deixis and it contains a basic idea of how space is formed in communicative action. In order to further develop the concept of space, we would

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like to connect with Löw's relational theory of space. We shall, however, have to briefly explain how we can adapt this to the concept of communicative action and the changed notion of relationality. Space, Löw argues: is a relational arrangement ofliving beings and social goods. Space is constituted by two processes that must be analytically distinguished: spacing and the operation of synthesis. (Löw 2016: 135) While Löw's idea of the places (as locations on which objects are placed) and "arrangements" can be grasped by the notion of objectifications, the basic concepts of"spacing" and synthesis are based on the one-sided model of action developed by Giddens. We therefore need to translate them into our social-theoretical model of communicative action. As important as Giddens' concept ofpractice is for the understanding ofinstitutionalization, it proceeds from what we have termed "one-sided action", in other words, a notion of action that lies outside the theory of sociality. The starting point of his theory of action is the "1-world relation". Communicative action, however, proceeds from a triadic relation enabled by reciprocity. lt is not the subject that is the primary reference point, rather the subject in a relation with the other. Space is not simply constituted in a dual relation between subject and object, or even between subjects. The objectivizations do not refer to "us" as a miraculously given universal subdivision ofapluralis majestatis. 1 Rather, space is formed in a social, or at least a socially constituted, relation, which is working, effecting, and affecting an objectivation or an objectification. As Steets (2015) rightly emphasizes, this objectivation is constitutive of the space. lt is so because it objectively defines a reciprocal intelligible meaning (i.e. the reference of pointing) physically or materially, which makes social action a communicative action. This first change of meaning from a one-sided to a socially relational perspective, affects, secondly, what Löw (2016) describes as "spacing". Christmann (2015: 98) draws attention to this change when she equates it with the "spatial activity of acting subjects'', for example the positioning of goods and people. Spacing is based on the positionality of the two parties who are related to one another in a reciprocal manner in the action. This relation follows not only from the perspective of the individually acting subject and her/his position, but also from the triadic relation of subjects and their objectifications. Space consists of the relation between subjects, as well as oftheir relation to objectivations, objectifications, and their arrangement (Christmann 2013). lt is because these objectivations are meaningful that space is always communicative. For this reason,

Also phenomenology assumes that space is initially constituted in the relationship of the individual to the world (Fuchs 2000). Moreover, the objectivist conceptions of, for example, the effect of the spatial atmosphere, as represented by Böhme (1999) or the effect of images, as theorized by Bredekamp (2010), do start from individual viewers who in solitary isolation face the world.

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one can say tliat " spaces" communicate because the arrangement of the objects, the people, and their relationships makes sense without the latter having to be expressed precisely, by means of signs or even verbally (Fischer & Delitz 2009). Space is not only about the (supposedly subjective) dimensions of the life-world, such as above, below, back, or front, but also about surfaces, elevations, inclines, openings, gaps, and obstacles that make sense as objectified formations ofbodies and objects. Space is also constituted by "body formations" and objects, such as the circular arrangement of small focused groups, as well as room arrangements of projectors, presenters, computers, and the public in PowerPoint presentations (Knoblauch 2013). Like all objectivations, spatial objects, places, and relations can, of course, also be conventionalized and assume specific signification: hills and mountains that, like the Alps, bad long been regarded as "obstacles", can be transformed into aesthetic objects; caves can be transformed into homes or houses, cities, and entire landscapes, which are constructed like meaningful, highly symbolic material structures. lt seems, therefore, appropriate to suggest that architecture is not the only thing that makes buildings "speak to us" (De Botton 2006: 71). In this sense, space is by no means an abstract category, as in Kant's "form of rationality" (Verstand). The space of communicative action is also always embodied. Therefore, what Löw considers to be "synthesis" , also needs to be transformed. This is not only a process in subjective consciousness, but also corporeal and communicative, as it gains its spatial meaning from and within the social relation (Christmann 2015). Its corporeality is, of course, connected with the body and, as shown above, with sensuality. This also includes kinaesthetic experiences, that is, the sensed movements ofthe body. Finally, the body is linked to the affectivity of space by which we grasp the "effect" of spaces on us, such as atmosphere as a subjectively felt meaning of conventionalized forms (Löw 2016). If spatiality finds a subjective expression in the positionality of communicative action, it also certainly affects the subject by its objectivized form, gestalt, and materiality. However, spatial objectivations, provided they are made in communicative action and designed and interpreted in their own form, can also become subject to conventionalization. Then, as with any signs, they can be associated with equally conventionalized meanings (from the circular form of a seating arrangement formed by human bodies, to celestial vaults in churches ). These meanings of space can be semantically quite fixed, as is the case in much functionalist architecture: the "functions" define the "forms", which are correspondingly clear and distinct. However, the meanings of spaces - whether they are constructed by builders and architects, like residential buildings, or more or less natural, such as forests -are often very diverse, ambiguous, or out offocus, ifthey are to be translated into linguistic categories. Such linguistic indetermination is therefore often interpreted as a kind of "ineffability", as it is called, with respect to mystical experiences, or, with respect to buildings and spaces, "atmospheres" (Böhme 1993). The fact that atmosphere has an ambiguous meaning is also due to subjective knowledge ofthese meanings. Because space has permanence that can transcend the duration of subjective experience as well as knowledge of space, the materialized space can affect subjects, even ifthey do not explicitly know the

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meaning. This also applies to "imaginations" of the space, which are linked to the cultural imaginary, such as the symbolic meaning of "above" and "below" in near-death experiences (Knoblauch, Schmied, & Schnettler 2001). 2 However, because spatiality is fundamentally connected with communicative action, its subjective meaning is not covered by the discourses about space. The meaning of space (and also of its "appropriated" significations) is always fulfilled in its performance. At this point, the concept of space (re-)construction proposed by Christmann becomes relevant. lt is concemed with those procedural meanings that arise neither in objectivations nor in subjective knowledge. lt is therefore about processes: in which members of the social context regularly ascertain what is important for "their space": the physical and material structure of what they perceive as typical for "their" space (e.g. a particular landscape), the material forms with which they have changed "their space" in the course of history (e.g. changes in the landscape, construction of buildings, possibly with specific architectures), the important events happening there, the people who have acted there, things created there, the local folkways, habits and routines. 3 The shift to the triadic concept of relation has another consequence for the conception of space, which becomes clear if we look at what Luhmann calls "the location" (Stelle). For Luhmann, the location is where objects are located; it reveals its spatiality when the objects leave the places (Luhmann 2000a: 180f). However, locations cannot only be perceived with respect to objects. Locations need to be related to the body's points of view. Tue location of objects, objectivations, and objectifications opens up the space of communicative action with respect to the standpoint, still dependent, however, on the reciprocal relation to the standpoint. Because relational space transcends the position of the subject in communicative action, this transcendence can be expanded by mediatization and becomes translocal. W e will address this possibility in the next chapter.

2. Presence, situation, and mediation The critique of the assumption that the spatio-temporal "presence" of actors is the paradigmatic basis of society, forms the starting point of our fundamental

2 In Western near-death visions, death is mostly associated with going up (to the heavens), while in classical China, such visions are associated with the earth and a downward movement. 3 Christmann (2015: 100) rightly emphasizes that these are reconstructive processes presuppose memory. This memory is, itself, bound to communicative processes, which are, on the other hand, reconstructive (like "stories"). In the case of space, however, they are also objectified in a variety of materials, without necessarily having tobe reconstructed. For material-space-related constructions of reality are not static, "even physical-material configurations can be abandoned, unused, altered, or demolished" (2015 : 101).

