 Dear listeners, now I am going to speak to you on a very important subject, culture and communication. Culture as a concept has different connotations. Likewise, communication also has different connotations for different people. Culture and communication together make a very interesting subject of study. What exactly is the role of culture in communication? Or the other way, what exactly is the role of communication in culture? If we combine both of them, what exactly emerges is the important question being asked. We are talking about information society, the concept wherein information is capital, information is product, information is profit. From information society, we are moving towards a new concept called knowledge society. And today the world is talking about knowledge creation, knowledge as wealth and knowledge as the tool of wealth creation. And most of the developed countries are moving towards a new discipline called knowledge economics or they are becoming knowledge economies. Knowledge is applied to create wealth and to create a egalitarian society. Perhaps you remember the famous saying by Marshall McLuhan, a noted communication scholar. He said the world is a global village. In other words, this world is like a village wherein different cultures coexist peacefully. He also perhaps you remember gave another concept, medium is the message. In fact, this particular phrase has got some useful meaning for all of us. Whatever the medium we use that itself will become the message. Perhaps today you will remember that the medium of telemission is considered as a restaurant medium per se whereas print was not considered so. When we talk of communication as power, we also talk of communication as culture or culture as communication. In other words, communication is culture oriented. What exactly we understand by this phrase communication as culture? Perhaps again you will understand this world is divided into two societies, the Western society and the Eastern society. The Western society is influenced by the works of Plato and Aristotle whereas the Eastern societies were influenced by several scholars belonging to different denominations. The Western culture or the Western societies adopted the principles and philosophies given by Plato and Aristotle. Perhaps you remember again that it was Plato who wrote the famous political treatise The Republic. He in fact used dialogue as a form of communication. On his part Aristotle used his work Rhetorica to enunciate his ideas and give them to the people on how to communicate, how to write, how to understand others. You also go back to the Greek tragedies where communication was considered to be a powerful tool particularly in the form of drama. Coming back to the ancient societies like India and China we have Confucius who was the main cultural normative prescriptor and coming to India we have several sages. In fact our epics Ramayana and Mahabharata also speak of communication. If you read the Artha Shastra of Chanakya you will perhaps understand that communication was a component of governance. When I talk of Eastern societies and Western societies I classify these societies into two. The Western society is called as individualistic society and the Eastern society is called as responsibility society. You may ask me why I am making this kind of classification. The basic principle behind classifying them is the factor of liberty. Individual freedom is considered to be very important in Western societies. The individual plays a role whereas the individual plays a subservient role in the responsibility societies of the East. In the Western society nobody gives up his liberty but ultimately the approach is the same that everybody wants to have the self-realization of his merits and also his own potential. Self-realization as a concept plays a very dominant role in culture and communication. If you ask me there is absolutely no difference between these two systems as far as the concept of self-actualization is concerned. It is the ultimate goal of all the religions, all the societies and all the normative prescriptions of the political governors. Actualization may not have the philosophical connotation which we think of but it also has got some kind of such connotation when you move towards the philosophical identities of the people. Whatever it is if we go a little away from the religious overtones it becomes a little bit different. When I talk of communication and culture I also talk of the value system and the attitude of the people towards life. We always divide values into primary values and secondary values. Primary values like honesty, integrity, truthfulness, they are universal in character. There is no question of any deviation from these core values in any society nor in their meanings attributed. But when it comes to secondary values we have got different interpretations because each society is different in its character. For example the western society attaches lots of importance to punctuality whereas in the eastern societies time as a concept has got different connotation. Manliness, competition, selling oneself in the market these are the highlights of any society in the west. Whereas in India when we talk of the responsibility society a person will have to be respectful to his elders and women occupy a different place in the society. They are on the higher pedestal at least theoretically. So culturally commodification of certain characteristics of the social prescriptions it may be a very important part of the western society. But in the east commodification of certain such things will not be allowed. What is decent in the east may not be so in the west. Or what is indecent in the west has got different connotations in the east. What is acceptable in the west may not be acceptable in the east. For example you take the dress code. The dress code in the east is totally different and the dress code in the west is different. And when you talk of stereotypes, stereotyping is very important in communication and culture. We have our own stereotypes in India. We expect every woman to be like Sita or Savitri or Ahalya. Whereas in the west a woman can be a model, a fashionable lady and she is used to sell products. In fact the very