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The word communication is a loanword from Latin. In that language communication means sharing, contact and it originated from the verb communicare: to share, to participate. Therefore, communication is commonly associated with agreement, fellowship or contact and it is an attribute of all living beings, not just humans.

Communication is an act of sharing our thoughts, emotions, judgments and expressing our will. It can be verbal or non‑verbal, however, most frequently, people use both of them simultaneously. We can emphasize our speech with gestures, facial expressions, tone of voice, and in case of a written discourse – graphic characters.

Act of communication
Act of communication constitutes a fundamental unit of communication. It is an act in which we use the language to reach a mutual understanding, to talk or write with the sender’s intention. The components of an act of communication include: sender, receiver, contactcontactcontact, codecodecode, messagemessagemessage and** contextcontextcontext**.

Sender is a person that utters the words but it is also their author. For instance, we can list following senders of a message that form a part of a television news service:

1. presenter reading the text,

2. journalist preparing the information,

3. editor proofreading the text,

4. news agency releasing the information,

5. institutional sender, e.g. a television channel broadcasting the news.

It’s worth mentioning that the sender may be either a single individual (individual sender) or a group of people (collective sender). The second type of a sender is visible in genres such as open letter or memorial. Sometimes, the author of the text hides his/her identity under a pseudonym or does not reveal it at all – in that case we are talking about an anonymous author.

Receiver can mean one person (individual receiver) or a group of people (collective receiver), who receive a message transmitted by the sender. An intendedintended receiverintended receiver, to whom the sender transmits the information intentionally, is called addressee. The ability to adjust the form of a message to the receiver is essential for communication. Lack of this capacity can lead to stylistic errors and misunderstandings. It is worth remembering that the sender and the receiver can swap their roles, e.g. during a conversation, that is to say, in case of a dialogue.

In order to make the communication successful, it is essential to create a mental contact between the sender and the receiver, which means that both of them have to show willingness to cooperate. It is also crucial to establish and maintain a physical contact during verbal communication (either visual or auditory).

Message is a content transmitted from the sender to the receiver. A message has to be about something, which means that it has to refer to reality, and therefore it should be embedded in a context. After all, a statement has to be related to concepts and values that are common for both the sender and the receiver. Moreover, it has to be set in a specific time and place, and therefore in a specific communicative situation. This way, we can omit some parts of the information as they become obvious. It is worth adding that the sender transmits the message to the receiver via communication channel: visual (e.g. newspaper articles, published books, communication via sign language), auditory (e.g. radio broadcast), visual–auditory (e.g. television broadcast, conversation accompanied by suggestive gestures) and tactile (such as Braille).

Every message has to be expressed in a language, and so in a specific code. There are verbal codes (they are based on words) and non‑verbal codes, among which the most important are:

1. kinetic code (gestures, position and movement of our body),

2. prosodic code (tone, power and intonation of our voice),

3. proxemic code (distance between the speaker and the listener),

4. graphic code (emoticons, handwriting, type and size of a chosen font).

Communication model

The above mentioned components of an act of communication form the communication model created by Roman Jakobson, which is presented in the following diagram:

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Schemat aktu komunikacji. Główną częścią aktu komunikacji są nadawca sender i odbiorca receiver umieszczeni pośrodku schematu, połączeni kropkowaną linią. Nad nimi znajduje się komunikat message jako przedmiot aktu komunikacji oraz kontekst context, czyli to, co wpływa na akt komunikacji. Pod nadawcą i odbiorcą umieszczono takie elementy, jak: kontakt contact oraz kod code, czyli system porozumiewania się (np. werbalny, niewerbalny).

Exercise 5

Search for information on different ways of communication of the creatures: dolphins, chimpanzees and bees. Discuss how other animals communicate.

Search for information on different ways of communication of the creatures: dolphins, chimpanzees and bees. Discuss how other animals communicate.

Search for information on different ways of communication of the creatures presented in the following illustrations: dolphins, chimpanzees and bees. Discuss how other animals communicate. Write a short note.

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Fotografia kolorowa przedstawia delfina wyłaniającego się z czystej wody, delfin znajduje się pośrodku zdjęcia.

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Fotografia kolorowa przedstawia trzy małpy naczelne, jedna siedzi trzymając jedzenie w lewej łapie, dwie pozostałe stoją na wszystkich czterech kończynach po jej obu stronach i wpatrują się w pożywienie.

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Fotografia kolorowa przedstawia pszczołę siedzącą na słoneczniku. Słonecznik zajmuje całe zdjęcie, podczas gdy owad umiejscowiony jest po środku.

Keywords

communication, sender, receiver, message

Glossary