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modification ofprevious approaches to sociological theory. We want to analyze, now, this notion of presence which forms part ofthe concept of situation. The concept of presence relates phenomenologically, first, to the present temporality of action as well as, second, to the spatial presence of whatever may be "given". Phenomenologically, presence exists when "an intentional object" (or, in the case of"intersubjective" presence, someone "like me") is given temporally or spatially. 4 Tue presence of things as well as the co-presence with others can therefore be directly related to the notion of situation in a sociological-interactionist sense. Referring to Goffman, Giddens (1987) defines the social situation by at least two actors perceiving one another and knowing that they perceive each other. Goffman has already emphasized the communicative character of the copresence, which encompasses the mutual perception ofthe body, as well as what they communicate intentionally or unintentionally. 5 (a) The situation

Tobe able to capture the triadic character in addition to co-presence, Goffman has proposed "social situation" as a key sociological concept. In his ":framework analysis" (Goffman 1974), he also includes the subjective side, as for example, in the "undetected deception". The subjective perspective is indispensable for deception, which builds on the difference between the position and the relation. F or this reason, the subjective perspective forms part of the phenomenological concept ofthe situation, as Hitzler and Honer (1984) explicitly state. For sociology, this concept has become significant through the famous "definition of the situation" by Thomas and Thomas (1928): "Ifmen define situations as real, they are real in their consequences" (Thomas & Thomas 1928: 571). Tue plural already indicates that the social situation is not only determined subjectively. Goffman (1972: 63) defines it as "any physical arena anywhere within which two or more individuals find themselves in visual and aural range of one another", in other words, "in one another's presence". If one accepts Goffman's proposition, then the social situation is spatially characterized by temporal copresence, as well by common physical space. As closely as Goffman ties the social situation to physical space, his definition of the situation includes a further aspect, which has been highlighted by Goodwin (1981): the social situation is also characterized by response presence. Response presence means that at least two actors coordinate their actions simultaneously in time. This coordination does not have to be symmetrical, as is the case of showing: the one perceives what the other does. Coordination can also involve a

4 Derrida (1967) criticizes the metaphysical assumptions ofthe concept ofpresence by noting that, from a subjectivist phenomenological point ofview, it always means the absence of others. 5 Goffman (1972) distinguishes between "signs given" and "signs given oft", that is objectivations that are made intentionally and those that can be read by others without necessarily being set intentionally, such as clothes and other parts of one's "front".

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non-action, as, for example, mutual ignoring in the elevator or walking in a pedestrian zone are social situations. Situation can therefore consist ofthe fact that the subjects share a space reciprocally, but they and the objectivations mentioned can also be spatially distributed and still form part of a situation - provided that the actions are coordinated and synchronized in "response presence". Just think of a group of computer gamers, sitting in different rooms, wearing headsets, watching their monitors and playing agame together (or against each other). Ifwe determine the social situation by this mutual coordination, co-presence and shared physical space is no longer necessary for social situations. This does not mean that communicative action is no longer "physical". On the contrary, detachment from the physical space ofthe body is produced and made possible by special material forms, to which Goffman himselfhas already referred. At various points in his work, he deals with interactions using various means of communication. Alternate coordination is possible, for example, when telephoning, in which a physical co-presence at the same location is not necessary. 6 What we consider as the overcoming of co-presence with the same "response presence" is what we call media. 7 (h) Media and technology

The concept of medium is immanent to the theory developed so far. Before we define media, Jet us illustrate what we mean, using the example offinger-pointing. We have regarded the finger as an objectification. As such, it has a referential character, since pointing with the finger refers to something else in space. Thus, the finger can be interpreted as a medium in a certain sense (although, as we shall see, this is limited). Nevertheless, part of the body, the hand or the finger-pointing to something is "the basic form of a medium" (Traue 2013a: 263). Just as Traue underlines the primordiality of the medium ("basic"), the finger is a (bodily) objectification that serves as a reference to something eise. lt has, therefore, a referential character, which, as we have seen, is the starting point for conventionalization, for signs, and for language. 8 In addition, the finger also has the character of a working act, because it is a performative movement of the hand that, if necessary, can also produce a material effect on other objects: in its movement, it may wave in front of the face or move toward the object, touch and move, or transform it. The finger is, thus, an intermediary to what is shown and

6 Goffman even anticipates video-telephony. Cf. Pinch 2010. In addition, in his analysis of "response cries" Goffman ( 1981) mentions a different form of reciprocal action in the absence of others, for example, the kind of reaction we have when stubbing a toe against a stone. In other words, by no means do we need the physical presence of someone at whom the curse is directed (except the stone). 7 Of course, media also contribute to the temporal overcoming of the co-presence, for example as storage media (writing, computer), which can be reused at different times. See Chapter VS. 8 For an analysis of different conventionalized forms of pointing devices, see Storrer and Wyss (2003).

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to the objects in space. In its corporeality, however, it is not merely a reference: the finger is a means and intermediary, because it has its own "materiality". Tue material arrangement of fingers, bodies, and what is referred to thus constitutes a formation in which the finger serves as a coordination "device" which allows for coordination and synchronization. In addition, the finger has a particular material shape, a gestalt, namely the elongated form, which (especially with the extended arm), protrudes out of the body and forms a line to be extended by the mind by reciprocal perception, in a way that may be most clearly grasped as a spatial "reference". If, therefore, the objectification signifies a relation to the body that produces a meaningful reference, in its form and materiality the finger expresses what makes it, in a certain sense, a medium (McLuhan & Fiore 1967b). Tue concept ofthe medium is not entirely encapsulated by the finger, because we have to make do with a physical objectification. More specifically, by media we mean an "extension of the body", in a way that does not apply to those objectifications, which, unlike objectivations, are regarded as detached from the corporeal body. 9 We therefore do not want "media'' here to simply mean extensions ofthe body, but, rather, objectifications which must be regarded as detached from the body.1° This also applies to the finger, which was only referred to in the aforementioned restricted sense as a medium, and can be viewed in isolation as detached from the body only under macabre circumstances. (Perhaps this detachment is possible in certain world views in which fingers act as independent actors, such as for pianists.) In contrast to the idea of media as something that is considered part of the body, that is, as an objectivation, here we take it tobe an objectification that is detached from the body. One further aspect needs to be added to the medium as an objectification, which coincides with what we have referred to above (Chapter III.5.c) as technology. Media as weil as technologies consist of effective treatments that produce objectivations: instead of a finger, it is the stab that shows something. Instead ofthe stab, we may also use a sign: a bent branch points the way, or the sign of an arrow which we use conventionally to indicate directions. However, media are also often associated with objectifications that affect other objectifications: the finger pushes a button that generates a sign (for example, the keyboard on a computer), or the button is electrically connected to a signal that is in a different place. Such interrelationships or mediations can also be institutionalized as technologies, such as the telegraph system (Flichy 1995). As far as technology is concemed with the mediation of signs, however, we are dealing with media (cf. Rammert 2007a: 62ff). 11

9 McLuhan and Fiore regard the body as a medium because it is "capable of formulation, patterning, shaping" (McLuhan & Fiore 1967a: 289). We do not want to equate the concept ofthe "medium" with the body, rather we want to reserve it for objectification in order to allow a clear analytical distinction from techniques. McLuhan and Fiore's definition ofmedia as extensions of the body has been rightly criticized in media theory, because it is too much bound to the body. 10 Cf. Chapter III. 5. 11 According to Rammert (1989), the basis of media can, in fact, be determined as a communicative form.

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As much as technology is ofteu reduced to being "function-related", "instrumental", or even to a cause, 12 essentially, as we have seen above, it consists of the "mediation relation" (Rammert 2007a: 55) between communicative actions and objectifications, which we have described above using Dewey's (2002) term "mediation". Because technology is characterized by its high regularity, its objectifi.cation contributes to the formation of social structures and can become part of institutions. 13 Hunting technologies, such as spears, contributed to the institutionalization ofhunting and to the formation ofthe roles ofhunters (as well as gender roles). Tue bus, the railway, or the telegraph are the starting points for the development ofhighly complex infrastructures, where social and material aspects cannot be clearly distinguished. If objectifications themselves are mediated by means of other objectifi.cations (as in the case of iron production, mechanical engineering or emailing), we can speak of the technical construction of structures. Thence technology is a material form of institutions. 14 U sing the concept of institution with respect to technology may appear, at first, somewhat irritating, yet they share a number offeatures: technology is essentially characterized by a division oflabor: it relieves the actor from reflection about new solutions to traditional problems, and it follows an occasionally explicit "idee directrice" so characteristic ofinstitutions. This "guiding idea", however, is firmly "inscribed" in its material processes, which can be described as a "black box", as actor network theory suggests. Technologies are packaged together and connected to each other in a permanent way and thus achieve a "car lift effect" (Rammert & Schulz-Schaeffer 2002a: 14ff). The factthat the effects oftechnologies no longer need to be reflected by the actors is by no means a special feature of the technology. All social institutions do something that does not necessarily coincide with the interests ofthe individual actors. (As we have seen in the case oflegitimacy, actors' own ideas can even be completely detached from the acts performed by institutions or technologies to which they claim to refer.) This institutional selfsuffi.ciency oftechnologies is that they can be detached from social structures and tumed into an infrastructure. (c) Mediation

As we shall see below with respect to the digital technologies of the communication society, the analytical difference between technologies and media should not be regarded empirically as a clear-cut boundary. (The defi.nition of "sign" given above also allows for an understanding of, for example, visualized

12 "A link between actions is technical if it is released from other meaningful references, such as tbe expectation of an. answer or the comprehensible execution of a previously agreed upon work, and if the combination of the detached elements depend exclusively on their interlocking and functioning" (Rammert 1989: 137). 13 As Eliade (1975) argues, early technical institutions are still linked with strong magical and religious ideas. 14 Here I refer to the notion of technics as an objectified instrumental institution (cf. Rammert 2006).

