EXISTENTIAL COMMUNICATION IN MARTIN BUBER’S 'I AND THOU' (Pages 64-72) by Dr. V. Madhavi * and Dr. L. V. Padmarani Rao ** in THE ENGLISH RESEARCH EXPRESS / ISSN:2321-1164 (Online); 2347-2642 (Print)

The word Communication comes from Latin communicare, meaning “to share”; it is the act of conveying meanings from one entity or group to another through the use of mutually understood signs, symbols, and semiotic rules. Human communication is mostly by using language and is termed as verbal communication assisted by the non-verbal communicative techniques like haptic communication (touch), gestures, body language, facial expressions, eye contact and how one dresses. Communication is very essential to maintain human relationships; and due to the communication failure, human life finds its meaninglessness in relationships in the post war society of the previous century. Such a thought of meaninglessness in life lead to the existential study by the 19th and 20th-century European philosophers, who questioned the very idea of the existence of man in this world. They established modern man with a sense of disorientation, confusion, or dread in the face of an apparently meaningless or absurd world. With the predominant value of man’s freedom, and authenticity, the existential scholars could make man choose in life to realise the true meaning in life. The existential inquiry of man has been the central probe by the eastern philosophers since the Vedic times. Martin Buber’s text I and Thou (1923) is an excellent example of the ultimate transformative existential-communication possible in human life to understand the existential answers of human life. The present paper deals with the eastern and western existential illustrative investigations of Martin Buber’s text from the point of view of existential-communication.he word Communication comes from Latin communicare, meaning “to share”; it is the act of conveying meanings from one entity or group to another through the use of mutually understood signs, symbols, and semiotic rules. Human communication is mostly by using language and is termed as verbal communication assisted by the non-verbal communicative techniques like haptic communication (touch), gestures, body language, facial expressions, eye contact and how one dresses. Communication is very essential to maintain human relationships; and due to the communication failure, human life finds its meaninglessness in relationships in the post war society of the previous century. Such a thought of meaninglessness in life lead to the existential study by the 19th and 20th-century European philosophers, who questioned the very idea of the existence of man in this world. They established modern man with a sense of disorientation, confusion, or dread in the face of an apparently meaningless or absurd world. With the predominant value of man’s freedom, and authenticity, the existential scholars could make man choose in life to realise the true meaning in life. The existential inquiry of man has been the central probe by the eastern philosophers since the Vedic times. Martin Buber’s text I and Thou (1923) is an excellent example of the ultimate transformative existential-communication possible in human life to understand the existential answers of human life. The present paper deals with the eastern and western existential illustrative investigations of Martin Buber’s text from the point of view of existential-communication.Key words: I and thou, I and it, Communication, existentialism, Philosophy and spiritualism.