Communication Science and Identity

Abstract

After more than half a century of modern communication studies, this science is still facing identity challenges, the ones reproduced in a variety of forms due to the fluidity of the discipline in different historical phases. In the absence of necessary frameworks, a systematic study of these challenges for the purpose of providing the theoretical frameworks together with their answers is of a vital importance. This article first expounds on the necessity of dealing with these identity challenges and the subsequent difficulties of such types of analysis. It then discusses the extreme expansion of communication issue and its consequences as a pivotal identity challenge in the field, finally, the communication historiography, as one of the major parts of an academic discipline's identity is focused upon and its major trends are explained.

Keywords

• communication disciplinary identity
• communication as a discipline
• communication science historiography
• expansion of communication discipline