Sven Windahl

Last updated
Sven Windahl
Windahl.jpg
Born(1942-05-01)May 1, 1942
Fristad outside Borås, Sweden
NationalitySwedish
Alma mater Lund University
Scientific career
Fields Communication studies, organizational communication, sociology
Institutions Lund University
Växjö University
University of Minnesota
University of Salzburg
ComCare
KAN Kommunikationsanalys
Nordisk Kommunikation

Sven Windahl (born May 1, 1942) is a Swedish professor of communication studies as well as a consultant in the field of organizational communication. His most influential work [1] is the book Using Communication Theory from 1989, co-authored with Dr. Benno Signitzer and Jean T. Olson. The book has been translated into many languages. [2]

Contents

Early years

Windahl was born in Fristad outside Borås in Sweden. While in high school (gymnasium) in Borås he also worked as a journalist at the social democratic newspaper Västgöta-demokraten

Education

He studied sociology at Lund University from 1963 to 1968, remaining at the university in an amanuensis position. In 1970, he became assistant professor at Växjö University (now Linnaeus University) where he helped start one of the first masters programmes in "information techniques" (now the Public Relations and Communication Programme) in Sweden. The programme focused on training people for information and communication work in the public sector, but as the programme continued, the private sector became an increasingly interested outlet.

While at Växjö University, he finished his doctoral thesis on the professionalization of journalism in Sweden. [3]

Career

While at the University of Minnesota in 1980-82 he worked with professor Jerry Kline on communication campaigns and also became editor and contributor of the peer-reviewed annual journal Mass Communication Review Yearbook . [4]

In 1982, his book Communication Models was published - co-authored with Denis McQuail. The book details basic communication models (Lasswell model, Shannon and Weaver's model, Gerbner's model), theories of media, audience-centered models and mass media systems in general.

In 1986, he was visiting professor at the University of Salzburg, working with professor Benno Signitzer with whom he wrote the book Using Communication Theory: An Introduction to Planned Communication (published 1989). The book has been translated into among others French, Chinese, Greek, Italian, Japanese and Spanish. [2]

His major research project between 1975 and 1987 was The Media Panel Program (MPP). [5] The program is located at Lund University in Sweden and is a long-term research program focused on basic aspects of the mass media use by Swedish children, adolescents and young adults. The MPP was founded by professors Karl Erik Rosengren and Sven Windahl, and is acknowledged as being one of the most comprehensive of its kind. Publications stemming from the program include: Media matter: TV use in childhood and adolescence (KE Rosengren, S Windahl and B Dervin, JAI Press Limited 1989).

While still a professor at Växjö University he started the consultancy ComCare, serving the public and health-care sector. In 1985–1992, he was working as an advisor to the Swedish government task force on AIDS (AIDS delegationen) where he made a comparative study of AIDS prevention initiatives across European countries. While working with the health care sector he turned his focus to organizational communication and management communication. In 1991, he founded the consultancy Kommunikationsanalys AB.

In 1992, he became professor at Lund University, Department of Communication Studies [6] and subsequently moved to Copenhagen. In 1993, he founded the consultancy Nordisk Kommunikation. It was during this period in the late 1990s that he introduced the notion of “communicative leadership”, focusing on the communication aspects of leadership in organisations.

In September 2017 he received an honorary doctorate from Roskilde University in recognition of his role as “a central researcher in the field of communication theory”. [7]

Selected articles

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lund University</span> Swedish university

Lund University is a public research university in Sweden and one of northern Europe's oldest universities. The university is located in the city of Lund in the province of Scania, Sweden. It traces its roots back to 1425, when a Franciscan studium generale was founded in Lund. After Sweden won Scania from Denmark in the 1658 Treaty of Roskilde, the university was officially founded in 1666 on the location of the old studium generale next to Lund Cathedral.

Media studies is a discipline and field of study that deals with the content, history, and effects of various media; in particular, the mass media. Media Studies may draw on traditions from both the social sciences and the humanities, but mostly from its core disciplines of mass communication, communication, communication sciences, and communication studies.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Roskilde University</span> Danish public university

Roskilde University is a Danish public university founded in 1972 and located in Trekroner in the Eastern part of Roskilde. The university awards bachelor's degrees, master's degrees, and PhD degrees in a wide variety of subjects within social sciences, the humanities, and natural sciences.

Uses and gratifications theory (UGT) is an approach to understanding why and how people actively seek out specific media to satisfy specific needs. UGT is an audience-centered approach to understanding mass communication. Diverging from other media effect theories that question "what does media do to people?", UGT instead focuses on "what do people do with media?" It postulates that media is a highly available product and the audiences are the consumers of the same product.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Esaias Tegnér</span>

Esaias Tegnér was a Swedish writer, professor of the Greek language, and bishop. He was during the 19th century regarded as the father of modern poetry in Sweden, mainly through the national romantic epic Frithjof's Saga. He has been called Sweden's first modern man. Much is known about him, and he also wrote openly about himself.

