Building a Theory of Multi-Media CMC: An Analysis, Critique and Integration of Computer-Mediated Communication Theory and Research

Abstract

In order to provide directions for future computer-mediated communication (CMC) scholarship, in this article, I analyze, critique and integrate contemporary CMC theory and research. Particularly, based upon an analysis of recent developments in multi-media software and the world wide web, I explore the theoretical implications of increased audio, video and three-dimensionality in cyberspace. In general, in this article, I argue that CMC theory and research has been limited by the `textual bias' of previous scholars. CMC researchers and theorists must begin to reconstruct the communicative, rhetorical and epistemological features of multi-media CMC in order to describe and explain communication in cyberspace. Through an integrated, inter-disciplinary program of multi-methodological empirical research, scholars can build theory that better accounts for multi-media CMC.