Mass Communication- concept and definition

Mass Communication

The concept of Mass Communication entails the transmission of messages to a large number of assorted, heterogenous people who are anonymous using technological tools called mass media. The recipients or receivers of the messages delivered through the process of Mass communication are also called the Audience.

The word ‘Mass’ in this context of Mass Communication studies would mean a large number of people who are heterogenous, assorted and anonymous in nature.

‘Large’ here would mean a relatively big audience or people who are many in number. However, it does not include everyone. People have their own choices in the consumption of Mass mediated messages.

‘Assorted’ here would mean a varied lot. Mass Media Channels have a huge audience but they are often assorted and spread out. They need not always be accumulated in the same place. The audience for a particular Media channel can differ not just from place to place but even in the precincts of a house. For instance, the children in the house may only prefer to watch cartoons on a particular channel, however, the parents may want to watch news, sports or any other tele-serial. The audience is scattered. Children in different homes from all across India may be watching a particular cartoon. Due to satellite Technology, this serial could even have an audience across countries. They may or may not be from a particular geographical context. They are assorted and from different places. However, for a Mass Media channel like a Community Radio, the audience is normally a particular community of people to whom the channel caters.

 ‘Heterogeneous’ here would mean that the audience includes different types of people. A Mass Media channel may have viewers from rich or poor backgrounds, educated or uneducated based on the content, it could be youth or adults, bureaucrats or ordinary middle- class family members. 

‘Anonymous’ would mean that the audience is nameless and unspecified.  While analysis can predict the number of hits a channel gets or the popularity a particular serial or book garners, once cannot identify the specific characteristic of every individual audience member. You may identify the place in which your audience exists but you will not be able to identify the person by his or her name. The Audience is Anonymous.

Keval Kumar: The process of delivering information, ideas and attitudes to a sizeable, diversified audience through use of media designed for that purpose is called Mass Communication.

C.V Nasimha Reddi: Mass Communication can be defined as ‘a process whereby mass produced messages are transmitted to large, anonymous and heterogenous masses of receivers’. By ‘mass produced’ we mean putting the content or message of mass communication in a form suitable to be distributed to large masses of people.

Littlejohn and Foss: The process whereby media organizations produce and transmit messages to large publics and the process by which those messages are sought, used, understood, and influenced by audience”.

McQuail: “The only one of the processes of communication operating at the society-wide level, readily identified by its institutional characteristics.”

Berger: Mass communication is the public transfer of messages through media or technology-driven channels to a large number of recipients from an entity, usually involving some type of cost or fee (advertising) for the user. “The sender often is a person in some large media organization, the messages are public, and the audience tends to be large and varied”

Tim O Sullivan, Hartley, Saunders and Fiske, (1983): Mass Communication is the practice and product of providing leisure entertainment and information to an unknown audience by means of corporately financed, industrially produced, stage regulated, high technology, privately consumed commodities in the modern print, screen, audio and broadcast media

Thompson (1995): Mass communication is the “institutionalized production and generalized diffusion of symbolic goods via the fixation and transmission of information or symbolic content”.

PLEASE NOTE THAT SOME OF THESE DEFINITIONS WERE WRITTEN PRIOR TO THE DEVELOPMENT OF NEW MEDIA AND DIGITAL TECHNOLOGY. SO, IT DOES NOT INCLUDE THE CONCEPT OF MASS COMMUNICATION THAT HAS ARISEN POST ARRIVAL OF THE INTERNET, CELL PHONES, CD ROM GAMES AND OTHER SOCIAL NETWORKING FORUMS AND OTT PLATFORMS.

Rowland Lorimer in his article title Mass Communication- redefinitional notes writes a very apt definition for Mass Communication. He does not confine Mass Communication to a single definition. Rather, he explains and includes the old and new forms of Mass Mediums in his concept of Mass Communication. He says:

Mass Communication is state- and interstate- organised transmission of intelligence, including -

(1) Centralised Mass information or entertainment dissemination (encompassing radio, television, newspapers, film magazines, books, recorded and performed Music and Advertising) (Lorimer)

(2) Decentralised information or entertainment dissemination: On the World Wide Web by individuals or organisations either through ready to access to, or wide distribution of information or entertainment products through sometimes state regulated, publicly accessible channels like the web or email. (Lorimer)

(3) Public Mass Communication- Wherein the exchange of intelligence at the societal level among individuals or small or large groups is by means of publicly accessible, sometimes state- regulated channels. (Lorimer)

Mass Communication thus includes:

·        Print Media- Newspapers, books, Magazines, Journals, Brochures, Pamphlets,

Newsletters, documents, etc.

·        Electronic Media- Radio, Television, Fax, Movies/ Cinema, Audio-visuals, etc

·    New Media- Cell phones, Smart Phones, world wide web, Internet, Social Networking Forums, OTT ( Over the Top Content) etc

Mass Communication is possible only in the presence of Technology. In many remote corners of India or in the world at large where there is no permeation of electricity, leave alone technology, Mass Communication cannot happen. Even in case of Mass Communication, many countries have bans on certain channels and only certain state permitted content can be shown or is shown. However, for those who have access to it, Mass communication has made communication easier and simpler for ordinary individuals, in spite of a complex organisation behind the scenes.