Communication now and then: analyzing the Republic of Letters as a communication network

TY - JOUR

T1 - Communication now and then

T2 - analyzing the Republic of Letters as a communication network

AU - Urena-Carrion, Javier

AU - Leskinen, Petri

AU - Touminen, Jouni

AU - van den Heuvel, Charles

AU - Hyvonen, Eero

AU - Kivela, Mikko

PY - 2022/5/1

Y1 - 2022/5/1

N2 - Huge advances in understanding patterns of human communication, and the under‑lying social networks where it takes place, have been made recently using massive automatically recorded data sets from digital communication, such as emails and phone calls. However, it is not clear to what extent these results on human behaviour are artefacts of contemporary communication technology and culture and if the fundamental patterns in communication have changed over history. This paper presents an analysis of historical epistolary metadata with the aim of comparing the underlying historical communication patterns with those of contemporary communication. Our work uses a new epistolary dataset containing metadata on over 150,000 letters sent between the 16th and 19th centuries. The analyses indicate striking resemblances between contemporary and epistolary communication network patterns, including dyadic interactions and ego‑level behaviour. Certain aspects of the letter datasets are insufficient to corroborate other similarities or differences for these communication networks. Despite these drawbacks, our work helps confirm that several features of human communication are not artefacts of contemporary mediums or culture, but are likely elements of human behaviour. (PDF) Communication now and then: analyzing the Republic of Letters as a communication network. Available from: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/360504249_Communication_now_and_then_analyzing_the_Republic_of_Letters_as_a_communication_network#fullTextFileContent [accessed July 14 2022].

AB - Huge advances in understanding patterns of human communication, and the under‑lying social networks where it takes place, have been made recently using massive automatically recorded data sets from digital communication, such as emails and phone calls. However, it is not clear to what extent these results on human behaviour are artefacts of contemporary communication technology and culture and if the fundamental patterns in communication have changed over history. This paper presents an analysis of historical epistolary metadata with the aim of comparing the underlying historical communication patterns with those of contemporary communication. Our work uses a new epistolary dataset containing metadata on over 150,000 letters sent between the 16th and 19th centuries. The analyses indicate striking resemblances between contemporary and epistolary communication network patterns, including dyadic interactions and ego‑level behaviour. Certain aspects of the letter datasets are insufficient to corroborate other similarities or differences for these communication networks. Despite these drawbacks, our work helps confirm that several features of human communication are not artefacts of contemporary mediums or culture, but are likely elements of human behaviour. (PDF) Communication now and then: analyzing the Republic of Letters as a communication network. Available from: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/360504249_Communication_now_and_then_analyzing_the_Republic_of_Letters_as_a_communication_network#fullTextFileContent [accessed July 14 2022].

KW - communication networks

KW - granovetter effect

KW - social networks

KW - social signature

KW - Republic of Letters

U2 - 10.1007/s41109-022-00463-1

DO - 10.1007/s41109-022-00463-1

M3 - Article

VL - 7

JO - Applied Network Research

JF - Applied Network Research

IS - 26

M1 - 7-1

ER -