Journal of Humanistic and Social Studies (Nov 2016)
Identité, altérité et incommunication chez Dominique Wolton
Abstract
Communication has become indispensable, nowadays, regardless of the field of activity. Every gesture, be it with a political, economic, social, or cultural connotation, already has a communicational dimension that publicly defines it more than the activity itself. Paradoxically, however, communication is also is the one that can lead to isolation, to refuge, or to rejection, uncommunication, conflict and fundamentalism. “The horizon of communication is uncommunication” says Dominique Wolton, one of the greatest European thinkers on the topic. Nevertheless, there is more to this than meets the eye, as uncommunication, like communication, has human freedom as its starting point. We are free to not communicate and nobody can condemn us for it. Today, in its moment of glory, communication faces a crisis and must be saved. But how? One of the tools offered by Wolton is intelligence. Another tool is education. And another is negotiation. After all, we are negotiating our freedom. Every single day.
