BEGINNING OF HUMAN COMMUNICATION

HISTORY AND EVOLUTION

It all began in the prehistoric days. Fossil records recovered from many sites all over the world show that the first development in the evolution of human beings (Homo sapiens) took place about 70 million years back. Our first ancestors were rat like creatures that lived during the period of dinosaurs. Millions of years passed before the first primates with flexible hands and feet evolved.

Few more million years after, one cat like primate developed an important characteristic. Its brain to body ratio was higher than its contemporaries. This higher brain capacity helped this primate develop learning ability. Then about five to one million years ago evolved an ape like creature. It is called the Australopithecus africans. This creature lived in Africa. It walked upright, lived in caves and rock shelters and in family units. 

They spread from Africa to Europe and other parts of the world.

And then one of our early ancestors (Homo habilis) appeared about two million years ago. These were more advanced. They were the first ones to make tools. Also they mastered fire and started using it. These early ancestors lived in bigger groups. This perhaps was the beginning of the civilization process. Then came the Homo erectus. They are so named because they could stand erect or straight. They developed finer tools like two-edged hand axes and other cutting tools. More importantly Homo erectus had a brain volume of 600 cc, which was much higher than its ancestors (we now have a brain volume of about 1500 cc). 

And the final development occurred about 90,000 to 40,000 years ago when the Cro- Magnon man (Homo sapiens-sapiens) appeared. The Cro-Magnon lived in caves and other such shelters. They used complex tools and were successful hunters. They had an elaborate social organization. Also the Cro-Magnon learned to preserve food and make clothes. And they spread to all parts of the world including Europe, America and Asia.

The Cro-Magnon also started carving and cave painting. They domesticated animals, began to use metals, and started agriculture. They were identical to contemporary human beings both in appearance and brain capacity (about 1500 cc). Most importantly, they started communicating with the help of rudimentary signs and grunts, etc.

STAGES OF GROWTH OF COMMUNICATION:

The human evolutionary process became much faster towards the end. Also the process of

civilization became faster. This was possible to a great extent because of their ability to communicate. This ability helped the early human beings to invent, borrow solutions from each other and most importantly to accumulate knowledge. The process of evolution of human

communication, however, was not smooth. On the basis of evidences from fossil records and the findings of scientists from various fields, a chronology of the development of human

communication has been prepared:

o The age of Signs and Signals,

o The Age of Speech and Language,

o The Age of Writing,

o The Age of Print, and

o The Age of Mass Communication.

THE AGE OF SIGNS AND SIGNALS:

The earliest ancestors of human beings, even before the toolmakers, communicated like other

well-developed animals. They used noises and body movements. These constituted mutually

understood signals and signs developed by small groups living together. The noises included

growls, grunts and shrieks. But they could not speak. This was because of their underdeveloped larynx or voice box. They could make sounds, but they could not construct or utter words. The limited range of sounds and hand-arm signals made communication complicated. Using signs and signals, our ancestors could only communicate about simple objects, concepts and ideas. These simple signs and symbols of our ancestors have now evolved into a well developed system called KINESICS or the science of body language.

However, in those early days, these signs, hand signals, body movements formed a very

slow and difficult system. This did not allow complex and lengthy communication. So, at best,

the communication was simple and slow. During this period, our ancestors also used smoke signals and fire as modes of communication.

THE AGE OF SPEECH AND LANGUAGES:

A lot is known about the Cro-Magnon man than about any other of our early ancestors. They made beautifully crafted tools of stone. Also for the first time they started to carve and paint, thus introducing art to the civilization process. They carved representations of animals and human beings from stone, ivory, bone, etc. They also painted cave walls. Hundreds of such

paintings have been found in Spain and France. They also made clothing from leather. They had developed the art of hardening clay by fire. Of all these, their most important achievement, in communication terms, were the cave paintings. These were perhaps the first attempts to store information, the forerunners of writing. But the most significant aspect of the Cro-Magnon man was that it had a skull structure, tongue and voice box (larynx) just like ours today. And with these they could speak. Speech and language seems to have originated about 35,000 to 40,000 years ago. Fossil records show that the Cro-Magnon people lived in the same areas as did their ancestors, the Neanderthals. These ancestors (Neanderthals) were physically well developed and much stronger than the Cro-Magnon. They were capable hunters, had developed effective tools. While they were well equipped to survive, they became extinct. And the much weaker Cro-Magnon flourished. The reason given for this is the Cro-Magnon's ability to communicate.