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"messages" as signs, not only for scientific observation, but also for the actors involved.) Therefore, it is important to emphasize what they both have in common, namely mediation. If we want to suggest an initial definition of mediation, we can say that it links communicative actions by means of objectifications that are connected to other objectivations. Mediation thus always is a "mediation of social communication" (Hepp 2012). lt includes technology and media. Before we turn to mediation by means of signs, in other words, mediatization, which is so important for the media, we would like to highlight that mediation involves further interrelationships that are directly related to the spatial aspects of communicative action, for 'Yhen we raise the question ofhow media help to overcome the "physical space" ofthe social face-to-face situation, mediation plays a decisive role. That is why we will first discuss the concept ofmediation before we turn to the forms ofmediation. In order to do so, we shall revert to the origins of the term in Schutz and Luckmann and its elaboration by Latour, in order to distinguish between different forms of mediation. As mentioned, the concept of mediation is discussed by Schutz and Luckmann (1989: 69ft) with reference to the "mediation of action". They clearly distinguish between "direct" and "mediated action", with recourse to Mead's concept of "manipulatory zones" (Schutz & Luckmann 1989: 44): the primary active zone is characterized by direct and spatially immediate action of the body, and the secondary active zone comes about through the mediation oftechniques and technologies. Tue concept ofthe manipulatory zone points to the role ofthe working acts that characterize mediation. However, the distinction between primary and secondary manipulatory zones suggests a boundary between two areas, as it forms part of Goffman's concept of the physical situation we just discussed. Tue fact that this boundary may be changing had already been observed by Schutz, with his premonition of a global Cold War in the 1940s: No spot ofthis globe is more distant from the place where we live than sixty airplane hours; electric waves carry messages in a fraction of a second from one end ofthe earth to the other; and very soon every place in this world will be the potential target of destructive weapons released at any other place. (Schutz 1964b: 129) Schutz's observation of an almost global mediation comes close to the concept of mediation proposed by Latour in two respects. On the one hand, Schutz draws the connection between the weapons of destruction and the concept of action in a way, reminiscent ofthe "materialistic" concept ofaction in Latour. Even more important is the parallel to the spatial context: Latour (2005), too, emphasizes that actors are by no means always local. Rather, it is Latour's goal to link the local and the non-local by actor networks. They are both local and translocal at the same time. lt is precisely at this point that Latour brings mediation into play with the notion of"mediators". To him, mediators are the kind of actors who connect the local with the translocal and the situational with the extemal. They are a "means oftransport", through which different contexts are brought together and

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become translocal. (Latour illustrates this, among other things, by the example of panoramas - to which we shall retum below. 15) If we transfer Latour' s static notion of mediators into the procedural language of communicative action, then mediation means the connection of the body with objectivations in action, their effect on one another and on the body in a manner that is not limited to the location ofthe body. Moreover, even the limitation of spatio-temporal "physical" situations is a result of mediation. In fact, certain objectivations can be considered as a means to create space-time boundaries: the construction ofwalls or the building ofhouses with roofs are used to limit spaces. However, spaces are by no means produced only by construction closures, boundaries, and limits. As Weidenhaus (2015) emphasizes, borders also contribute to the creation of a second space, even if this only appears as "outside". Borders and other spatial arrangements of objects always produce connections. Trees, which are synthesized with other trees into a forest, are such connections, as are the spaces hidden in hollows, caves, or craters. The horizon is a border and, simultaneously, a connection of spaces. In addition to spaces created by the connection of action with objectivizations, the human body can be divided into a public and an intimate body by clothing, the "second skin". The "intimate" inside ofthe body is not delimited by the body but also by those parts of clothing, e.g. underwear and other things or bodies which set, mark, or provide a limit. Because mediation connects bodies and objectification in a way that yields effects, the relationship between physicality and sensuality to the materiality of the objectivations plays an important role. This is addressed by the term modality (Kress 2010). In contrast to the classical "channels" ofmedia, modality means a socially and culturally shaped resource for the generation of meaning. Pictures, handwriting, print, or sound are examples of such modes. Modality is the link between the senses and objectifications. Even though Kress (2010) looks primarily at significant objectivations, their materiality determines the modality and allows for different possibilities of bestowing meaning. For example, a text that is written by hand on a slate is something different from a text projected onto a wall by a projector. Modality must not be reduced to just the visual sense but may encompass other forms of senses and materialities at the same time, leading Kress to speak of"multimodality".

(d) Forms ofmediation As modalities link bodies to technical or medial objectifications directly, communicative action can also involve discrete objectification, such as things and objects. Before tuming to communication technologies, let us briefly outline these important forms of mediation.

15 According to Latour (2005) mediators are contingent in a way that, we argue, is based on the ambiguity of signs and the subjectivity of perception and interpretation.

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One obvious form of mediation is the exchange of things or goods, which has already been mentioned in connection with gifts. In exchange, objectification itselfbecomes a medium ofreciprocity, for giving an object as the first sequence of an exchange is also a way of mediating a material, but also otherwise insignificant objectification. If objectifications already have a meaning by being given, which not only creates their "value" but also a social relationship, mediation by means of exchange consists of the fact that the objectification, in the simplest case, spatially changes its social location. The sequence comes to a conclusion in the second part, whereby the gift is reciprocated or "paid". The movement of objectifications that characterizes exchange is, therefore, a fundamental sequence of the reciprocity of objectifications. As Bourdieu observes in his critique ofLeviStrauss, the exchange does not take place at the same time, but involves a delay - a "delai qu'abolit le modele monothetique", a delay that calls into question the one-sided, monothetic model (Bourdieu 2000: 339). Bourdieu therefore demands a relational view of the exchange: the exchange is a sequence of successive traits. Exchange is based on this sequential structure and, from this structure, we can deduce the circulation of goods, things, and services that consist of such exchange sequences or mediate between them in more extended relational settings. If we take a closer look at exchange, we should emphasize that even presumed purely "economic" transactions contain their own meaning and are therefore communicative. (This may also be "knowledge" if it is objectified in some way.) Ifthe gift already creates a "feeling" of obligation, then the exchange forms the reciprocal follow-up, thus completing an elementary sequence. The meaning of the exchange is connected with the objectification. This is by no means limited to economic value, even less to a "work value" or expected benefits, but does include an "ideal" value. 16 Ifwe start from the basic notion ofreciprocity, as already implied in the simple (and precisely one-sided!) gift as a communicative action within the framework of a sequence, we recognize that "value" is essentially social: the gift can be countered by being returned, but a lack of reciprocation also means something that can be considered as symbolic value, "recognition" or "power". 17 Reciprocity means, in essence, allowing the gift to be followed by an obligation that creates a social relationship. Yet the one-sided gift (or the absence of the counterpart), presupposes the reciprocity of communicative action: from this comes the "feeling" of guilt and obligation, which establish power and recognition. The returned gift can be detached from the body by means of media and techniques and it can be mediated by signs, as expressed in money. With money, the exchange of goods turns into a significative communication, which can again be replaced in different modalities and materialities of exchange and production and

16 Economic anthropology explains this commitment by the "ideal" social meaning of the object given (Kapferer 1976). 17 If we look at the various types of "response", then we refer to the capital varieties outlined by Bourdieu: ifthe social capital corresponds to the relations implied in every communicative action, then economic capital corresponds to the objectifications (goods, products, etc.), while the symbo!ic capital represents corresponds to the legitimation and discourses.

