Panel 12
Panelists in this session all investigate particular social practices, whether a group gathering in silence together, non-monogamous sexual encounters, or the invocation of cultural terminologies, as constitutive of relations between groups, individuals, and “non-living” objects. Given this approach, can the communicative practice you investigate be treated as exclusively authoring of social relations given other powerful forces like history, systems of capital, or political structure? Can any communicative practice be constitutive of social relations? In what ways does the practice you investigate move from "mere behavior" to constitutive of particular relationships? What are the necessary conditions in order for your practice to accomplish this? Also, please briefly elaborate the methods and theoretical conceptualizations you find most useful for addressing issues of communication's abilities to shape our relationships to one another, the divine, or “non-living” objects.