Organizational Discourse Studies Research Articles

Temporal multimodality and performativity: Exploring politics of time in the discursive, communicative constitution of organization

This paper discusses the critical role of time in the discursive, communicative constitution of organization under neo-liberal capitalism and its normalization of uncertainty and change. Building on a review of extant time notions in studies of organizational discourse and communicative constitution of organization, we propose a critical approach to temporality inspired by feminist time notions, namely spacetimemattering and politics of time. In doing this, we develop a multimodal and performative concept of temporality that facilitates a double attention to the multiple communication modes of time and their performative powers in organizing work life. We explore the value of this conception of temporality through an empirical illustration, showing how multiple temporalities entangle, differentiate, and compete, and how one time construct may domesticate and devalue other times without, however, eliminating those, thus enabling ongoing, precarious struggles over organizing work practices and subjectivities. The paper expands the scope of temporality studies in organizations, nurturing critical theorizing of and insights into the multimodal performativity and politics of time at work in neo-liberal capitalism.

The Struggles for Organizational Discursive Hegemony on the Sustainability of Fracking in Colombia

ABSTRACT Over more than ten years different organizations in Colombia (South America) have discussed the advantages and disadvantages of implementing hydraulic fracturing processes (fracking) as a way to increase the production and exports of oil and natural gas. Drawing on the fields of critical organizational discourse studies and environmental studies, this manuscript explores how the Colombian discourses on fracking emerge, recontextualize, operationalize, and become hegemonic in order to present fracking as a sustainable or unsustainable practice. After performing a discourse analysis of organizational texts published between 2012 and 2020 by different Colombian organizations, I argue that the intertextual discourse on the sustainability of fracking reflects both interorganizational collaboration and disruption.

Advancing a Baradian perspective on the field of identity work

Conceptualizing identity in processual terms as identity work has long been acknowledged within the broad field of critical management and organization studies. However, recent studies show that the process by which identities evolve is still under-explored. Although extant research has considered how discourse and other symbolic means play a part in this process, this article expands such perspectives by foregrounding the relationality of discourse-materiality in identity construction processes. Using the example of an empirical analysis taken from a case study within education in Denmark, the author examines the process of identity construction by considering the ways in which discourse-materiality works to perform identities. The author combines insights from new materialist thinking with organizational discourse studies in the development of an analytics to approach the process of identity construction – coined as identity intra-activity. In doing so, the article demonstrates how an informal middle-management positioning of selected teachers is performed within its organization. By advancing the notion of identity intra-activity, the findings enable an understanding of identity work as materialized by multiple discursive-material and embodied resources – all enacted in/through the teachers’ practices – creating a petri dish for examining the co-constitutive role of discourse-materiality and enabling new ways of thinking about identity work.

Retooling methods for approaching discourse–materiality relations: a new materialist framework of multimodal sensitivity

PurposeWhile recent theoretical discussions around discourse–material relationality have facilitated important conceptual and analytical advancements within the broader field of CMS, less progress has been made methodologically with regard to innovating empirical methods and data modes. Therefore, the purpose of this article is to contribute to strengthening the methodological focus in the literature when grappling with the relationality of discourse–materiality and co-constitution. This includes a method-retooling framework inspired by new materialism.Design/methodology/approachIn this article, the authors engage at the methodological level by developing a method-retooling framework that combines insights from organizational discourse studies and new materialist thinking. This framework enables a retooling of existing methods to become sensitive to multimodality and offers two concrete examples that were developed during fieldwork for a multi-sited and multi-method case study in 2018.FindingsBased on the framework for retooling methods for multimodality, two illustrations are offered. These include retooling interviews by employing multimodal vignettes and retooling observations by using multimodal mappings. They are unfolded and discussed regarding their appropriation of discourse–material relationality.Originality/valueThis paper includes original research and method developments – adding a critical focus on the methodological aspects and potential advancements that are necessary in the wake of the ongoing debates around discourse–materiality across CMS and specifically within studies of organizational discourse and CCO. By suggesting a framework, the authors stimulate methodological explorations and contribute to furthering method developments that are equal to the rich conceptual progress made within the field.