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their reciprocity. The digital "stream offlows" (Castells 1996) ofmoney is certainly a special case that gives us a taste for what we will treat under the heading of communication society below. 18 Mobility, as a movement ofthe body, constitutes a further form ofmediation enabling connection between spaces. Due to performative acts of working, the movement ofthe body is an essential aspect of communicative action. Movement is notrestricted to certain parts ofthe body as with pointing, ratherthe whole body moves in a way that is communicative. Like the movements of hands, fingers, and heads, body movements are relational to others. Spaces are constituted of movement not only with respect to other subjects but also with regard to objectifications and their arrangement. lt is precisely movement that is responsible for the transcendence of the co-present situation, and therefore it is movement which opens the space. As far as movement of the body is concerned, we talk about mobility. Mobility is characterized by the classic embodied spatial categories of upper, lower, rear, and front. For mobility, the objectifications with which the movements are linked play a key role: horses, trains, cars. However, mobility is also part of mediation. Some objectifications move "as ifby themselves" - and are potentially parts of sequences because they either respond to actions or react with actions (i.e. the car that accelerates). lt may possibly be fruitful to look at division oflabor as another form ofmediation. In the division of labor, mediation can be effected by the coordination of bodies and by the coordination ofbodies and things (medical treatment ofbodies being a liminal case) as well as by the coordination between technologies: one handholds, the other strikes; one person rushes, the other shoots. This bodily division of labor includes objectivizations and material technologies but can also be achieved with the help of animals (e.g. horses or dogs). Based on this, the division of labor also refers to the various technical and technological contexts of objectifications that act on one another and on the body. As mediation, the division of labor goes beyond this and can be regarded as a connection between bodies and things, the meaning of which does not lie in action alone. Rather, the respective objectification or the respective state of objectivity acts as a conventionalized sign that coordinates the sequences of actions. This coordination presupposes a discursive context, which explains the enormous "increase in performance" that results from the division of labor. Finally, one can also look at infrastructures as forms of mediation. Infrastructures are "pervasive enabling resources in network form" (Bowker et al. 2010: 98). These could include the Roman postal and road systems, the telephone network, or digital networks. lt is characteristic of infrastructures that they are spatial structures, because they arrange technologies and objectivations in space. Infrastructures are based on materialized objectifications and technologies, which are located in rooms, move in spaces, and are connected with one another in such

18 The communicative constructive perspective has been applied to the meaning and use ofmoney by Krisch (2010).

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a way that they act as mediators. As Braudel (1979) indicates, infrastructures are also social structures, as well as "hardware, software, personnel, service and organizations" (Atkins et al. 2003: 13). However, the consideration of infrastructures as social structures (which has, in the meantime, been established as a distinct research approach by Bowker and Star) also implies that they can be separated from the social structure of human agents as "material prerequisites" (Tully 1994: 75). This separability is the result oftheir materiality, which can give them stability beyond physical social structures. Because they provide mediations and thus connections between objectifications, infrastructures are by no means static. They are characterized by the fact that they provide a link to mobility, such as vehicles, dynamic technological objects, and human bodies, which they use and which are moved by them. lnfrastructures also result from the institutional nature ofthe technologies which perform actions independent of subjectivated intentions. As much as infrastructures consist of technologies and objects, they are nevertheless conveyed by way of communicative actions that are, in part (and especially in the communication society), signs. By way oftheir connections to communicative actions, infrastructures are subject to social and procedural changes and thus, to continually changing.

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REFERENCE 1

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MEDIUM

(e) Mediatization While the concept of mediation contributes to overcoming the limitation of situations to physical proximity, it emphasizes the aspect of communicative action that is linked to work and objectivation. Moreover, even ifwe are confronted with objectifications of a significative nature, mediation emphasizes their materiality. Its referential character has led us to what we called signs. However, signs, as we have seen, are a very special kind of material, for with signs, it is no longer the objectification that makes sense, but the social convention (Rammert 2007a: 62). Media, therefore, connect the material and physical carriers, as well as the signs, sign systems, and codes. 19 We can illustrate this as shown in Diagram 8. Thus, while mediation refers to a link between actions, objectivations, and other objectifications, the medium refers to objectifications with a significative character. Tue mediation of media can take place very differently from other objectifications and, as is well-known, they can range from wall paintings to screens. With the concept of mediatization we want to address these different ways of how the materiality of signs is combined with conventionalized meanings. By drawing on Latour, we shall first make clear the difference between mediation and mediatization, and then we briefly outline our concept of mediatization. More precisely, we illustrate Latour's problem of a "minimal-semiotic" model with respect to the way he analyzes panorama. Latour (2005) considers the panorama tobe a "mediation", more precisely, a mere "means oftransport" by which

19 Media therefore are material structures that function like codes, as emphasized by Flusser (1998: 271).

Diagram 8 Media, signs, and communicative action

spaces are created. For him, the panorama creates space as an arrangement of things, drawings, and human beings. Tue shortcomings of this interpretation with respect to mediation become clear when comparing it to a second analysis of the panorama. Thus, in his interpretation of the panorama, Soeffner (2000) reveals completely different features, not even mentioned by Latour. On the one hand, Latour overlooks the aspects of action and subjectivity: the panorama has to be experienced by walking, and its architecture is oriented toward a subject that has its own specific position so that only with a certain distance can the subject identify figures, scenes, and realities. This architectural form also finds expression in the pictorial sign system. With a central perspective, the panorama uses a special symbolic code, which, in turn, is semiotically related to the subjective location of the body andhas tobe processed sensibly. Onlyby the subject's own perception of the space she has perpetrated can the panorama be "synthesized" (the same holds for the ANT ethnographer who writes about it20). Moreover, Soeffner emphasizes

20 Thus, Gombrich (1960) states that the central perspective ofthe Renaissance is a cultural form of seeing. lt does not capture a universal form of human vision but differs in some aspects from the subjective way of seeing. This includes, für example, the difference between the flat surface and the convex retina, which does not allow straight lines.

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that, for him, the sign, or rather, the panorama forms a genre of its own that must be recognized as panorama. With its specific (mostly historic) topics, the panorama points to a culture-specific pictorial world, which requires knowledge that is not accounted for by Latour (for example, on the usual proportions of scaling, which is still quite different in medieval pictures). The panorama is, thus, not simply a "mediator", only linked to the human body. Rather, the panorama consists of signs, which, in turn, are related to actions, know ledge, and a subjective experience. Because of these signs, it is possible to recognize colors, shapes, and figures as signs ofpeople, landscapes, and constellations. As van Loon (2008: 117) rightly emphasizes, media are not just about materiality and its connections. We must also pay attention to its significative side, which we can grasp as reference, meaning, or representation. The example ofthe panorama demonstrates that such reference has its own materiality, which must be taken into account. 21 On the other hand, we are dealing with signs in the pictorial world of the panorama, that is, in the context of iconographic representations. In other cases, the conventionalized signs can also be scientific representations that differ according to their disciplines and even within interdisciplinary contexts. They may also be significative systems, such as formal-mathematical languages, audiovisual genres, and formats on YouTube. Furthermore, significative representations can be objectivizations, such as buildings, which take on a certain meaning, for example as functional constructions (factories, office buildings, dwelling houses ), but can also dramatically change their semantics as well as their "lexicon": the Gothic church space can become a funeral home, the Doric column ofbourgeois omament can become kitsch. Ifthe contents of signs, their representations, meanings, and grammars are addressed by the notion of discourse, then the materiality of the signs, their interrelationships, and technical-material connections represent the part of the media described here as mediation. Mediation can be institutionalized as technology (which becomes very clear in the case ofthe emergence ofthe printing press during the Renaissance), but it can also change - and does so continuously. Ifthese changes imply significations, we refer to them by the term mediatization. Krotz (2012: 36) defines mediatization as a temporal change in the role of the media. 22 In this process, the way in which communicative actions, objectifications, and sign systems are connected with each other changes. Temporal changes, however, can also be described structurally or qualitatively (Couldry & Hepp 2017). For the change from writing with a typewriter to a computer not only is purely temporal but also affects the sequences of communicative action when writing and, thus, writing as a whole. We can call

21 Ifmateriality, following Barck (2009: 130ft), is only brought into view once again by critical theory and the sociology ofknowledge, it is in France, where the materialistic semiotics ofTodorov regards the material signifier in its relation with the signified as communication. 22 The distinction of mediated from mediatized action is analytical and, therefore, often ignored in empirical studies. Thus, clothing is already, in fact, a significative objectification, which can be very important; and even in our simple example ofthe fingertip, a manicure can make significant differences.

