1st Edition

Crisscrossing Communication Research Historical Context and Global Perspective

By Chin-Chuan Lee Copyright 2025
    350 Pages
    by Routledge

    Drawing on studies of international communication and late Qing and Republican newspapers, this book examines the intellectual and practical development of communication from a global and historical perspective.

    The book is organized in two parts. The first part explores the "domestication" and fragmentation of communication studies, examining how domestic communication paradigms have been transformed into "refined mediocrity" and how international communication is now included in discussions of "modern theory". Focusing on the newspapers of China's Republican era, the second part explores the history of journalism from a variety of perspectives and addresses several key research issues. By exploring ways to connect theories in the humanities and social sciences, bridging the gap between Eastern and Western cultures, and interweaving case studies and macro-level theorizing, the author shows that communication analysis is necessarily dialectical, specific, complementary, and conditional. The book sheds important light on how acting locally while thinking globally can help us reconstruct the epistemological and methodological foundations of international communication.

    The title will appeal to scholars and students in communication studies, journalism, and the social sciences, especially those interested in international communication.

    1. The Space-Time Coordinates of Communication Research  Part I: International Communication: China Connects with the World  2. The "Involution" of Communication Studies: A Brief Review of the Paradigm and Identity of Mainstream Research in the United States  3. International Communication Research: Critical Reflections and a New Point of Departure  4. Local Experiences, Cosmopolitan Theories on Cultural Relevance in International Communication Research  5. Perspectives and Communication: Dialogue between Chinese Social Media Studies and Western Mainstream Scholarship  Part II: Newspaper in the Republic of China: Connections Between Journalism and History  6. The Scholars’ Political Commentary in Modern China  7. Journalists’ Feelings and National Imagination  8. Semi-Colonialism and Journalistic Sphere of Influence: British-American Press Competition in Early Twentieth-Century China  9. Public Opinion in Modern China: Is It a Dialogue of the Deaf, or Public Dialogue?  10. American Pragmatism and Chinese Modernization: Importing the Missouri Model of Journalism Education to Modern China

    Biography

    Chin-Chuan Lee, Yu Shan Chair Professor of Communication at National Chengchi University in Taiwan, is an elected Fellow of the International Communication Association (ICA) and recipient of its B. Audrey Fisher Mentorship Award. He is Professor Emeritus of Journalism and Mass Communication at the University of Minnesota, and Emeritus Professor of Media and Communication at City University of Hong Kong.  He has published in both English and Chinese, and in a wide range of topics, including global communication, media and social change, social theories, media political economy and media history.