ABSTRACT

This volume advocates a shift from the social constructivism found in the work of Thomas Luckmann and Peter Berger, to a communicative constructivism that acknowledges communication as an embodied form of action in its own right, according to which social actors, in engaging in communicative action, construct a material social reality that guides, delimits, and enables actions. A study of the importance of understanding the role of communication in an age in which digitization and mediatization have extended the reach of communication to a global level and brought about the emergence of the communication society, The Communicative Construction of Reality shows how communication society does not merely replace modern society and its hierarchical institutions, but complements it in a manner that continually results in conflicts leading to the refiguration of society. As such, it will appeal to scholars of sociology with interests in the sociology of knowledge, communication, and social theory.

chapter I|12 pages

Introduction

chapter II|41 pages

From social to communicative construction

chapter III|80 pages

Social theory

Communicative action

chapter IV.A|73 pages

Theory of society

Time and sequentiality

chapter IV.B|26 pages

Theory of society

Space and media

chapter V|35 pages

Diagnosis

Communication society

chapter VI|10 pages

Conclusion

The refiguration of modernity