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this a qualitative change in the structure of communicative action. Structurally, this change must by no means be merely the complete replacement of one technique by another. At times, new media may complement old media. However, technical changes can also occur in the same media: the media can be connected to other types of signs (for example, in the transition from linguistic to iconic and visual representations on the computer screen). In the context of mediatization, the modalities of communicative action are changing - from speaking and listening, to writing and seeing. Tue significative character of codes can also change fundamentally, such as from letters to pictures and audiovisual formats. 23 These changes affect the structures of communicative actions. They have direct implications for social relations, institutions, and, as they are media, discourses: from oral discourses of, for example, political debates on the ground, they can become audiovisual discourses, which have been taking place in local video projects since the 1980s and have now become today' s global networked webvideos (Traue 2013b ).

(f) The process ofmediatization Mediatization refers to the structural changes of media over time. Such temporal changes can be understood as processes of increasing or decreasing technization, or as an increasing or decreasing compression of communicative action through signs, objects, and infrastructures. In order to explain this process, we should not regard technology as a determining factor. On the contrary, technology plays a changing role in society because it changes the structures of communicative action and, consequently, of communicative forms and institutions. Krotz (2012: 36ft) considers this change tobe a long-term "mega-process in which human actors and their social relations are also changing with the media". Krotz draws on the work ofthe Toronto School, which regards changes in media, that is mediatization, as a major reason for social changes. Again, this is not to suggest that this relationship is causal, as if the changes to media would cause social change. However, it seems to us a logical link that changes in mediation and the mediatization of communicative action lead to changes in the forms, institutions, and structures of society. Communication structures do not have to play a central role in social structures generally. However, as we assume that they will change their roles in the course of the mediation process and become a determining factor for the communication society, we have to present these changes in more detail here. For the sake of simplicity, we follow a linear representation, as exemplified by Innis, but emphasize again the variety of changes that can take place as replacements, additions, improvements, and the like. 24 Thus, Innis (2007) shows that the shift in communication from hieroglyphs on stone to papyrus or the shift from the hand-written manuscripts to book printing is closely linked to fundamental changes in the social and political order.

23 The representation by mediatized signs is also covered by the concept of medialization. 24 Parts ofthis argument are elaborated in Knoblauch (2010: 33lff.).

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The transition from oral to written communication is even more striking in this respect. Primarily oral societies are characterized by a simple social structure, a slightly differentiated political order and basic economic forms. Oral societies are closed in a double sense: firstly, orality requires physical presence. The closeness of the verbal community to the outside, however, also promotes its inward openness and fluidity. There are relatively few differences in social status and social perspective. Tue oral world is characterized by the relevance of the different senses: of hearing, seeing, smelling, touching, etc. If one follows Innis, the preservation of k.nowledge in oral cultures depends entirely on living memory. A good part of time in such cultures is therefore invested in activities of remembrance and narrative and the people are a living library who must remain closely connected. Oral cultures are, therefore, not only conservative and traditionalistic; they also work hard to maintain what they already know. Tue consequences of media change for society and communicative action become clear when compared to writing cultures. In writing cultures, not only does k.nowledge become mediatized by using carriers of signs beyond the human body. The role of subjects and the forms ofk.nowledge also change as a consequence. If oral ways of thinking are additive and sequential, thinking supported by writing tends toward subordination and classification. Tue use of formulas and fixed epithets, which are aggregated and thus become synthetic, is typical of oral cultures. They combine subject, object, and predicate, and make them appear as a unit. Tue written, on the other hand, tends toward analytical reasoning: by visualizing language, writing can turn individual linguistic elements (for example, sentences) into objects, creating a "grammar" and a "logic". This is due to the fact that writing requires a kind of linearity that makes it possible to look back at past communication. Orality, on the other hand, does not allow individuals to distance themselves from ongoing communication, but instead produces redundancies: it leads to repetitions and duplications (as we find in refrains, anaphors, and parallelisms in poetry). Because oral knowledge is so fleeting, it must be repeated very frequently. Tue distancing of communication from its social context also means that oral communication is much more concrete than written: it calls things by their name, recognizes fewer abstract categories, and uses more comprehensible contexts. Since it remains strongly context-bound, oral communication is much more empathetic, more situational, and more participant-oriented than written, which can be distanced and very abstract. Thus, while the "experts" in oral societies are essentially "keepers", in written societies they are innovators. Change is slow, because social and cultural survival depends on what is k.nown. The development of handwriting is evidently not compatible with the political constitution of tribes and hordes in oral society. Writing opens up the possibility of focusing on letters and also enables prose writing, as well as long, complex thoughts tobe tracked and stored. This also changes the media formats and genres, as witnessed by the emergence of literature, theology, and philosophy. Thus, early representatives of "intellectuals" also come into being. Their appearance enhances the differentiation of k.nowledge and fosters competition between

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different symbolic experts, who engage in working with the media and compete with themselves and practitioners. Writing means that people who live in the same physical and social environment relate to something beyond this environment and feel connected with those who are far away. Writing connects people as well as separating them. Unlike talking and listening, writing is not just a physical medium; it is characterized by its own materiality, such as stone, papyrus, ink. This materiality is also linked to an infrastructure that provides both the raw materials and procures the media. In addition, writing places demands on the subject: if acquiring the knowledge of phonetic language requires time, leaming the written language is even more time-consuming, and it is most successfully achieved ifthis is undertaken in childhood. Until the introduction of the printing press, therefore, writing increased social inequality. However, the infrastructures ofwriting also facilita,te the social disembedding of communication, in other words, the decoupling of communication from a situation of co-presence. This is compensated for by spatial institutions of interactively decontextualized communication, such as books, libraries, and archives (Burke 2000). At the same time, writing also creates a new temporality. Permanence, stability, and the objectification outside of the individual memory produce the difference between memory and history, as Halbwachs has already emphasized (Sebald & Weyand 2011). Structurally, writing contributes decisively to dissociation of the act of communication from that of understanding: the generation of communication, mediation, and reception can now be understood as independent actions. They lead to "parasocial relations" in which communication between authors and readers are mediated by texts (Hartmann 2010). Tue tendency to individualize communication was fostered by the invention of printing. Thanks to mechanical production, letter printing led to an immense increase in the reading public. Printing also promoted the mass subjectivization of communication: individuals could now delve into texts alone and could be addressed as individuals. As Eisenstein (1979) demonstrates, this individuation of bodies was ideologically linked to early modern individualization, aimed first at a self-understanding as individual (such as "personal" piety), for the Bible could now be read individually, thereby facilitating individual access as well as individualized communication with God, which no longer necessitated priests (and Mass). lt promoted further self-engineering, such as the keeping of diaries, which evolved from the Protestant era and replaced the dialogical evidence of confession (Hahn 1997). Tue increasing tendency toward silent reading supplanted reading texts aloud, which was customarily used in solitary reading and which could now be considered a selftechnique. As Kittler (2003) emphasizes, the book format also led to particular practices in dealing with texts and, thus, new forms of knowledge. Already the codex had enabled scrolling books and thus undermined the linear order ofreading.25

25

F or this reason, the revolutionary change must be seen in the connection of the human body (eye, hand) with the material object and its sensually relevant nature, and not in printing alone (Kittler 2003).

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Thanks to the infrastructure connected with it, printing facilitated the bypassing of localized communities and, thus, was able to address, formulate and form "imaginary" communities of reading. Their formation goes hand in hand with the idea of a community of different, geographically dispersed people and eriabled the creation of larger political and spiritual units. Thus, printing became one of the prerequisites for the creation of modern nation-states. As Anderson (1988) demonstrates, modern nationalism can create a common concept (as a "community of the mind") of the local community just through modern media. However, book printing is not just a representation. Its spread was accompanied by changes in communicative actions promoting the uniformization of language, the establishment ofnational languages and the formation ofnew forms ofpublicity. Among these were the salons, coffee houses, and reading houses, which, for Habermas (1989), constituted the core ofthe modern bourgeoisie. As mentioned, these social developments should not be attributed solely to the medium or its materiality. The particularly widespread dissemination of printing in Europe was also linked to the rapid expansion of the infrastructure, characterized by the particular form of W estem capitalism. In contrast to China, where book printing was managed centrally by a bureaucracy, in Europe printing was decentrally organized by publishers, businesses, and the evolving book market. lt is true that some take this decentralization to be a major reason for the success ofWestem capitalism, but one should not ignore the state's support for education and the influence ofthe centrally organized nation-state, especially after 1800. The production of mass-produced texts and their distribution via the market led, again, to the development of new written formats and genres, especially (after the long domination ofreligious texts) of"aesthetic" literature, not to forget science and technology with their specific printed products and genres. As Meyrowitz (1994: 57) shows, printing was one of the key prerequisites for the emergence of science. The more communicative action becomes one-sided, the more actors have to know about what they refer to and how the signs are used. Mediatization is therefore accompanied by the formation of a special communicative culture, a media culture which, in the case ofbourgeois culture, found its own "bourgeois" expressions: not only does language become highly regulated (for example with written grammars) but also aesthetics became codified so that readers could follow these codes (the same happened with music, as demonstrated by the spread of printed music notes and their increasing public and private use). Tue basis for the increased one-sidedness of communicative action does not lie in its "subjectivation". Rather, it can be seen in the growing asymmetry and separation of communicative "production" and "consumption", accompanied by mass-industrial production and the correspondingly hierarchically organized infrastructure ofthe media. If one concedes that consumption also implies a mediation of objectivations and is, therefore, a form of production, then the societal production of media and their reception are increasingly separated. Such production creates a typical "author". Moreover, the reception becomes one-sided and intemalized in a way that had already appeared in the early days of secular mass literature, for example, in classical or romantic literature, and becomes so strong

