Chapter 11

In order to describe an act of communication, one must answer the questions, "Who?", "Says what?", "In which channel?", "To whom?", and "With what effect?". These questions were derived from the thoughts of Harold Lasswell, and are now known as the Lasswell formula. In this chapter, a formula is defined as "a statement expressing some fundamental truth or principle." Lasswell's formula can be applied to Jackobson's model of the communication process. Lasswell's "Who?" relates to Jakobson's addresser or sender of the message, "Says what?" is the message or content, "In which channel?" means the medium or contact, "To whom?" refers to the addressee or receiver of the message, and "With what effect?" would be compared to the functions of the message.

Chapter eleven defines models as "abstract representations of processes that occur in the real world." A model has a value that means it may be portrayed graphically, which would give it an easily understandable interpretation. Models also have limitations such as simplifying something complicated and leaving out important information. I agree with what these men are saying, because in order to communicate, people do have to send messages that contain content back and forth. There has to be two people (the sender and the receiver) and there has to be something specific that they are talking about (message or content). To understand what is being said, the receiver has to know the code, or meaning behind the message.