This ability enabled them to pool their mental resources, conceptualize and plan. Thus they

could overcome the hardships of life and survive. The Neanderthals did not have this ability and

thus became extinct. The Cro-Magnons used their ability to communicate to grow towards civilization. They domesticated animals. Also about 10,000 years ago, they developed farming. Instead of wandering around in search of food, they now settled at strategic places like riverbanks and grew their food through cultivation and farming. This happened about 6,500 years ago. And while all this was happening, language continued to be developed and polished

further. People moving from place to place-learned new languages and spread them. They

developed words, numbers and the rules of language (grammar), which made the use of language much easier. It also made learning much easier. Languages also become more

standardized. Most importantly, language development helped in a big way in the change over of human beings from a way of life focused on hunting and wandering to the development of great civilizations. While language was not the sole reason for all these, such changes would not have been possible without language.

THE AGE OF WRITING:

It took millions of years for the evolution of human beings. It took thousands of years for human beings to develop speech and language. After that, it just took few hundred years for writing to be developed. This comparative shorter time span shows that with communication ability, development became much more faster. The history of the development of writing includes developments from pictorial or pictographic representations to phonetic or sound based systems.

Pictography: Pictography represented ideas (simple and complex) with pictures or stylized drawings. As we have already discussed, the earliest attempts at recording information were the cave. These cave paintings soon led to the simpler pictography. Pictures are representations of objects, scenes, etc. These do not help much in communication if they are not properly understood. Even today we use captions to supplement photos in newspapers and magazines. So in those early days to communicate the intended meaning with the help of pictorial depictions only was difficult as no standardized encoding and decoding process existed. Such a system including standardization of meanings of pictures was the first step towards writing. This was perhaps necessitated by the need to keep records of land boundaries and business contracts and transactions. Such a system was first developed in ancient Egypt, where agriculture and business were first practiced. Inscriptions of pictures associated with meanings dating back to about 4,000 BC found in the ancient valleys of Mesopotamia and Egypt prove this. These were crudely drawn pictures painted on walls of buildings and other such surfaces. These included sunrise (for beginning of a day), bow and arrow (for a hunt), a wavy line (for a river).

Hieroglyphy: Soon many such picture-symbols were decided upon and standardized. Standardization meant that all the receivers understood these picture-symbols in the same way. This made communication easier. The Egyptians are credited with simplifying this system and also for having developed a more elaborate system. They developed what are now called glyphs or symbolic characters. In the beginning the Egyptians carved these glyphs on stone. But later on these glyphs were drawn and painted. This Egyptian system of picture writing is also called hieroglyphy. Egyptian hieroglyphy is similar to today's Chinese script. Like the Chinese script of today, the ancient Egyptian system also had numerous symbols. Individual symbols were representations of a particular thing, idea or concept. And in those days it took years to master these symbols before one became 'literate'.

Cuneiform Writing: Not far from ancient Egypt, on the north of the Persian Gulf, lived another

 tribe, the Sumerians. They acquired the Egyptian hieroglyphic symbols. But they found them to

be very difficult. So they developed their own system of symbols. Instead of using 'pictures in realistic details', the Sumerians developed a system of small, simple and stylized symbols. They used sharpened sticks to draw these pictures on tablets of soft clay. The resultant symbols are called cuneiform writing. Most of these symbols have survived as the clay tablets were baked hard.

Phonetic Writing: Developing a simpler, stylized and more practical system of symbols was not

the only achievement of the Sumerians. The most important aspect of the Sumerian system was letting each little stylized symbol stand for a particular sound rather than an object or idea. This development came around 1700 BC. The advantage of this system was enormous. Instead of thousands of different symbols, each representing an object or idea, the new system required very few symbols. Each symbol was assigned a particular sound. And these symbols were combined to form words. And the words stood for objects and ideas, etc. This is called the phonetic system. Our present system of alphabetical writing, in which each consonant and vowel has its own sound and character, is a much simplified version of the Egyptian phonetic system. The Sumerian system now had only about a hundred symbols instead of the thousands of symbols of the earlier systems. This made literacy easier to acquire as one had to remember only about hundred or so symbols to be able to write.

Alphabetical Writing: The next development was alphabetical writing. This came about 1000

years after phonetic writing was developed. The Greeks and the Romans were not satisfied with even the hundred odd symbols. They reduced the number of symbols to about two dozens.

Other developments included simplification of these symbols. The designs of the earlier symbols were simplified to simpler combinations of straight and curved lines. Many variations of alphabetical writing were developed around the world. However, the Greeks developed the most simplified and standardized form of alphabetical writing by around 500 BC. The Greeks also added 'five' vowels to the alphabets. These Greek alphabets were passed on to Rome. 

The Romans modified and improved it even further. They developed the majuscule (capital) and minuscule (small) letters. Now we call the upper case and lower case letters, according to their position in the typesetters' trays in printing presses. And thus the human beings achieved one of their greatest accomplishments. But for this development large majority of the population of the world would still be illiterate. Civilization made great strides only because people could read and write.