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that it still lingers on as a subjectivation pattem, providing individuals with a vocabulary for their inner life. The connection between printing and epochal social changes only appears causal if one assumes that both sides are separate and then correlates them with each other. The concept of mediatization explains how this separation follows the wrong perspective. Mediatization essentially forms part of communicative action, which also changes with altered mediations, signs, and infrastructures and, thus, contributes to new stru.ctures. This connection becomes particularly clear when we turn to electronic mass media characterizing modernity, such as the telegraph, radio, or television. They are characterized not only by the medium, but also by what Thompson (1994) has described as "mediated quasi-interaction" (2005) and Krotz (2001) as "parasocial interaction". Their particularity lies in the fact that the temporal sequence of communicative action is conveyed through a medial objectification. Because, with mass media, communicative actions need not be coordinated in time, we are dealing with a one-sided communicative action. This is actually true even for solitary reading, which creates a correspondingly "imaginary" inner world. 26 lt applies to literary linguistically created fictitious worlds but also to abstract and formalized sign systems, such as philosophy or mathematics. These imaginative worlds are condensed if the one-sidedness and incorporation ofknowledge itselfbecomes supported by communication: the individual reading of the Bible may be supported by the religious service in which the canonized interpretation I de]ivered by a priest. Modem mass media condense these relations: radio and television, in particular, strengthen reality by their mimetic sign relation. They can represent reality, at least in the modalities provided by the media, so that its reception appears as a quasi-interaction. Mimesis can therefore be described as a "simulation" ofreality (Baudrillard 1968), yet early critiques ofthe mass media (Adorno 1977) show that the genres ofmedia do not often concern everyday reality, but "escape" from this reality into fiction, entertainment, and play. Electronic mass media animate the audience as much as they simulate reality. Compared to writing, a different, more complex code of signs is associated with the mass media. Tue new modalities of codes (speaking, moving pictures) allow for an increased "interactivity", that is (similar to reading aloud) interaction between the recipients. This is accompanied by particular possibilities of their conventionalization, since they can lead to temporally coordinated (mass) reactions. (Mass media also trigger the idea ofmodern mass society.) These new modalities also lead to further differentiation offormats, not only offiction (such as radio plays, theater plays, and television films) but also of everyday reality (television news) and other frames (such as quiz-shows). In contrast to printing, modern electronic mass media are distinguished by a special technical infrastructure that can produce simultaneity of action across space. Unlike printing, however, a more complex organization of media

26 The connection between imagination and fiction is, therefore, also a subject of early modern literature since Cervantes, especially in Don Quixote; see also Iser (1993).

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production is required. In addition to the authors, book shops, and printing companies, editorial offi.ces, studios, and broadcasting companies depend on an elaborate electronic network and corresponding organizations. The "structural change of the public" observed by Habermas (1989) also means the differentiatiön of a social "apparatus" or, more neutrally, a "media system" with its own institutional order, training, and professions. Although media production is sometimes diffi.cult to distinguish empirically from mediation, the separation of material production, infrastructure, and overall mediation from the production and organization of signs and discourses certainly plays an important role in pre-modem forms of mediatization. Tue disposal of the means of production of mediatized communication (paper and literacy) is a systematic part ofthe power relations and a resource for authoritative claims. Tue role of this separation is also retained in the mass media. Modem mediatization is characterized by a conflicting dynamic between symmetry (literarization ofthe population) and asymmetry (social control ofthe content, censorship, etc.). Even in the democratically legitimated societies ofthe nineteenth century, organizational forms remained mixed. There were centralized (state, ecclesiastical controls) and decentralized forms of organization (publishing companies) and thus sharp asymmetries between a small elite of text producers who also had literary (and thus the media) production resources and their connectivity, such as newspapers (which also holds for the "counter-cultural" case of the revolutionary public) and an "audience", who were only minimally involved in production. As cultural studies have emphasized, this social and material difference still characterizes the mass communication ofthe 20th century. 27 The increasing organization or, in critical theory's terminology, "monopoly" of the media does not only have consequences for the audience. One should at least mention that this monopolization has also affected the scientific conception of communication, for "communication science" has emerged at a time when communicative action is structured by mediatized mass communication (and what had been "masses" of "mass psychology" has now become synonymous with the audience of mass media). In the service of media-specific organizations, communication is therefore largely understood on the basis of the various complex variants of the mass media "transmitter-receiver model" (McQuail & Windahl 1993). This model certainly corresponds to the institutionalized situation ofmass media. However, this is less a general model of communicative action than a pattem that follows particular institutionalized forms and, in the first instance, takes mass communication to be the basic pattem for all communication. lt is characteristic of this model that its distinction between "transmitter" and "receiver" parallels the distinction between production and reception. These distinctions already exist in cultures who know writing by hand. With the mass media, however, they also become part of mass communication. By making objectified media products widely accessible, reception also becomes increasingly linked to production. This way, reception appears as an "inner" act performed in the

2 7 If one believes in critical theory, this asymmetry is even increasing.

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loneliness of reading (newspapers, books ), listening (radio, records) or watching television. The individualistic concept of the mass media only breaks down gradually: it is "discovered" that reception is by no means "purely psychological" but itself composed of communicative actions. 28 Reception is mediated by a medial objectification and is by no means a purely passive "receptive" act. In addition to the sensual bodily interaction with the technical medium, reception requires a knowledge of the signs or what is termed "deciphering". This deciphering occurs not only through language. lt also follows a social frontier that runs along the distinction between media production and reception. As Hall (1980) has emphasized, mass media production largely adapts the hegemonic code of the ruling bourgeois class. Even though the model is very simplistic,29 Hall's coarse distinction between a (hegemonic) code of the ruling class and a code of the ruled class can certainly serve as a model for fhe monopoly-like structure of mass media communication in modern class societies, such as Great Britain (Hall 1980). This does not mean that only economic or political monopolies rule over the media. Nevertheless, the long-standing separation between bourgeois high culture and popular culture makes it clear to what extent bourgeois groupings dominate the production, formats, and contents of mass media. In the course of the 20th century, the petite bourgeoisie is increasingly taking over popular culture, while the focus of popular culture is shifting from rural "folk culture" to more urban, industrial, and white collar workers, often linked to counter-cultural voices (Traue & Schünzel 2014). Tue transition toward electronic mass media (film, television, broadcasting) initially strengthened the monopolistic tendency, as their infrastructures were dominated by politically and economically dominant institutions (each with strong national and political variations). However, the economic liberalization and the end of the Cold War (as well as the end ofthe monopolistic dominance ofmass media organizations) has led to the formation of a popular culture. Because of the diminishing influence of political institutions on the structure ofthe mass media, this has been paralleled by the marginal differentiation ofthe media as well as its audiences into diverse "cultures oftaste". As Bourdieu (1986) has shown, the meaning orientations ofthese popular audiences are separated from those who have privileged access to knowledge and, thus, to hegemonic forms of communication. In France, it is "popular taste" that shapes the lower classes and separates them from those who dispose of the legitimate forms of capital.