Denis McQuail was a British communication theorist, Emeritus Professor at the University of Amsterdam, considered one of the most influential scholars in the field of mass communication studies.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Curt Weibull</span> Swedish historian, educator and author (1886–1991)

Curt Weibull was a Swedish historian, educator and author.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jönköping University</span> Swedish university college

Jönköping University (JU), formerly Högskolan i Jönköping, is a non-governmental Swedish university college located in the city Jönköping in Småland, Sweden.

Media psychology is the branch and specialty field in psychology that focuses on the interaction of human behavior with media and technology. Media psychology is not limited to mass media or media content; it includes all forms of mediated communication and media technology-related behaviors, such as the use, design, impact, and sharing behaviors. This branch is a relatively new field of study because of advancement in technology. It uses various methods of critical analysis and investigation to develop a working model of a user's perception of media experience. These methods are used for society as a whole and on an individual basis. Media psychologists are able to perform activities that include consulting, design, and production in various media like television, video games, films, and news broadcasting. Media psychologists are not considered to be those who are featured in media, rather than those who research, work or contribute to the field.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Yngve Brilioth</span> Swedish theologian

Yngve Torgny Brilioth was a Swedish theologian, professor for church history and author who served as Bishop of Växjö from 1938 to 1950 and Archbishop of Uppsala from 1950 until 1958.

Jay G Blumler was an American-British theorist of communication and media. He was Professor of Public Communication at the University of Leeds.

Klaus Krippendorff (1932–2022) was a communication scholar, social science methodologist, and cyberneticist. and was the Gregory Bateson professor for Cybernetics, Language, and Culture at the University of Pennsylvania's Annenberg School for Communication. He wrote an influential textbook on content analysis and is the creator of the widely used and eponymous measure of interrater reliability, Krippendorff's alpha. In 1984-1985, he served as the president of the International Communication Association, one of the two largest professional associations for scholars for communication.

The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to communication:

Anders Rapp (1927–1998) was a Swedish geomorphologist and geographer who pioneered quantitative geomorphological approach on mass movements and erosion. He was the first to make a comprehensive study on avalanche boulder tongues. Most of Rapp's works were made in the Scandinavian mountains and Spitsbergen including the areas of Kärkevagge near Abisko and Kebnekaise.

Nils-Göran Areskoug, is a Swedish physician, musicologist, composer, author and interdisciplinary scholar. With five academic degrees he is Associate Professor in Transdisciplinary Research at Strömstad akademi, Sweden (2009), and Associate Professor in Musicology at the University of Jyväskylä, Finland (1996).

Lars Jörgen Pålsson Syll is a Swedish economist who is a Professor of Social Studies and Associate professor of Economic History at Malmö University College. Pålsson Syll has been a prominent contributor to the economic debate in Sweden over the global financial crisis that began in 2008.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">John Landquist</span> Swedish literary scholar (1881–1974)

John Landquist was a Swedish literary critic, literary scholar, writer and professor of pedagogy and psychology at Lund University from 1936 to 1946.

Lasswell's model of communication is one of the first and most influential models of communication. It was initially published by Harold Lasswell in 1948 and analyzes communication in terms of five basic questions: "Who?", "Says What?", "In What Channel?", "To Whom?", and "With What Effect?". These questions pick out the five fundamental components of the communicative process: the sender, the message, the channel, the receiver, and the effect. Some theorists have raised doubts that the widely used characterization as a model of communication is correct and refer to it instead as "Lasswell's formula", "Lasswell's definition", or "Lasswell's construct". In the beginning, it was conceived specifically for the analysis of mass communication like radio, television, and newspapers. However, it has been applied to various other fields and many theorists understand it as a general model of communication.

Samuel Linnaeus was Carl Linnaeus' younger brother and the son of Nils Linnæus and Christina Brodersonia.

Malene Freudendal-Pedersen is professor of urban planning at Aalborg University and has an interdisciplinary background linking sociology, geography, urban planning and the sociology of technology. Her research has been strongly inspired by the mobilities turn.

References

  1. With more than 450 citations listed on Google Scholar: https://scholar.google.dk/scholar?q=using+communication+theory
  2. 1 2 According to WorldCat, the Online Computer Library Center's library search engine
  3. Professionella kommunikatörer - en explorativ studie: https://openlibrary.org/b/OL4807670M/Professionella_kommunikatörer
  4. Mass Communication Review Yearbook volumes 2 and 3. published by SAGE Publications
  5. The program is still active and funded by the Swedish National Data Service https://snd.gu.se/en/catalogue/study/snd0700
  6. Lund University, Department of Communication Studies: http://www.iks.lu.se/index.php?id=343
  7. Roskilde University's press release: https://ruc.dk/nyheder/roskilde-universitet-udnaevner-tre-aeresdoktorer