communication industry in the west depends upon the women models. You sell everything through the women models. But in the eastern societies for a long time it was considered as a taboo. Of course when it comes to the treatment of women we also lack behind perhaps we talk of equity, equality for women. Nowadays it is empowerment of women which has got very important role to play in government policies. Whatever it is when we talk of communication and culture, culture plays a very vital role in how we communicate with others. Perhaps you will understand that when culture becomes communication we simply mean that cultural characteristics of a people are reflected in the communication behavior of the individuals. When you use mass media, the mass media contents also reflect the culture of that particular society. When each society has its own distinct culture and tries to preserve its culture then the task of communicator becomes a little more complex than what it was before. When we talk of the mass media we all know that mass media were invented in the west they are western products. We adopted the technology to reach out to the people and give went to the aspirations of the people. Unfortunately this technology can also be used for wrong ends. When we go back to the western concept of communication we also think of language as a part of our cultural communication. Some countries are the melting pots of different cultures but there also you will find the ethnic minorities trying to preserve their own culture, their own identities, their own existence through mass media. That's why we talk of alternative communication channels or alternative media. It is perhaps again valid in the context of the United States of America. Or you can take India for that matter, India, a country of diverse cultures, diverse languages is nothing but a great challenge to any communicator. Communication in a multicultural society, multilingualistic society is very difficult. And this task is to be accomplished by careful use of the language, the media and the communication strategies. When I talk about technology dominating the world now there is a new concept called technoculture. That is technology induced culture. There is also a danger of the westernization of the indigenous cultures in other countries. What I mean here is western influence is taking over and there is going to be a uniform culture in all the countries. The multinational corporations who are producing different products, they are using media to promote their products. International advertising is a reality. International advertising I mean is selling products across the borders. When I talk of selling, they are not only selling products, they are also selling lifestyles. They are also selling dreams. Dreams are manufactured in studios. Culture is manufactured in studios. Should we have such kind of proposition? All of us know that culture is a product of evolution. It is a product of several centuries, the way in which people think, the way in which people react to situations, the way in which people try to protect and preserve their identities and their nativity. In the mad rush for development, in the mad rush for aping the west, all of us are moving towards what is known as Coca-Cola culture or McDonald culture. I also mentioned techno culture where technological determinism is very important for policy makers. It is technology which decides our culture. Should we have such a culture created by technology, we do not know. It is left to the people. We always say young people are quite technology savvy. Do young people forget about their culture? When we talk of developmental communication, we also have a concept called reverse modernization. It is a fine example of a person who lived in the west for decades coming back to his own roots and behaving like local people, forgetting that he lived in the west and he becomes one of the local people and becomes very rigid and conservative. We also call it as new traditionalization in our parlance. Culture is deep rooted. It is not a matter of instantaneous production. But what we are talking of is television or film producing what is called as instant culture. Fashion. It is only superficial. It exists only for a few days. Manorisms. All these we think that they are all temporary. Whatever is studio manufactured will not last long. Ultimately it is very important to know that the social institutions play a very vital role in the development of any society. The social institutions are school, family, religion and mass media. It is the family which is responsible for the cultural development of any child. Again it is religion which prescribes social norms and behavior for the people. And thirdly, it is again the school where people learn formal education and that formal education makes them learn the cultural aspects of life. And lastly mass media, they also play a vital role but their role cannot be 100% precise. When I talked of culture and communication, any culture cannot be devoid of religion. Every religion has got its own influence on the culture of the society in question. For example, the western culture has got its moorings in Christianity. I spoke about Aristotle and Plato. The whole communication concept in the west is based on the Aristotelian model. If you come to the east, the eastern model is totally different. Each country had its own finer aspects and each country had its own band of dedicated scholars who contributed for the development of culture. For example, the epics of Ramayana and Mahabharata in India have such a strong influence on the Indian psyche that cannot be so easily measured and imagined. The famous mega serial on Ramayana made the entire countries sit, glued to the television set and watch what was there on the small screen. Similarly, the epics of Mahabharata when it was telecast. Imagine it is not that television influenced the television viewing, it is the viewer's preference for the epics. Understand that culture played a vital role. If you ask all the procedures, processes that a society initiates is towards the collective welfare. If you just imagine that religion plays a vital role, you can always ask certain interesting questions. How we are going to classify