28 For example, reception is the "discovery ofthe primary group" and ofthe "opinion leaders" (cf. Katz & Lazarsfeld 1955); it also includes the discovery of active reception and communication during and about mass communication (cf. Keppler 1994a). 29 There can be productions by competing elites as weil as by different discourse communities who interpret the same signs differently (i.e. depending on the media (leaflet, newspaper, television) or the format (e.g. appeal, news, crime ). Under such competitive conditions, the sharing of codes must usually be linked to a legitimacy of the community, as in the "imagined communities" of national societies established by the mass media of the 18th and 19th centuries, who disseminated organizationally by means of general compulsory schooling.

il

!i 1

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(g) Communication culture As indicated, mediatization can be reconstructed as a historical process. Whatever it may mean for society, it should not necessarily be regarded as the central factor in the historical changes of society. Structures of governance, production methods, weapon technologies, and means of transport are at least equally important, if we are to explain the change of whole social types, for example from feudal to industrial society. Tue electronic mass media certainly play an important role in the development of modern society. Still more important is capitalism as an economic form, and industry as its central mode of production, which occupied the greater part ofthe working population ofWestern societies in the mid-20th century. Industrialization is certainly linked to the mass media, if one thinks, for example, of the printing industry, the industrial production of televisions and the development ofthe "entertainment industry". However, the core ofmodern industrial production can be captured by technology, organizations, and mediations. Tue production and division of labor are regulated by communication, yet the highly complex division of work requires intensive communication. This kind of communication often takes place outside the production sphere and finds expression in complex hierarchical organizations. lt is only with the development of modern "scientific management" that it gradually penetrates production (and uses a very naturalistic code). Tue "adjunct" role of the media is part of the common description of modern society as a differentiated system of specialized institutions. In addition to those institutions specializing in political action, religious communication or economic production, distribution, and services, we have witnessed the rise of a "system of mass media". Luhmann (1995) emphasizes the role ofthe mass media because they are at the center of this system and form what he terms "public", while other forms of the communication culture scarcely come into view. Luhmann (1995) regards the separation between the reception and the production of "information" as the essential step that led to the differentiation of a specialized media system. lt is separated from "direct" forms of communication in family, village, and other "interaction systems". In addition to the separation of production from reception, the media system is characterized by the fact that its "dissemination techniques" are delivered to a large number of anonymous addressees. 30 While Luhmann differentiates the "audience" of the mass media from the "public roles" of other subsystems (such as political, religious, or economic systems), other approaches highlight the extent to which mass media address "culture" in general. This view of the cultural

30 This perspective on mass media opens the possibility of the unified production and reception. However, this should not lead us to ignore the fact that we are also dealing with communicative actions. Thus, media production is a highly communicative activity executed by collectives, such as film teams. In modern society, as weil, there are still broad areas in which the mass media reception is indirect (for example, as topics of table talk, as a "form" template for institutional interactions). Above all, early, high and late modern as weil as present societies seem to share the notion expressed in modern sociology and social philosophy that the "real" core of the social is the face-to-face encounter, which is as immediate as possible.

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signi:ficance ofmediatiz~tion is also stressed by critical theory; by the Birmingham School of Cultural Stud1es; as well as by the cultural sociology of Bourdieu and is also held (albeit implicitly) by earlier works on communicative constructivism as suggested by the concept of"communication culture" (Knoblauch 1995). ' By communication culture we mean the totality of the various communicative forms that pre~ail ~ a society. Communication culture encompasses the media culture that ex~s~s m the p_roduction, mediation, and reception of radio broadcasts, of ad:ert1smg campa!gn~, or oftelevision broadcasting (Crane et al. 2002). Und~r t~e title of commun1cat10n culture, supposedly "receptive" forms of comm~mcation, such as comments on television broadcasts or the implementation of shde~~ows (Keppler 1994b), are also included. Communication culture refers to "tradit10nal" and "immediate" forms offamily conversations atthe kitchen table as well as to communicat!on in highly speci:fic modern organizations, in political movements or psycho~og1cal therapies (Luckmann & Bergmann 1999). I~ co_ntrast to the 1dea of the differentiation of communication, some commu~1cative fo?!1s may ~ollow different codes, such as function-speci:fic language reg1sters or mil1e~-spec1:fic sociolects, but many communicative genres and forms cross the b?undanes of the structural differentiations of society: jokes, teachings, or con~ers1~~s can b~ found anywhe~e. Communication culture, thus, permeates the vano~s .systems of modern soCiety, because it also consists of those small c?mm~1cative !orms a~d genera that can occur everywhere, e.g. proverbs, goss1p, ?r ?10graphical stones (Ulmer 1988). This general communication culture is not hm1ted to small a~d simple forms. lt also includes more complex performative genres, such ~s ~eddmgs, doctor's visits, and management meetings. The p~cu!ianty of communication as "culture" is expressed in the features of commun~~ative ~eures: Comm~icativ~ genres are characterized by an "external structure , that 1s, therr connect10n w1th the social structure. This includes for example,_ th~ di:ision of labor between production of commodities and pr~duct comm~mcati?n m the production of commercials (Raab & Knoblauch 2002). From the pomt ofv1ew ofa cultural approach, social institutions and social structures are regarded _as "_extemal structures", because one assumes that they are primarily extracommun1cabve_- Just as com~~icative genres are essentially understood by their form and_meanmg, commun1cation as a whole has been seen as being restricted to the ~eanmg of the cultural. Communication is still treated as something that is not a soc1~l structure or constitutes one, but is at best related to it, correlates with it and thus d~ffers from it. This limitation of communication culture has, on the one hand, anal~1cal :e~so~s that are connected with Luckmann's previously mentioned categoncal d1stmcbon between social and communicative actions. We can therefore s~ea~ of a "culturalistic" notion of communication because this attributes commumcation to "soft" culture and differs from the "hard" social structure. 31

31 This critique is raised_ by Habermas (1984) against Schutz and Luckmann, but also affects his own theory, as he dehneates communicative action as a linguistic "talking about" from "hard" mstrumental and teleological action in the "objective" world.

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This limitation of communication to culture, however, also has a certain parallel in society. lt reflects the limited role ascribed to communication by researchers as well as by society: 32 As long as the "media system", up to the liberalization of the mass media since the l 970s, consisted of a largely closed network of specialized institutions, communication could not be regarded as central to the whole of social structure. Even though there has been a global shift from the political control of the media by the state to free economic regulation of the media (for which the situation in the US served as a paradigm), massive institutional asymmetries continue to exist, which basically shape all mass media communication: whether we are dealing with books, radio, or television - the media are part of an institutional system in which state and large economic organizations play a dominant, sometimes even a monopolistic, role. lt is this continuing dominance of the great economic and govermnental institutions that was seen by critical theory as a system of control (also of"consciousness"), and by cultural studies as a persistent hegemonic class society (opposed by a counter-culture). lt is this societal role of the media that has allowed us to view "communication culture" as merely a soft structure of society. In industrial societies, communication culture was, at best, regarded as a kind of infonnal supplement and "folklore". However, the role of major institutions has changed fundamentally with the recent wave of digital interactive mediatization in the last decades. Communicative action tums into communication, and this fonn is gaining relevance for the whole of contemporary society. Communicative action no longer characterizes a subordinated "communication culture" in charge of the production of "meaning" of "objective structures". By way of the more recent fonns of mediatization, communication has become the central social process, which, according to our thesis, has become a communication society.

32 While Habermas only allowed linguistic acts modelled on the pattem of written language, the analysis of communicative genres tumed additionally to oral forms of communication. As in the case of cultural studies, media genres, and formats have also become increasingly relevant. Cultural studies emphasized their connection to the economically determined dass structure, maintaining, nevertheless, the distinction between the cultural media and the social structures that characterize them, as weil as their interpretation and appropriation.

