ABSTRACT
A poststructuralist approach to communication theory analyzes the way electronically mediated communication (what is called 'the mode of information') both challenges and reinforces systems of domination that are emerging in a postmodern society and culture. The author's general thesis is that the mode of information enacts a radical reconfiguration of language, one which constitutes subjects outside the pattern of the rational, autonomous individual. Electronic culture permits a different interpretation of the gap. The tremendous extension of the space between speaker and listener in the mode of information upsets the confinement of the gap to the self-identical subject. By contextualizing Jean Baudrillard's understanding of consumer culture in relation to the mode of information, by connecting it with specific communication technologies, the author hopes to extract the critical impulse of his position without acceding to his monolithic vision.
