All human enterprise depends upon communication, therefore communication professionals have a special responsibility to create and analyze messages with critical attention to the processes that shape them, the information that supports them, the arguments that are made, and the effects?messages produce. Communication is central to our personal and social lives, in our families, and in our work. Skill in communication is consistently identified as one of the most important abilities employers value and seek when hiring.? Knowing how to effectively communicate also enables us to participate meaningfully in civic life.? Whether the messages are verbal or nonverbal, face-to-face or mediated, private or public, as a communication studies student you will be challenged to create, describe, analyze, explain, and evaluate them as a knowledgeable communicator.