Background Knowledge in the Context of Digital Communication: Between Anthropology and Social Epistemology

Abstract

Background knowledge is examined as a key epistemological category that shapes the dynamics of interpretation and legitimation of knowledge within digital communication, which is characterized by fragmented meanings and algorithmic content moderation. The aim of the study is the theoretical reconstruction of the conceptual status of background knowledge and the identification of its functions in a digital environment marked by a deficit of shared context and the atomization of semantic fields. The objectives of the work include: 1) an analysis of the conceptual foundations of personal and background knowledge in the works of Michael Polanyi and Harry Collins; 2) consideration of Niklas Luhmann’s systemcommunicative theory as a methodological tool for analyzing digital communicative structures; 3) identification of the symbolic and technical intermediaries that mediate the selection and circulation of knowledge; 4) investigation of the phenomenon of “digital Cartesianism” as a new regime of truth. Background knowledge is interpreted both as an embodied anthropological stance and as a socially reproducible medium that ensures the coherence of communication. On the basis of a theoretical synthesis of Polanyi’s, Collins’s, and Luhmann’s propositions, the thesis is advanced that background knowledge performs a selective function, determining which messages are received as credible and which are excluded from the cognitive field. In an environment of hyperinformation, background knowledge becomes not only a prerequisite for mutual understanding but also an instrument of epistemic coercion, defining the parameters of truth legitimation through cognitive schemas embedded in the user experience. The results of the study demonstrate that background knowledge underlies the ideological mechanisms of the digital environment, controlling access to knowledge via algorithmic filtering, narrative normalization, and the delegitimization of alternative viewpoints. The dual nature of background knowledge is analyzed as both a condition of understanding and a means of covertly regulating meanings in mass communication.