This work traces the yearning for contact not only through philosophy and literature but also by exploring the cultural reception of communication technologies from the telegraph to the radio. It is an account of a complex concept that has both shaped us and been shaped by us.

Communication plays a vital and unique role in society-often blamed for problems when it breaks down and at the same time heralded as a panacea for human relations. A sweeping history of communication, "Speaking Into the Air" illuminates our expectations of communication as both historically specific and a fundamental knot in Western thought.