Development of Portable Media: The earliest pictographic symbols were carved on stone or

painted on wall. This was the case with the Egyptian hieroglyphs. The Sumerian cuneiform

involved writing on clay tablets or stone slabs. The biggest advantage with these was that they

were 'permanent' to a great extent and could not be easily destroyed. The biggest problem,

however, was the lack of 'portability'. These writings, whether done on walls, stone slabs or clay

tablets, could not be transported easily. To overcome this problem, the Egyptians developed a kind of durable writing material from 'papyrus' plants about 2,500 BC. Papyrus was extremely light as compared to stone or clay. This was the beginning of paper. Also writing on papyrus paper was much easier using brush and ink. The earlier process of chiseling on stone was laborious and time consuming.

Papermaking was first started on the Nile Delta where papyrus plants were found in plenty. Fresh green stems of papyrus were cut, laid crisscross on each other and pounded till they formed one single mass. This mass was then pressed, rolled, and dried to form paper. Some other civilizations also started making their versions of lighter, easy to write and easily transportable writing material. In India palm leaves and bhuja patra were used for a long time for writing. This led to quicker and easier preparation of written material, which could be read easily. Religious doctrines and scriptures could be easily recorded. Observations of nature and natural calamities, their interpretations, successful treatment for diseases and many such important things could be recorded for posterity. All this added to the growing storehouse of human knowledge. The human mind was freed from the burdensome task of having to remember entire cultures and reproduce them through memory. The human mind could now concentrate on more productive ventures. This was the greatest step forward in the age of writing

 THE AGE OF PRINT:

After the development of language and writing, one of the greatest human accomplishments in

the field of communication was the development of printing. The earliest attempts at printing

involved preparing printing plates by carving wooden blocks, stone tablets, or metal plates. The

text and other matter to be printed were laboriously transformed into a raised and reverse format. This was done to facilitate transfer of ink from the raised surface. Later it became known as relief printing. All these activities including engraving, inking, and transferring the images on to paper were done by hand. This manual practice was time-consuming, tedious, laborious and prone to errors. Also the printing was not of very good quality. More number of copies could not be printed. By the fifteenth century, many parts of the world had developed technology for producing paper and ink along with a technique for printing manually.

The biggest change came in the middle part of the fifteenth century. Johan Guttenberg, a goldsmith in the small town of Mainz, Germany, was the moving force behind this revolution. Gutenberg is credited with two important developments, movable types and the mechanical printing press. The first originated because of Guttenberg's profession. He was a goldsmith. He experimented for years before he came up with square shaped metal castings bearing individual alphabets on them. The alphabets were raised and in reverse. These were the very first readymade and reusable types. Now there were no need to carve individual letters onto a plate. All one needed was to arrange the ready-made types in the required sequence. Guttenberg also developed a special alloy of lead and other metals to prepare types. Also these types could be rearranged and used again and again. The other invention by Gutenberg was the mechanical printing press. The juice-making machine inspired him. From a juice-making machine, he developed a mechanism that had two platforms, a mobile one for the image plate and a stationary platform for the paper. Other modifications included a process for inking and finally a mechanism for bringing the two surfaces together for the transfer of images. 

Using his two inventions, Gutenberg printed an elaborately decorated book, THE 42-LINE BIBLE. It is one of the finest examples of the printer's art ever produced. Spread of literacy: The beginning of the sixteenth century saw thousands of books being published in great numbers. From religious books to educational books, printing finally led to newspapers. And by the eighteenth century newspapers had become omnipresent and a powerful tool of communication. However, the greatest effects of printing were:

• Expression of knowledge covering a broad range of ideas and feelings;

• Permanence of records;

• Swiftness; and

• Information distribution.

THE AGE OF MASS COMMUNICATION:

Printing ushered in a new era in the field of communication. With expressiveness, permanence,

swiftness and diffusion or spread of information and knowledge, people around the world got to know about developments in other parts with in no time. This led to newer inventions and

discoveries. By mid-nineteenth century, telegraphy became a reality. It was not a means of mass communication. But, non-the-less, it was a great initiation, which resulted in the development of radio and television broadcasting technologies. But before that, motion pictures made their entry towards the end of the 19th century. The twentieth century began with cinema becoming an accepted from of family entertainment. In the 1920's, radio broadcasting began. Two decades later, in the 1940's, came television. While radio and television were spreading all over the world, newer media were being invented. VCR, Cable TV, and interactive videotext, etc. followed soon. Satellite technology, developed much earlier and used for many purposes like weather forecasting, etc., was now being used for broadcasting. This gave birth to the concept of satellite radio and satellite television.

Next came computers. Initially they were used for calculating and computing only. Soon satellites, telephony and computers were brought together to form a network connecting people all over the world. This international network or INTERNET with its world wide web (WWW) has finally turned the world into a global village in the real sense.