Origin and evolution of the study of communication

Communication is essential for every person to build interpersonal relationships. Communication simply means the exchange of feelings, ideas and knowledge. The study of communication began to grow as a subject with the advent of the media in the industrial age. One of the reasons for this was the situation after the First and Second World Wars. The rapid development of communication technology during the First and Second World Wars influenced the emergence of media as well as its growth and spread. During World War II, war information was used for post-war entertainment and information gathering from communications.
The post-war media presented simple, entertaining and scary information and messages aimed at alleviating the plight of war-affected people.
With the development of the communication process, the infinite amount of information exchange and exchange that takes place through various advanced communication tools, including the media, has a profound effect on the individual's mind and behavior, and ultimately on the individual's social interactions with society as a whole. They have a fulfilling as well as a detrimental effect.
It is impossible for a person to avoid the use of information as a social being .It is necessary to obtain information necessary for the progress of the individual and the society .This requires the knowledge of saving and using the information provided through the media. They must be equipped with the media literacy knowledge and the knowledge needed to act as a critical receiver, which the person needs to have the strength to distinguish between the illusion and reality created by the media.
At several of its conferences, UNESCO's Growwalt Declaration in 1982 pointed out that children and youth should be freed from the negative influence of the media. It was emphasized that children should be empowered with media literacy and the wisdom to use the media critically as well as creative thinking and therefore it was recommended that media education should be imparted from the primary grade of the school.


The beginnings, development and importance of learning in communication studies.

  There is an inextricable link between communication and human interactions. Human communication has been active since the day man began to live on earth. Although human communication and animal communication have functioned in two ways since then, human communication has now evolved into universal human beings with the invention of human beings. . With the advancement of communication technology as well as the growth of the media and the influence of the media on society, everyone has the opportunity to study the field of communication as an independent subject.

The main purpose of the study of communication is to study how communication works as a central factor in human experience, and to gain an understanding of how human experience involves the creation, communication, interpretation, and behavior of human beings.

The world's first focus on the day when communication was also made an academic subject was in the early 20th century. The methods of communication used during World War II were later used to entertain the people and to provide information, and the mass media was used to bring out the broken mental states of the people affected by the war.

Before the subject of communication was called Communication Studies as an independent subject, it was integrated with three major subjects, Psychology, Sociology and Political Science. The current development in the field of communication studies was pioneered by Charles Cooley, Walter Lippmann, and John Dewey, who contributed to it in the early part of the twentieth century.

In 1909, Charles Cooley defined communication as a method of maintaining and promoting human relations through his term social organization. Also, in 1922, Walter Lippmann, in his book Public Opinion, feared that, given the gap between the concept of the ideal of democracy and its reality, he feared that the emergence of new technologies in mass communication would act as a process for producing public pleasure. The book emphasizes that people and their problems have the potential to transform society and create a better society.

The impact of changing and evolving media technology on culture and communication, these scholars further elaborated on the social issues that arise from the four elements of democracy and community and laid the groundwork for the study of communication as an academic subject. Has been the focus of many American and American scholars, focusing on the United States.

During Hitler's dictatorship, which operated in Germany from 1933 to about 1945, large numbers of scholars who had been expelled from German universities emigrated to the United States. They pursued a variety of academic studies in the field of communication, centered on American universities. Among them were scholars such as Harold de Laswell, Kurt Levine, Paul Lassasfeld, Carl Howland, Wilbur Schramm, George Gabner, and engineers such as Claude Shannon and Warren Weaver, who laid the foundations for the academic development of communication studies.


In the 1940s, Professor Wilbur Shram took steps to institutionalize the study of communication as an academic discipline. This enabled the establishment of universities as well as school communication research institutes. The University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign was the first university in the United States to introduce communication studies as an academic discipline. The subject was integrated with subjects such as political science, sociology, psychology, and English, and was established as an independent subject in the early 1960s.

Research conducted in the 60s and 70s revealed that the messages and messages presented by the media have a profound effect on the lives of the people. According to Wilbur Shram, research has shown that television affects children. His research presents three effects of television on children

1 that there is a link between children's social contact distance and television use.

2 Children who quarrel with their parents use the media to escape their frustrations.

3 that tends to watch on TV to forget heartache.

The research team, led by Professor Wilbur Shram, confirmed the findings of a research study conducted by a University of Pennsylvania University research team that allowed groups of children to watch violent and non-violent television cartoons.

1 Decreased sensitivity of children to painful things.

2 children they live Fear of the environment and the world around us.

3 Increased tendency in children to be aggressive and quick to quarrel when dealing with others.

The behaviors of the children who influenced the presentation of these facts were not good. Research has also shown that children who watch violent cartoons are quick to quarrel with their peers and ignore adult advice, changing the mindset of girls who started heroic characters and programs in the 70s.

With the advent of digital technology in communication in the 1980s and 90s, there have been a number of major transformations in communication. After the 1980s, the relationship between media activism and digital technology began to grow. As a result, Internet and computer games became popular among many children as well as youth groups.

There are a number of factors that influence the field of communication studies to be studied feministly.

Gain an understanding of communication and media activism nationally and internationally.

Develop skills in critical media handling.

Development of critical thinking

Improving media literacy.

Maintain effective human interactions.

Active contribution to social development.

Understand the workings of the media.

To be a person full of knowledge and skills.

Introduction of Communication Studies to Sri Lanka

The history of teaching Communication Studies as a subject subject in Sri Lanka is very short. Edwin Ariyadasa's 1968 course on 'Journalism' is recorded in the history of Communication Studies in Sri Lanka as the first step in studying Communication Studies as a subject. It is being implemented by the Hewala Junior University.

Although the journalism course was completed in two years, the focus was again on the formal teaching of journalism after the 1971 Youth Rebellion, when the focus shifted to career-oriented courses in universities. Shortly afterwards, in 1973, the Department of Mass Communication at the University of Kelaniya was established. Accordingly, the first teachers to teach Mass Communication were Prof. Wimal Dissanayake and Prof. Sunanda Mahendra. External speakers were Dr. Edwin Ariyadasa, Dr. Piyasoma Medis, DB Nihalsinghe, K. Jayatilake, Mahagama Sekara, WD Amaradeva, DC Ranatunga and Piyasiri Gunaratne.

In 1972, the University of Sri Jayewardenepura also started a diploma course in journalism, but it was discontinued a year later, but many universities in Sri Lanka have now started teaching Communication and Media Studies.

Training courses for professional journalists were conducted by the Ceylon Radio Service and Lake House in Sri Lanka in the 60s.

Today, a large number of courses on the subject of communication are conducted in Sri Lankan universities. The course is administered by the University of Kelaniya, the University of Sri Jayewardenepura, the University of Colombo, the Sripali Campus of the University of Colombo, the Rajarata University, the Open University, the Trincomalee Campus of the Eastern University and the University of Jaffna. The above universities have started a large number of courses which can be studied up to Certificate, Diploma, General Degree, Special Degree, Post Graduate and Doctoral courses.

According to UNESCO's Gonwalt Publication, the National Institute of Education first introduced the subject of Communication and Media Studies as an additional subject in Grade 10 in 2007 to Grade 11 in 2007.

Communication and Media Studies have been included in the Advanced Level Arts stream since 2008.