Expository on Change in Communication
I often try to comprehend cultural, social, political, moral and other changes that humanity has undergone throughout centuries of its existence and development. To a large extent these changes were caused by technological progress: new inventions often transformed the way of people’s lives and respectively, the norms by which societies lived. Airplanes, cars, computers, mobile communication devices, as well as other technological wonders have reformed the way we think and live. But, what is even more curious, technologies have also metamorphisized the way we communicate.
Englishmen have a tradition to talk about the weather when they met an unfamiliar (or even a familiar) person. Japanese people have multiple complex ways to start a conversation politely. Many other nations also had their own rules of etiquette; these rules allowed people to enter the communication process smoothly. However, nowadays we can see that etiquette is rather often neglected in favor of the efficiency of communication. The pace of everyday life has increased dramatically compared even to the middle of the 20th century, and today people have to sacrifice courtesy in favor of productiveness and efficiency (IFResearch). Perhaps, from the viewpoint of a person from the 1950s, we would most likely look like rude and straightforward people, as we have become less concerned about our culture of communication, considering it to be archaic.
The time we live in is interesting in terms of the existence of at least two levels of language usage; basically, they are the real world and virtual reality (IDFS). The Internet has made it possible to transfer not only meaning, but also the emotional palette and even images. All kinds of emoticons in social networks and messengers serve the purpose of mitigating plain insentient text; moreover, it happens often enough