them? You know, we classify again the eastern societies and western societies into two. The eastern societies have a strong oral tradition whereas we call the western societies as literate societies. For the simple reason that the western societies depend upon the written documents. Whereas the eastern societies have their epics, their scriptures, everything passed on from one generation to another generation orally. So the oral tradition has its own advantages and disadvantages. Precision is a problem in oral tradition. Authentication is a problem in oral tradition. But the way in which people have contributed for the development of culture cannot be underestimated so easily. You just take the example of the philosophies, religious philosophies of India. If you take Dwaita or Advaitha or Vishishtha Dwaita, the three major philosophies that emerged in the south, you will perhaps understand how they worked. One example is that of Advaitha. Ajishankara gave the philosophy of Advaitha where he considered that everything is non-dichotomous. Dwaita means dichotomous, Advaitha means non-existence of dichotom. In other words, he said, I am God. He meant there is no difference between the human being and the God. The God exists in the human being. He made a famous statement, you are not what you are, you are what you are not. For him, the entire physical world was nothing but an illusion and there was a metaphysical world which was real. So he wanted to find out the distinction between reality and illusion. When I talked of the perception, you know, in intercultural communication, when we talk of culture and communication, we perhaps talk of intercultural communication. In intercultural communication, I already mentioned that self-realization or self-actualization is the ultimate goal of any society or any individual. But they pass through different stages of perception. The Western perception, as I mentioned, is different. The collective welfare passes through different stages, first from the individual, then to the collectiveness. Whereas in the Eastern concept, it passes from the collective to the individual self-realization. So the approach is different, but the goal is the same. If that is the case, then these religious philosophical aspects of intercultural communication play a vital role. When I talked of Dvaita philosophy, it was the difference between man and God. We use communication channels in Advaita for self-realization which was nothing but intrapersonal communication. When you come to Dvaita philosophy, it is inter, it is communication between God and the people. Communication was a channel of communion. If you go to the other philosophy, Vishistha Dvaita, Saint Ramanuja added one more factor. He said, without compassionate communication, there cannot be any communion. So compassion, communication and communion became three vital aspects of philosophical communication of the East, especially in South India. So we can go on narrating how communication and culture are intertwined. We must understand at the same time a very important role of language. Language is also a product of evolution and language is a product of every society's culture. Language reflects culture and culture reflects language. If you take India as a classical example, then you can understand how each word has emanated from the cultural background of the people. We had very great scholars who have contributed to the development of language. Our grammar, our very expression of language will have cultural connotations. We talk of connotative meanings and denotative meanings of language. In addition to that, there is also a concept given by the Indians to the world of research, especially in cultural communication, that is the concept of meaning of meanings. That means every meaning has an inner meaning. You must have heard of the very famous scholars like Pani, Patanjali, Prabhakara, Mandanamishra. Prabhakara and Mandanamishra were perhaps one of the main contributors to the development of language. Mandanamishra's Bharat Katavallari was written in a different language and his contribution to the development of cultural communication is of very high order. Unfortunately, we do not have much evidence about what he contributed and whatever we know we have known from secondary sources. And when I talk of connotative and denotative meanings of the language, they do reflect the cultural component of each society. Every word has a cultural intonation. Every cultural presentation displays its language ability. By that I mean culture and communication, they are strongly intertwined. They blend together and without culture no language can develop. Without language no culture can develop. When I talk of the development of language and culture, a new threat has come from technology. Technology has started overpowering both communication and culture. When I spoke about technoculture, I meant the influence of technology over culture. And again, it is technology which is influencing our language, influencing our communication behavior. And these are the finest areas of research for communication scholars. When I spoke of developmental communication, I did not mention that culture was a component of development. And when we talk of national development and communication strategies for development, we must also realize that culture plays a very important role in communication for national development. And the new technology has changed the very face of the world. Today, the world is shrinking. The planet is becoming small, but we have to put these different cultures which will have to survive. Monoculture is not for the human civilization and mass media should aid in preserving culture. When I talk of culture, when I talk of language, when I talk of communication, they have certain meanings to us. And our scholars talked about language and communication in a different perspective. They also talked of word explosion, word implosion. That is how we can make words become very strong and effective to influence the culture and the thinking of the people. Today, the world is moving towards multiculturalism because of globalization. And in such a context, the study of multicultural communication becomes all the more relevant. Thank you.