Contact innovation
As Contact Innovation is called innovation , triggered by interpersonal communication (eg. As with dissatisfied customers or other actors in the environment), passed or be taken over. Innovations are also referred to that arise at the boundary lines between two cultures or social systems and from which innovation effects or other emergence phenomena result for both systems . While cultural boundaries are generally regarded as barriers to innovation that are difficult to overcome, innovations in science and technology are increasingly emerging at system boundaries, e. B. at the borders between institutions (universities and practice organizations) or at the borders between scientific disciplines.
Theories
According to Everett M. Rogers (1962), innovations are passed on from an innovator to a follower . He assumes that the decision to adopt innovations depends primarily on the success or failure of interpersonal communication. According to Everett, the subjective benefit of an innovation and its transfer for both sides, the compatibility of the innovation with the respective value systems, the simplicity or complexity of the innovation perceived at first contact, the possibility of experimenting with the innovation and its visibility are also important for the adoption of an innovation crucial.
Innovation cannot cross a cultural threshold simply by disseminating information. The thesis of the great importance of cultural contacts is thus close to modern diffusionism . However, this emphasizes that the innovation is one-way, while the concept of contact innovation emphasizes the interaction between and the benefits for several actors or cultures.
Examples
In the past, innovations often arose through long-distance trade, along highways and other transport axes, or they were e.g. B. induced by migration. So z. B. the invention of bronze can only be explained by contact innovation, since the basic materials copper and tin required for this in the early Bronze Age , i.e. in the 3rd millennium BC. BC, in distant regions. While the copper came from Anatolia or the Caucasus , the tin probably came from the Serafshan in present-day Tajikistan . In addition, both copper and tin are softer than bronze, so that the alloy was hardly created through systematic experimentation and targeted search for a harder material, but rather through chance contacts or ritualized exchange of shiny, solid metals.
A prime example of diffusionist theories is the Bronze Age chariot . The spoked wheel, which, in contrast to the Sumerian full-disc wheel, is better suited for horse-drawn carts than for carts of oxen, was invented by horse breeders in the Eurasian steppes. But the combination of "horse and chariot" was not adopted by the Semitic peoples from there in a finished form, and it was certainly not spread through migrations of a "superior" cultural group. Rather, the innovation was only optimized in the palace taverns of the Near East and, because of its dubious functionality in this environment, it was used more often as a prestige object than for war purposes.
John Donnelly Fage and Roland A. Oliver explain e.g. B. the emergence of the West African kingdoms through the fruitful contacts between arable farmers and riding nomads and exclude a simple diffusion of the state idea from the advanced cultures of the ancient Orient.
In generalized terms: At every culture or system boundary, interaction processes with high combinatorial potential arise, which prevent innovation flows from running as one-way streets and technologies or ideas from being adopted unchanged when crossing over . The determination of the function of the technology or the process can also change and be restricted or expanded when cultural boundaries are crossed by successful or unsuccessful interaction processes. In extreme cases, the technical functionality or efficiency can be lost and replaced by a purely symbolic purpose.
linguistics
In linguistics , especially in contact linguistics , the phenomenon of the emergence of new languages in a heterogeneous community is called creolization . The Creole language is not becoming a full-fledged language in the generation that created it. But the children of this generation grow up in this environment and learn it as their mother tongue. Scene jargons such as Kanak Sprak or Pidginsprachen are also contact phenomena, mostly with asymmetrical participation of the contact parties. They represent "layering phenomena": In pidgin z. B. the colonized take over the vocabulary of the colonial rulers, a linguistic superstrat , in order to be able to understand it, but continue to use their grammar (the linguistic substrate ).
Business administration
Innovations that are developed or perfected in a dialogue process between developer and customer are also referred to as contact innovations ( customer contact innovation ). This contact can be personal or technical, e.g. B. take place via innovation platforms or exchanges. The customer (or supplier) contact thus becomes an important factor in creativity and innovation success.
For example, the variety of possible uses of modern materials can only be explored by having them touch, smell, taste, test, etc., by as many different user groups as possible - lay people as well as professionals.
See also
Others
Contact Innovation is also the name of an image editing program.
Individual evidence
- ↑ Assaf Yasur-Landau, Old Wine in New Vessels: Intercultural Contact, Innovation and Aegean, Canaanite and Philistine Foodways , in: Journal of the Institute of Archeology of Tel Aviv University, Vol. 32, No. 2, September 2005, pp. 168-191.
- ↑ Stefan Burmeister, Peter Raulwing, Stuck. The controversy about the chariot , in: Peter Anreiter u. a. (Eds.), Archaeological, Cultural and Linguistic Heritage. Festschrift for Erzsébet Jeremin Honor of her 70th Birthday , ARCHAEOLINGUA ALAPÍTVÁNY 2012, pp. 93–113
- ↑ Roland A. Oliver, John Donnelly Fage: A short History of Africa. London 1988, p. 37 f.
- ↑ Materials in Art and Design Education , Conference of the Institute of Materials, Minerals and Mining, London, April 25, 2008, online report (PDF; 1.1 MB)
literature
Everett M. Rogers: Diffusion of Innovations . New York: Free Press 1983 ISBN 978-0-02-926650-2 (first 1962).