Mid-semester Reflection

I've thought a lot about the story with which Frank ended class last week. When confronted with his mortality, he thought about his ancestors, and a reunion with them wherever they are. I've experienced the inverse of that.

I have really low blood pressure, and the way that I found out was by fainting in a restaurant. I'd never fainted before, and it's a pretty incredible experience. I lost consciousness, but not sub-consciousness. While I was passed out, I remember looking around a dark hallway for my grandmother. It was a very calm, very rational moment. And I thought to myself, "Well, she's not here, so I guess I'm not dead." I didn't realize how certain I was that death would reunite me with lost loved ones until I had some time to reflect on that experience.

And now I'm thinking about how our ancestors contribute to communication habits that are unique to us, that we inherit as beneficiaries of the familial institution. Stereotypically, many Italian people use their hands when they communicate. In my own family, my grandmother communicates via the preparation and presentation of food. I obviously can't speak to the communication habits of other families, but I presume that each family has a set of communication strategies or techniques that are inter-generational.

What does this mean for the study of communication? I think it means that we can approach communications with a camera, so to speak. We can look through the lens and make generalizations that apply to the majority of people. We can look broadly at the history of the communications tradition that we (humanity) have inherited. Or we can zoom in. We can zoom in to look at communications within institutions such as the state, religion, education, etc. We can zoom in further to look at family dynamics and politics. Finally, we can zoom in all the way, until we get to ourselves. As Frank said in class, "In the end, we each define our own rootedness and duty."

And in the end, (I think) we return to our ancestors.