Americans should not just tolerate dissent. They should encourage it. In this provocative and wide-ranging book, Steven Shiffrin makes this case by arguing that dissent should be promoted because it lies at the heart of a core American value: free speech. He contends, however, that the country's major institutions--including the Supreme Court and the mass media--wrongly limit dissent. And he reflects on how society and the law should change to encourage nonconformity. Shiffrin is one of the country's leading first-amendment theorists. He advances his dissent-based theory of free speech with careful reference to its implications for such controversial topics of constitutional debate as flag burning, cigarette advertising, racist speech, and subsidizing the arts. He shows that a dissent-based approach would offer strong protection for free speech--he defends flag burning as a legitimate form of protest, for example--but argues that it would still allow for certain limitations on activities such as hate speech and commercial speech. Shiffrin adds that a dissent-based approach reveals weaknesses in the approaches to free speech taken by postmodernism, Republicanism, deliberative democratic theory, outsider jurisprudence, and liberal theory. Throughout the book, Shiffrin emphasizes the social functions of dissent: its role in combating injustice and its place in cultural struggles over the meanings of America. He argues, for example, that if we took a dissent-based approach to free speech seriously, we would no longer accept the unjust fact that public debate is dominated by the voices of the powerful and the wealthy. To ensure that more voices are heard, he argues, the country should take such steps as making defamation laws more hospitable to criticism of powerful people, loosening the grip of commercial interests on the media, and ensuring that young people are taught the importance of challenging injustice. Powerfully and clearly argued, Shiffrin's book is a major contribution to debate about one of the most important subjects in American public life.

A rapid and widespread growth of interest in applied ethics is occurring today not only in the United States, but around the world as well. Academia both reflects this and is a leader in the movement. The field of speech communication shares in this increased sensitivity to ethical concerns. Students and the general public are looking for thoughtful analyses and guidance in all areas of communication. Ethical concerns relative to mass communication have been the subject of a number of books, but only a very few cover the entire scope of communication to include interpersonal, intercultural, organizational, small groups, and public speaking. This book tries to fill that need by discussing ethical concerns as they emerge in the areas of the communication process -- the communicator, the message, the media, the audience, and the situation. The speech communication field now has a need to digest and synthesize the existing research findings and the general literature in the field and in related humanities and social science works into a coherent and nontechnical discussion. This volume explores the most up-to-date materials to provide just such a synthesis. An extensive bibliography at the end of the book gives readers the sources on which the book is based, and offers ample avenues for further personal exploration. The book should provide meaningful food for thought as readers grapple conscientiously with the many everyday decisions made in communication transactions, and in evaluating the communication of others.

Ethics in Speech and Language Therapy is a key text for students, practitioners and managers alike. The demands of practice, legislation, registration and the recognition of competencies all point to the need for speech and language therapists to be explicitly educated about ethics. This book provides an overview of this key topic, grounds ethical practice in the broader context of morals and values; discusses frameworks for ethical decision making; discusses common ethical issues in speech and language therapy practice and service management; and considers factors which complicate ethical decision making.

Although listening is central to human interaction, its importance is often ignored. In the rush to speak and be heard, it is easy to neglect listening and disregard its significance as a way of being with others and the world. Drawing upon insights from phenomenology, linguistics, philosophy of communication, and ethics, Listening, Thinking, Being is both an invitation and an intervention meant to turn much of what readers know, or think they know, about language, communication, and listening inside out. It is not about how to be a good listener or the numerous pitfalls that stem from the failure to listen. Rather, the purpose of the book is, first, to make readers aware of the value and importance of listening as a fundamental human ability inextricably connected with language and thought; second, to alert readers to the complexity of listening from personal, cultural, and philosophical perspectives; and third, to offer readers a way to think of listening as a mode of communicative action by which humans create and abide in the world. Lisbeth Lipari brings together historical, literary, intercultural, scientific, musical, and philosophical perspectives, as well as a range of her own personal experiences, to produce this highly readable analysis of how “the human experience of being as an ethical relation with others . . . is enacted by means of listening.”

First Published in 1973. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

Broad in scope, yet precise in exposition, the Sixth Edition of this highly acclaimed ethics text has been infused with new insights and updated material. Richard Johannesen and new coauthors Kathleen Valde and Karen Whedbee provide a thorough, comprehensive overview of philosophical perspectives and communication contexts, pinpointing and explicating ethical issues unique to human communication. Chief among the authors objectives are to: provide classic and contemporary perspectives for making ethical judgments about human communication; sensitize communication participants to essential ethical issues in the human communication process; illuminate complexities and challenges involved in making evaluations of communication ethics; and offer ideas for becoming more discerning evaluators of others communication. Provocative questions and illustrative case studies stimulate reflexive thinking and aid readers in developing their own approach to communication ethics. A comprehensive list of resources spotlights books, scholarly articles, videos, and Web sites useful for further research or personal exploration.

Maatian Ethics in a Communication Context explores the ethical principle of Maat: the guiding principle of harmony and order that permeated classical African political and civil life. The book provides a rigorous, communication-focused account of the ethical wisdom ancient Africans cultivated and is evidenced in the form of recovered written texts, mythology, stelae, prescriptions for just speech, and the hieroglyphic system of writing itself. Moving beyond colonial stereotypes of ancient Africans, the book offers insight into the African value systems that positioned humans as inextricably embedded in nature, and communication theory that anchors good communication in careful listening habits as the foundational moral virtue. Expanding on the work of Maulana Karenga, Molefi Kete Asante and other groundbreaking scholars, the book presents a picture of civilizations with a shared lust for life, a spiritual connection to scientific speech, and the veneration of ancestors as deeply connected to the pursuit of wisdom. Offering an examination of Maat from a specifically communication ethics perspective, this book will be of great interest to scholars and students of Communication Ethics, African philosophy, Rhetorical theory, Africana Studies and Ancient History.