V Diagnosis Communication society

The book started out with fundamental considerations about social theory and thenmoved on to outlining the concepts of social order resulting from these considerations. Now we enter the diagnostic part of the text. As already discussed (Chapter 1.3), our topic here concems how society is currently changing. Various recent changes will be integrated into the concept of communication society. This means that we want to characterize current social changes using communication. For this reason, changes in the meaning of communication have already been mentioned as the starting point for the fundamental shift from social to communicative action. Here, we do not consider the general notion of communicative action as a diagnosis but rather we show which specific characteristics of communication characterize contemporary society. Communication society does not describe a nonnative program or a political project; rather it summarizes different societal developments. Against a backdrop of the long-term historical process of mediatization leading to communication culture, the following societal diagnosis emphasizes and highlights the changes rather than focusing on the continuous features of society. That is, it highlights the new aspects of the "new society" that Castells (1998: 360) saw coming: a society with production relations changed, new power relations and new pattems of social relations. Quite typical for diagnoses, such changes can only be observed in their first stages, but our description goes far beyond what Castells had predicted at the turn ofthe second millennium. We are no longer concemed simply with a "network society", as Castells diagnosed at the time, because the societal changes concem communication between people, between people and things, and, increasingly, also between objects and technologies. In order to draw attention to these changes, we diagnose a communication society. We must concede that this diagnosis is not based on systematic research findings. Rather, it is a hypothesis derived from various scattered empirical observations and theoretical considerations. In order to find better support for this hypothesis, to define it more precisely, and to empirically examine it, we subdivide this hypothesis into various sub-hypotheses, which we shall describe below. These sub-hypotheses are based on the concepts developed up to now in this book, but their empirical manifestations can only be suggested and therefore require more detailed research in the future. Thus, they help us fonnulate an

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Diagnosis: Communication society

Diagnosis: Communication society

empirical program that describes the developments in the communication society as a result of changing structures of communicative action through the new forms of mediation. This program also relates to the context of the various subhypotheses. lt is not yet possible for us to form reasonable assumptions about the link between these sub-hypotheses and offer a final model. Rather, they represent different aspects ofthe overall picture, the communication society. W e use the phrase communication society because these social changes cannot be understood without what we have described as the mediatization of communicative action. The more recent forms of mediatization (discussed below) demonstrate that communication contributes to material economic production and creates social structures. This leads to a shift from communication culture toward communication society, which we will outline in the first section. Since mediatization is a historically overarching phenomenon, the more recent forms of mediatization, which we call communicatization, need to be determined then. They are particularly characterized by digitization, interactivation, and the spread of communication work. Their societal dissemination is due to the global development and expansion of an information infrastructure beyond nationally organized societies, which we see as an ongoing active process: infrastructuring. As a materialized form of social structure, infrastructure is characterized by networks, with two opposing tendencies ( a powerful structure and a flat deconstruction). As a consequence of the expansion of communicatization, there are fundamental changes in communicative action, for example, in the dramatic rearrangement of space, which we call translocalization. Tue temporal order of the communicative construction of reality also changes and is reflected in, for example, the de- and restructuring of institutional knowledge. Like any form of mediatization of communicative action, communicatization also has consequences for the kind of subjectivation that we describe as a double subjectivation. Tue aspects mentioned here are intended to make the concept ofthe communication society plausible. Therefore, they do not represent causal assumptions, but, presumably, aspects of an incomplete definition that should allow the diagnosis of the communication society to be distinguished from other diagnoses, such as that of the industrial society, the information society, or the knowledge society. These diagnoses are by no means to be regarded as false or inaccurate. Rather, we assume that communication society is a more recent development superseding earlier features of society. lt is not, as we believe, merely an incidental feature of society, but results and departs from what is called modemity, without destroying it. This thesis of a comprehensive historical change to communication society is therefore tobe sketched as a refiguration ofmodemity. The different hypotheses summarized in this short overview carry equal importance and status: Some emphasize technical effects ofthe current type ofmediatization, others the role of signs or of knowledge. However, all of them refer to aspects of communicative action that have been described above, since the thesis of the communication society presupposes a fundamental change in the structure of communicative action to communication. Moreover, they describe

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a large-scale change from the industrial to the communication society, which we will treat as a "refiguration" in Chapter VI.

1. From discursivation to the communication society Following our discussion of communicative culture in the previous section, it is clear that the dominant form of communicative action that can be attributed to this concept is "discourse". Accordingly, discursivation accounts for the increasing relevance of communication in the last decades of the 20th century (section a). Due to the new interactive digital forms of mediatization, the expansion of digital infrastructures and the increasing effects of communicative work, communicatization now becomes the relevant form of communicative action. This leads to a change in the communication society, which will preliminary defined in section b. (a) Discursivation Even before the formation of communication society, we have been able to observe the increasing relevance of communication, manifested in modern communication culture. As already emphasized above, the concept of "communication culture" is by no means merely an analytical proposal. Modem communication culture is already designated by a diagnostic thesis, which could be roughly summarized as follows: before we reached a recognizable consolidation of communication society, which occurred around the turn ofthe millennium, we had already observed an expansion of communication culture by way of increasing discursivation. This process started with the incipient de-industrialization ofthe 1970s and the expansion of communication culture as the cultural basis of the modern, functionally differentiated society outlined above. Discursivization means that communication has become significant in the sense that it interferes with social structures and regulates their legitimations (without necessarily having to accept them). Because these legitimations are multiplying and expanding quantitatively, they are tuming more and more into discourse and, correspondingly, we have seen an increase in discourse theory or discourse studies in the social sciences. 1 Qualitatively, discursivation means an intensification of communication, with a tendency also toward taboos and scandalizing: every possible topic can be the subject of discourse, the novelty of topics is rewarded by increased attention and, at the same time, topics and the associated discourse arenas multiply. The thesis of discursivation can already be found, labeled differently, in a work from the early 1990s by Münch (1991: 87), who observes a "constant multiplication, acceleration, consolidation and globalization of communication". In reference to Habermas, Münch sees a reason for this discursivation in the fact that

In this respect, Habermas and Foucault certainly form the two major axes because they regard discourse as the rational part of actions (Habermas) or as de-subjectivated and power-oriented processes (Foucault). Both aspects can be included in our concept of discourse.

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it is increasingly necessary to legitimize action. While these legitimations cross different functional systems, for Münch they constitute the "culture of society". Legitimations refer to social structures, but they are largely the discursive legitimations of structures and not the structures themselves that are legitimized. Discursivation, however, is not limited to legitimatory discourses. For example, empirical research on communicative gemes makes it clear that other forms of communication also increase and contribute to a spreading "multiloquence", in which communication becomes more important than what is communicated. 2 Discursivation is also linked to the differentiation of mass media forms and their massive multiplication, which began in the 1970s as a result of the liberalization of the media market (somewhat later in countries which maintained statesupported mass media). Discursivation is manifested in communicative forms beyond the mass media such as, for example, informal organizations, which are now increasingly forced to solve the moral problems ofthe social order situationally and locally (Luckmann & Bergmann 1999). The societal causes for this discursivation are dealt with in detail in (post-)modern diagnoses of Western societies of the last decades of the 20th century. W e can refer to them here because, on the one hand, they have a historical significance and describe the society of that time; on the other hand, some of these processes still have an effect, are complemented by new media and have expanded, thus becoming part ofthe communication society. Discursivation can be explained by the de-traditionalization of social relationships, of structures, and of institutions. These processes weaken the normative power of laws and values, the meaning of which increasingly needs to be interpteted by actors. Cultural and social pluralization have similar effects: While the common "values" of the various social classes and strata are increasingly diversifying, "lifestyles" or "milieus" are multiplied. Diversification is further enhanced by horizontal mobility ("commuters", "tourists", and, above all, migrants), which can also include the growing ethnic, national, and transnational migration. Pluralization, which contributes to discursivation, also includes increased simultaneous affi.liation to different life-worlds, lifestyles, and milieus (Hitzler 1986, 2008). All these pluralizing tendencies require more communication in order to translate between different discourses, the negotiation of action orientations, and the coordination in interaction. This also means that much of what is embodied in the "implicit knowledge" of "practice" needs to be made increasingly explicit (even if discourse as communicative actions using signs presupposes rules and conventions which are not explicated). Another sociological reason for discursivation is the institutional "functional differentiation", broadly described in sociology and associated with the growing spread of organizations, professions, and specializations (Pfadenhauer 2003).

2 Cf. Knoblauch 1996a. Postmodem theories even go so far as to suggest that the "logic of the social" is replaced by the "logic of the cultural" (Lash 2002: 26), which dissolves society into a global "semiotic circulation", a circulation of signs.

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The increased number of areas of special knowledge requires ever more communication: members have to be recruited from the outside, knowledge has to be legitimated externally, and, as a rule, capital must also be taken in by outside knowledge. This results in numerous new communicative areas located between functional areas which thus interpenetrate each another (Münch 1991). In addition, such growing complexity creates new "advisory" knowledge areas, expertise, and special knowledge, which concern knowledge dissemination, such as knowledge management or coaching (Traue 2010). The diagnosis of discursivation, as well as the related explanations of de-traditionalization, pluralization, and specialization, is, of course, very closely bound to their time, namely the last decades of the 20th century. The tendency to discursivation is not replaced by communication society, rather is continued indeed strengthened. However, this is done in a different way. Now, the discursive process is no longer limited to a bounded communication culture. Although discursivation in its conventional form is transferred to other systems and institutional spheres of society, in which economically produced or institutional structures (and the media system) are created, they are largely separated from them.