What is the history of communication?

Abstract

Abstract Communication History is an expression that proves to be problematic in the light of theoretical and conceptual analysis, as this article clarifies and discusses, when examining the proclamations made by its main spokespersons. Both methodological and empirical works are taken into account, with the purpose of evaluating how this object of knowledge is defined and approached, comparing it with what is effectively presented in the investigations, published by scholars from different generations and contexts. It is argued that there is a tendency to confuse the subject with others, especially Media History. An important exception is the cultural historian Robert Darnton, although a careful examination of his historiographical project with an ethnographic bias ends up revealing that his proposal for communication tends to reorient the field under no less problematic parameters.