Studying Change in Religious Organizations: A Discourse-Centered Framework

Abstract This article highlights the discourse-driven nature of contemporary processes of religious change. Drawing on the textually-oriented discourse theory and discourse analysis of Fairclough supplemented by additional perspectives from organizational discourse studies, the article outlines a discourse-centered analytic framework for the empirical study of the changing discursive practices and modus operandi of contemporary religious organizations. The framework consists of four analytic factors, each of which highlight the role that discourse plays at various levels of processes of religious organizational change. The article demonstrates the application of the framework in actual practice in relation to empirical examples from five traditional Christian churches in three different national contexts, thus bringing the tangible effects of changing discursive practices on the operations and practices of religious organizations into clear focus.

A Methodological Framework for Organizational Discourse Activism: an Ethics of Dispositif and Dialogue

In the article, we elaborate an interdisciplinary methodological framework that enables us to study and prepare the grounds for the development of organizational practices through discourse perspectives. The framework differs from mainstream monological and complexity reducing tendencies within organizational studies in that it argues for an approach that takes in historical, broad, and situational power relations and discourses into consideration when we engage in ethical organizational development. We place the framework within organizational discourse studies (ODS) and discuss how the intersection of Bakhtinian and Foucauldian ideas and concepts, as well as their diverse analytical strategies and focuses, contributes to the field. The combination entails taking a dissensus approach to organizational discursive phenomena that we view as dynamic features that are historically and locally (re)created through battles of unifying (centripetal) and diversifying (centrifugal) force relations. Following similar ideas of Deleuze and Bakhtin, we argue that dialogue and every (organizational) situation is seen as a plurivocal, open-ended, and unique time-space in which subjects have agency to change and transform the power relations and lines of subjectification that they are embedded in. We arrive at a methodological framework that bridges the gulf that often exists between discourse perspectives that tend to either focus on situated or more abstract and historical discursive dimensions. Furthermore, the frame involves an ethics of dispositif and dialogue that insists that organizational discourse scholars engage in organizational discourse activism furthering local change processes.

A mudança organizacional sob a ótica do discurso: um caso de ensino de uma comunidade de pessoas com e sem deficiências de aprendizado

This article presents a teaching case focused on the discussion of organizational change, from the perspective of the interpretive paradigm and of the studies of organizational discourse. It describes a process of change within a non-profit organization, where people with and without learning disabilities, the latter called assistants, live in community. The introduction of new government guidelines changed the system of financing of such activity, giving more autonomy to people with learning difficulties and failing to provide activities that were central to the organization’s system of meanings. With the “heart” of the community threatened, assistants express the challenges to experience organizational change, reporting that they are dancing in blood. The case aims to contribute to the discussion of organizational change processes in postgraduate and possibly undergraduate courses, through an unusual perspective, which states the change not only as deliberate, but mainly as something built in participants’ interactions. It also can be used for supporting the discussion between agents and recipients of change in organizations.

Letting go of Managing? Struggles over Managerial Roles in Collaborative Governance

This article discusses the role of the manager in collaborative governance studies. These studies identify a new managerial role as facilitator of stakeholder collaboration when pursuing public policy and service innovation. But the complications of role changes are underexplored; hence this article addresses the emerging challenges. Drawing on organizational discourse studies, it theorizes and analyzes managers’ positioning during collaborative governance practices in cases from the Danish daycare area. The findings demonstrate how public managers construct old and new roles related to various public management discourses, and their struggles to change accordingly. However, the findings also show how managers empower their new role and gain agency to steer collaborative outcomes. Thereby the article unpacks the challenges of becoming a facilitating manager alongside other roles: the struggles of identity and agency constitutive to particular ways of managing, as well as struggles over multiple roles. It suggests paying greater attention to constitutive aspects of changing roles to understand the managerial challenges and effects implied through emerging public management discourses.

