We explain and summarize the history of human communication and the media that exist. Also, its characteristics and timeline.
The capacity for language is unique and exclusive to humanity.
What was the history of human communication?
The history of human communication It includes an extensive journey, from the first social manifestations of the human beingthrough which one individual and another could transmit their intentions and perhaps come to an agreement, to the sophisticated forms of communication that predominate today.
Human communication is a complex and broad category in which There are many ways to exchange information and numerous possible languages, verbal or not, and through different channels.
Although communication is an action of exchanging information between two or more beings, The ability to speak is unique and proper to human beingsLanguage consists of a system of signs that allows us to express thoughts and feelings through words, and is possible thanks to the human intellectual capacity that reaches the levels of abstraction necessary to create, interpret and learn.
Origin of human communication
human communication was born with the human being himselfbecause it is one of their natural abilities. There is no milestone or date that we can mark the beginning of communication for our species, but we can trace a path of the evolution of communication.
The first of all forms of human communication is language.It is estimated that human verbal communication began with the appearance of the Homo sapiens, about 2.5 million years ago, because it was a species that developed the capacity for understanding and expression. It could have developed a communication system, through onomatopoeia and signs.
For example, he Homo neanderthalensis possessed linguistic and communicative skillsbut much less developed than those we know today, which allowed them to lead a different lifestyle characterized by hunting, gathering and nomadic life.
Non-verbal communication
Nonverbal communication is also useful with other species.
Language and the human voice were not the only mechanisms of communication that primitive man had. He had various types of non-verbal communication, that is, not involved in the spoken word.
For example: gestural communication that is instinctive and that involves the body to express emotions actions. Sometimes, gestures can be a universal type of communication, because the meaning of a gesture can be much easier to interpret than a word.
human voice
The first form of communication in human history was the voice, that is, the language articulated through our vocal system: lungs, throat, vocal cords, larynx, mouth, tongue, lips, teeth. Everything is put at the service of emitting a chain of sounds in a continuous, organized and coherent manner, according to the rules dictated by a language (or idiom).
The human voice is our regular channel of communication, the most common and most used, either live and direct, or through instruments invented to magnify it, such as megaphones or microphones. In prehistoric times (that is, before the appearance of writing), the transmission of knowledge depended on the voice. All knowledge was transmitted from one generation to another orally and was preserved in the memory of each individual capable of remembering it.
The custom of transferring knowledge orally developed certain strategies that helped people remember the information, for example: the rhyme It is a memorization technique based on the similarity of sound that made it possible to counteract the lack of human memory.
Writing
Kanji are graphic symbols that represent specific ideas.
Writing is a system of graphic representation, through signs that make up a language. There are as many systems or languages as there are cultures in the world that have evolved from their appearance to the present day. Among the main writing systems throughout history, the following stand out:
- Pictograms. They consisted of a system of signs that represented observable reality, that is, drawings, illustrations of some kind, but organized in a finite series of possibilities that gave them a certain sense and order. This type of proto-writing was used by various cultures in the world from 9000 BC and became very popular between 5000 and 6000 BC. For example: the hieroglyphics created by the Egyptians and the codices developed by the Mayans.
- Ideograms. They consisted of a system of signs that were derived from pictograms and were differentiated by the possibility of combining ideograms to convey more complex meanings and broader concepts. That is, the same symbol could represent different meanings, such as the drawing of legs that could mean “legs as part of the body” or the “act of walking” depending on how it was combined with other symbols. For example: the kanji or sinograms of the Japanese language.
- Alphabet. They consisted of a system of ordered signs with an abstract design. The first alphabet was that of the Phoenicians, around 1000 BC. The evolution of the alphabet allowed the development of the writing systems that survive today. It consists of the reproduction of signs, accompanied by a respective phonetic, but which have no relation to the object to which they refer. For example: the drawing of a flower is representative of the flower that our sense of sight perceives. However, the word “flower” is a combination of alphabetical signs ordered in an arbitrary manner that only makes sense in a certain culture or language and that has no relation to the object that we perceive itself.
Post mail
Each country began to develop its own mail service.
The exchange of texts written on paper and other physical supports made of plant fiber gave rise to letter and parcel sending and receiving systems in different countries, known as printed mail.
Communications through postal mail required time, because the message issued by the sender could take weeks or months until it reached the hands of the receiver or recipient. After the invention of the steam engine, postal mail delivery times were significantly reduced. This model It was replaced at the end of the 20th century by e-mail. Or email.
Printed communication
The invention of Gutenberg’s printing press in the 15th century revolutionized the way written texts were disseminated and books, which until then were made manually and belonged to the most exclusive sectors of the population, such as the nobles and the clergy. As a consequence, the transmission and dissemination of knowledge expanded to the general population in an unprecedented way, potentially reducing illiteracy.
This new invention brought about the possibility of using metal plates sprayed with pigmentsto successively ink many identical pages and mass produce a book. It also allowed the emergence of the first mass-produced periodical publications, which could be distributed among citizens in hundreds or thousands of copies.
Along with the later invention of lithography and other similar techniques, With the printing press, a mass publication market emergedand later companies dedicated to written information, which were the first newspapers and magazines.
To this day, modern versions of the printing press circulate far more publications of all kinds than ever before in human history. It is, perhaps, The most effective written communication method in history.
Telecommunications
Radio waves enabled the creation of radio, telephone and television.
The technological advances of the Industrial Revolution impacted the way of creating content and disseminating it on a massive scale, through moving images and sounds. Furthermore, it allowed the transmission of information through cables, such as the telephone, and through hertzian waves, that is, electromagnetic waves, such as radio.
Thanks to this revolutionary advance Impressive communicative inventions emerged from the 19th and 20th centuries: the telegraph, telephone, radio, television, even radar and microwaves. New technologies made it possible to carry out faster, more massive communications and contact people separated by great distances around the world.
Information technology
Technology allows us to communicate in real time over great distances.
The Digital Revolution of the late 20th century It had a full impact on human communication. Computers are machines capable of receiving, storing or transmitting much larger volumes of information and at much higher speeds than any previous human invention.
The connection of computers and cell phones through increasingly extensive networks, such as the Internet, allowed sending multimedia messages in real time, make teleconferences, video recordings, chats, business or personal emails and text messages, among other types of platforms for sending messages. It was a radical change in the way we communicated until now.
Timeline of human communication
- 200,000 BC Emergence of human voice communication.
- 50,000 BC Creation of the first cave paintings in prehistoric caves.
- 3250 BC c. Creation of Egyptian hieroglyphic writing.
- 1050 BC. Creation of the first alphabet, by the Phoenicians.
- 900 BC. Creation of the first postal mail service in China, for bureaucratic purposes.
- 305 ADInvention of the method of reproducing symbols, through wooden boards, by the Chinese.
- 1440Invention of the printing press, by the German Gutenberg.
- 1814Invention of the first photographic process, by the Frenchman Niepce.
- 1876. Patented the first telephone model, by the British Graham Bell.
- 1920. Creation and rapid expansion of radio.
- 1927. Broadcast of the first TV program, made by the BBC in London.
- 1962. Launch of the first telecommunications satellite, Telstar I, by the United States.
- 1994. Launch of Internet connections to the general public worldwide.