ICA Timeline
1950 |
|
On 1 January, the International Communication Association officially emerges as the National Society for the Study of Communication (NSSC) |
1951 |
The NSSC publishes the first issue of the Journal of Communication | |
1953 |
The student membership category is created, signifying ICA's commitment to mentor students and incorporate them into active and full membership status | |
1967 |
NSSC separates from the Speech Association of America (now National Communication Association) | |
1969 |
NSSC, which has 150 members from 27 nations outside the United States, is named International Communication Association (ICA) | |
1973 |
ICA adds Human Communication Research to its publication program | |
1977 |
Communication Yearbook begins as a combination of selected conference proceedings and annual reviews from within the field | |
1980s- |
Membership remains constant and develops a cyclical pattern: members flow in and out of the organization primarily depending on whether their paper or panel is accepted at a conference; conferences outside North America see fewer scholars, and membership numbers decline when conference attendance is lower | |
2000 |
A bylaws change establishes five regional-at-large board seets | |
2001 |
ICA relocates to rented office space in Washington, DC from Austin, TX to strengthen its international standing | |
2002 |
The board restructures membership by aligning membership year with the fiscal year; the change shifts the focus of membership in conference presentation towards a set of consisent set of services and benefits | |
2003 |
Since this year, almost half the board of directors have been from countries other than the United States | |
2004 |
Membership grows to a record of over 4,000 scholars in 76 countries | |
2005 |
The publication program is expanded with the launch of the Guide to Publishing, and Communication, Culture, and Critique | |
2006 |
ICA purchases an office building which now provides a permanent home for its staff and its records |
The "I" in ICA
Towards an international identity
The international identity of ICA has been a key issue since the name change in 1969. Whereas several debates about what it means to be international-or how to put the "I" in ICA-have been documented in board and committee minutes, the most significant change began in the late 1990s when ICA's board of directors established a global connections committee to tackle this objective. The committee recommended a series of actions, four of which were adopted by the board.
Towards an international board
For ICA, internationalization meant that the board of directors, committees, and editorial boards needed to have representation, voices, and active participation from all areas of the globe.
A bylaws change that established five regional-at-large board seats was approved by the membership in 2000. As a group, the at-large members have struggled and have been inconsistent in their representation of their geographic areas. A review of governance documents demonstrates as well a concerted, purposeful effort to have at least one non-North American on every committee and subcommittee. Beginning with the election of division officers in 2003, almost half the board of directors were from countries other than the U.S., a strong indication that ICA's stated objective of becoming truly international was being realized.
Towards an international membership
With its new emphasis on internationalizing, the board also restructured membership in 2002 with two purposes in mind: to stabilize the membership by aligning the membership year with the fiscal year and to recognize the differing resources of scholars around the world.
Using the World Bank ranking of national economies, ICA developed a tiered dues and conference registration structure. With these changes, ICA's membership once again demonstrated a significant increase, largely from non-U.S. countries. Other outreach activities began at approximately the same time. ICA newsletters published columns that addressed international issues and profiled communication scholarship in various regions of the world.
Towards international scholarship
When scholars look to publish their research, it is natural to look for "like-minded" individuals on a review panel or editorial board; ICA's publications did not have the international look, therefore receiving few submissions from outside North America. Those that ICA did receive often had difficulty finding reviewers who understood or accepted the methodology they had utilized.
To address this issue and others, beginning in 2005, it launched Communication, Culture, and Critique, to provide an "international forum for critical, feminist interpretive, and qualitative research examining the role of communication from a cultural and historical perspective" (Pecchioni, 2006, p.1).
