sey091

Here's a neat guide to a variety of infographics   that have much to say about various aspects of communication. Thanks for sending me this, Heather Brown: http://www.infobrandz.com/great-big-list-of-infographic-ideas/

I want to apologize to users of my Interpersonal Communication Book , 14th edition. A paragraph was omitted in the printing. The following paragraph would be inserted on page 130 before "Personal Distance."  Intimate Distance.   In intimate distance , ranging from actual touching to 18 inches, the presence of the other individual is unmistakable. Each person experiences the sound, smell, and feel of the other’s breath. You use intimate distance for lovemaking, comforting, and protecting. This distance is so short that most people do not consider it proper in public. Again, I apologize.

I'm developing this exercise for possible use in the new edition of Human Communication and I thought it might be of interest more generally for just about any course in speech communication or interpersonal communication. The ten items I have below can be changed and probably should be changed to better reflect the specific students in the class.  The Exercise This exercise is designed to explore the differences in difficulty of various communication interactions: what makes for a difficult communication experience, what individual differences influence what constitutes difficult communication, and the skills needed to make difficult communication easier. To Know Communication theorists and researchers often argue over whether communication is easy or difficult. Of course, if you think about the various communication interactions you engage in everyday, you’d have to conclude that communication is both easy and difficult. Some communication interactions are simple, easy, and are ...

This exercise is designed to help explain the concept of politeness in terms of positive and negative face (Brown & Levinson, 1987; Cupach & Metts, 1994; Goffman, 1967; Goldsmith, 2007; Holmes 1995; Metts & Cupach, 2008). To Know In Brown and Levinson’s (1987) theory of politeness, based in part on Goffman’s (1967) concept of face, we all have basically two needs: (1) the need to maintain positive face and (2) the need to maintain negative face. Positive face refers to the desire to be viewed positively by others, to be thought of favorably, to be held in high esteem. Negative face refers to the desire to be autonomous, to have the right to do as you wish, to not be imposed upon. Politeness in interpersonal communication, then, refers to behavior that allows others to maintain both positive and negative face; and impoliteness refers to behaviors that attack either positive face (for example, you criticize someone) or negative face (for example, you make demands on someone)...

Here is a little piece that I wrote for a local newspaper--the Blue Stone Press (May 15, 2015)--in response to an article on parents opting out of testing for their children. It was published as a Guest Analyst Opinion. It’s sad that so many parents are opting out of the current testing, as Jillian Nadiak noted in BSP (May 1, 2015). It’s also a big mistake. The Mistakes Perhaps the major mistake is to assume that parents—simply by virtue of the fact that they are parents—are the best equipped to make educational decisions for children, even their own. In fact, the very reason we have schools and teachers and teacher education programs is because parents cannot effectively educate their children. Parents don’t assume they can diagnose and cure childhood illness and so we expect them to seek competent medical treatment from doctors and nurses. And there are laws that will penalize parents for not seeking competent medical care. But, with education everyone seems to see themselves as expe...

Here's an interesting article that offers interesting suggestions for  Responding to Rudeness  which should work well in a class in the discussion of conversation or a variety of other interpersonal topics. Among the suggestions offered are how to respond to catcalls, unwanted and negative comments on your appearance, or friends who reveal personal information.  It would be interesting to see how students would deal with each of these several issues and if there's a gender or age difference in the responses.

I want to bring to your attention a new book by a friend of mine; we went to graduate school together at the U of I.  The book— Lydia Pinkham: The Face that Launched a Thousand Ads by Sammy R. Danna (Rowman & Littlefield, 2015)--is about Lydia Pinkham, her vegetable compound (which is still being sold), and the revolution in marketing and advertising of which she was a major part.  Congratulations Sam; you did a wonderful job!