An eventful view of organizations

Recent work in organizational discourse and communication studies has engaged considerably with ontological questions in an effort to resolve dualistic understandings of discourse and materiality, problematizing the existence of objects as immutable, mechanical, and real. We argue that organizational and communication scholars can obtain further purchase on the issue by explicitly taking an eventful worldview, and treating ontology as temporal, processual, and ongoing. Drawing mainly from Deleuze, we animate this eventful view by considering three cases of direct action as a form of global activism in both object-bound and event-oriented ontologies to illustrate how an eventful view affords new insights into organizing. We argue that an eventful view of organizing moves us further beyond dualistic thinking by emphasizing the process through which material and idealistic elements intersect and transform, over space and time, in facilitating the ongoing becoming of organizing.

Visual discourse analysis in historical research: a case of visual archaeology?

In this essay I complement the methodological practice of organizational discourse studies. My contribution lies in using visual discourse analysis in a historical research setting – I call this methodological approach ‘visual archaeology’. I highlight this method by reporting an empirical case from the presidential leadership of Urho Kekkonen of Finland. After going through the research process of my study, I present the emergent photo-essay, showing and explaining my theoretical reading of the empirical material that I collected. The essay concludes with a discussion of the contributions of this approach for the practice of conducting visual discourse studies in historical organizational research.

E-HR and international HRM: a critical perspective on the discursive framing of e-HR

In the current global economic climate, international HRM is facing unprecedented pressure to become more innovative, effective and efficient. New discourses are emerging around the application of information technology, with ‘e-HR’ (electronic-enablement of Human Resources), self-service portals and promises of improved services couched as various HR ‘value propositions’. This study explores these issues through our engagement with the emergent stream of ‘critical’ HRM, the broader study of organizational discourse and ethical management theories. We have found that while there is growing research into the take-up of e-HR applications, there is a dearth of investigation into the impact of e-HR on the people involved; in particular, the (re)structuring of social relations between HR functions and line managers in the move away from face-to-face HR support services, to more technology-mediated ‘self-service’ relationships. We undertake a close reading of personal narratives from a multinational organization, deploying a critical discourse lens to examine different dimensions of e-HR and raise questions about the strong technocratic framing of the international language of people management, shaping line manager enactment of e-HR duties. We argue for a more reflexive stance in the conceptualization e-HR, and conclude with a discussion about the theoretical and practical implications of our study, limitations and suggestions for future research.

"Language, Discourse and Organizational Change in Japanese Contexts"

Japanese methods, such as TQM, TPS and lean, and Japanese organizational characteristics, such as loyalty to the company and long-term incentive systems, have received great attention from researchers who study organizational development and change. Some studies suggest that Japan's unique modes of communication can lead to effective and unique forms of organizational development and change. However, only a few studies examine the role of language and discourse in organizational development and change in Japanese organizations. The situation is similar in other non-English speaking countries. Most of the studies that draw on organizational discourse theory use cases of Western organizations in which English is used as the official language. This symposium is an attempt to break through such a situation. The main aim of this symposium is to bring a perspective on the diversity of language and various modes of language use in the studies of organizational discourse as well as organizational development and ...

Discourse of the real kind: A post-foundational approach to organizational discourse analysis

In response to the postmodern invasion of organization studies, some critics have issued increasingly loud cries that we should ‘get real’ about organizational discourse analysis. But what precisely do these proponents take to be the ‘real’? In this article we trace out some of the attempts of ‘getting real’, arguing that these approaches have some important limitations. We then explore the relevance of a post-foundational approach to discourse, which, we argue, have far reaching implications for the study of organizational discourse. We argue that such approach offers us a way of theoretically linking the ‘real’ with (1) the way discourses are structured around fundamental gaps, (2) how discourses are brought together through nodal points and (3) how discourses generate affective and emotional attachment. We then offer some suggestions of how these points can be used to study organizational processes. We conclude by reflecting on some of the limitations of this approach to studying discourse.

Image construction in non-profit organizations: a discursive analysis

This paper contributes to organizational discourse studies of non-profit social ventures and to the impression management literature by identifying the discourse strategies used to create organizat...

