Networks, Society, and Polis: Epistemological Approaches on Mediatization

Jairo Ferreira 260 newspapers, radio, television, and on the networks, shows a maxim of Marx : the anatomy of man is the key to the ape’s anatomy . In other words, the algorithm can reveal the secret of the media to update the reflection on the relations between the media, social and communication processes. However, empirical research in the lineage does not cover all forms of materializing mental experience. Its object is cut: only what is or breaks out in the public space, by actions of individuals or actors located in the private space or the sphere of the specialist fields, is the object of the empirical investigation of the mediatization in the perspective that we propose here. An immense universe of material signs constructed by the species is restricted to the private universe or specialized fields, which differ and define access rules. They are potential objects. They are kept in social and psychological safes of different levels, rel- atively sealed. Before the eruption (seal rupture) in the public space, mediatized semiosis is potential. Therefore, in any of the cases (materials of the pri- vate space, of the specialist, and imaginary and symbolic fields not manifested), something may break out in the public space. In this process, the media directed to the public space are cen- tral to the understanding of media processes, and, as a way of looking to mediatization. The specific strength of these media of publication (books, newspapers, radio, television, etcetera ) is to accelerate – to expand time and space – the processes of cir- culation of sign materializations, and, therefore, of the mental experiences of the species. It is not a question of semiotics as logic, but of logics that are in processes, based on accesses, us- age, practices, and social appropriations. As the mental experience materializes in new media, new interactions and relations between production and recep- tion are constituted. Thus, the printed matter (from the book and almanac to the newspaper), radio, television, and cinema, etcetera, constitute new relations between production and reception and configure new audiences. The circulation per- spective suggests that this relationship between production and reception systems be deciphered as relations and not in isolation.