Kommunikationshistorik

Kommunikationshistorik, or communication history, is the scholarly study of how humans transmit and interpret information across time. The field treats communication as a social practice embedded in technologies, institutions, languages, and cultures. It examines how methods of conveying messages—from oral speech and script to printing, telegraphy, radio, television, and digital networks—shape everyday life, economic organization, politics, and knowledge production. It also analyzes how societal structures influence communication, including literacy, gender, class, race, and policy.

The scope covers ancient to modern periods, and includes both technological innovations and the cultural practices surrounding them: the establishment of postal systems, the rise of mass media, the governance of broadcasting, the globalization of information, and the current shift toward online platforms and data flows. Key topics include standardization and regulation, the public sphere, propaganda and persuasion, censorship and surveillance, media literacy, and the economics of information.

Methodologically, kommunikationshistorik relies on primary sources such as manuscripts, letters, newspapers, corporate and state archives, as well as secondary works. Researchers employ comparative history, historiography, discourse analysis, media archaeology, and network analysis to trace the adoption, diffusion, and impact of communication technologies and practices.

The field aims to illuminate how communication technologies enable and constrain social change, and to provide historical context for contemporary media policy, cultural production, and digital culture. It is closely related to media studies, history of technology, linguistics, and sociology.