Organizational Discourse: Domains, Debates, and Directions

Interest in the analysis of organizational discourse has expanded rapidly over the last two decades. In this article, we reflect critically on organizational discourse analysis as an approach to the study of organizations and management, highlighting both its strengths and areas of challenge. We begin with an explanation of the nature of organizational discourse analysis and outline some of the more significant contributions made to date. We then discuss existing classifications of approaches to the study of organizational discourse and suggest that they fall into two main categories: classifications by level of analysis and classifications by type of method. We argue that both of these approaches are inherently problematic and present an alternative way to understand the varieties of approaches to the analysis of organizational discourse based on within domain and across domain characterizations. We conclude with a discussion of the challenges that remain in the development of organizational discourse as an area of study and point to some of the opportunities for important and unique contributions to our understanding of organizations and management that this family of methods brings.

Readers beware: Provocation, problematization and … problems

In their recent Human Relations article and subsequent rejoinder to three commentators, Alvesson and Kärreman make a number of assertions concerning the development of organizational discourse analysis and the current state of research in this area. We believe their emphasis on provocation results in an unsatisfactory problematization of discourse-based work with the result that there are significant problems with both their analysis of the literature and their solutions to the shortcomings that they believe exist. We discuss a number of reasons why we believe that readers should be wary of what they read about organizational discourse analysis in Alvesson and Kärreman’s work. Drawing on our critique of their article and rejoinder, we propose some ideas that we believe will be more useful in developing studies of organizational discourse than those put forward by these authors.

What’s cooking in organizational discourse studies? A response to Alvesson and Kärreman

While Alvesson and Kärreman’s (2000) ‘Varieties of Discourse’ essay was an important and oft-cited marker in the field of organizational discourse studies, I argue in this response that their rather gloomy, even curmudgeonly, updated reading of the field is not only misplaced but also rooted in their own reductionist conception of discourse — a charge that they themselves level against contemporary organizational discourse research. As a communication scholar who makes his interdisciplinary home in the area of organizational communication/organization studies, I argue that much of Alvesson and Kärreman’s critique has its origin in a rather anemic, even wrongheaded, reading of the ‘linguistic turn’ — a reading that limits the generative and analytic possibilities of post-linguistic turn organizational discourse studies.

Conversational use of genres in managerial meetings

Summary This article addresses the question of how the concept of genre, defined as a linguistically realized activity type, can be applied to the study of organizational discourse. In particular, the authors show how and for what practical purposes managers invoke genres in meetings. The data of the study consist of video-recorded company-internal meetings and the methodology is based on ethnomethodological conversation analysis. In the empirical analysis the authors show how genres are used as resources for joint understanding and for conducting a particular conversational action in a meeting, namely proposing a solution to a problem. The study highlights the importance of genre knowledge in managerial meetings and the practical nature of this knowledge.

Organizational discourse and communication: the progeny of Proteus

As Van Dijk (2007) proposed in the first issue of Discourse and Communication , the main purpose of this journal is to bridge the two cross-disciplines of communication and discourse studies. Given this goal, this article sought to help clear the ground for such interdisciplinary development by investigating how organizational researchers use the terms `discourse' and `communication' and cast discourse—communication relationships. By reviewing 112 organizational discourse studies from major journals in communication, organizational studies, and interdisciplinary journals published between 1981 and 2006, this study identified diverse conceptualizations of these basic concepts. The findings help dispel some of the misunderstandings that scholars from one research field may possess toward the other and sort through some, if not all, the confusions regarding the terms `discourse', `communication', and their relationships.

Organizational Discourse and New Organization Development Practices

A new ensemble of organization development (OD) practices have emerged that are based more on constructionist, post modern and new sciences premises than the assumptions of the early founders. These include practices associated with appreciative inquiry, large group interventions, changing mindsets and consciousness, addressing diversity and multicultural realities, and advancing new and different models of change. We propose that the emerging field of organizational discourse offers sympathetic concepts and research that could add additional insights and theoretical rigour to the New OD. In particular, studies of organizational discourse based upon social constructionist and critical perspectives offer compelling ideas and practices associated with the establishment of change concepts, the role of power and context in relation to organizational change, and specific discursive interventions designed to foster organizational change.