In names, in titles, it's a literal start (8)
I believe the answer is:
initials
'in names' is the definition.
The answer and definition can be both related to communication as well as being plural nouns.
Perhaps you can see a link between them that I don't see?
'in titles it's a literal start' is the wordplay.
'in' is an insertion indicator.
'titles' becomes 'ini' (I can't justify this - if you can you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'it's' becomes ''tis' (I've seen this before).
'start' says to take the initial letters.
The first letter of 'literal' is 'l'.
'ini'+'tis'='initis'
'a'+'l'='al'
'initis' enclosing 'al' is 'INITIALS'.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for initials that I've seen before include "First letters as of names" , "Components of an acronym" , "Signs briefly" , "Lisa in it (anag)" .)