Module 3 Notes—COM 207
Chapter 19—Cultural Approach to Organizatons
Clifford Geertz
o Anthropologist
o “Man is an animal suspended in webs
... [Show More] of signifcance that he himself has spun.”
o Field research, interpretve approach
Michael Pacanowsky
o Organizatonal communicaton scholar
o Culture of organizatons
o The process of communicaton: “creates and consttutes the taken-for-grated reality of
the world”
Culture as Metaphor
o Culture as root metaphor
o Corporate culture as
Surrounding environment that constrains a company’s freedom of acton
A quality or property
An image, character, or climate
Controlled by a corporaton
A puzzle
Not something an organizaton has
Something an organizaton is (pacanowsky, from symbolic approach)
Culture
o A system
Shared meaning
Shared understanding
Shared sense-making
o Subcultures & countercultures
Likely to emerge
Not all members accept or practce same beliefs/behaviors
Organizatonal/Corporate culture
o Employee performances
“those very actons by which members consttute and reveal their culture to
themselves and to others”
o Cultural performances
“an ensemble of texts”
o Study of culture is a sof science
Interpretve rather than experimental
Searching for meaning rather than laws
Cultural Vs. Scientfc studies of organizatons
o Traditonal method: focus on problem/soluton
o Cultural studies: focus on culture as symbolic constructon
o Interpretve researches accept ambiguity
Try to capture spirit & diversity of organizatons values or practces
Use evocatve language & metaphors
Studying organizatonal culture: methodological reasons
o To analyze organizatons & communicaton with focus on culture
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New vocabulary
o Organizatonal researches, managers and members borrowed vocabulary from
anthropology giving them new ways to view organizatons
Ethnography
o Mapping out social discourse
Why social?
Why discourse?
o Systematc approach
To analyze organizatonal culture
Reflect on “lived experience” of organizatonal members
o Interested in the signifcance/meaning of behavior, not statstcal analyses of behavior
Ethnographic method
o Researcher
As partcipant-observer
Recounts his/her reflectons on members experiences
o Thick descripton—the intertwined layers of common meaning that underlie what
people say and do
Tracing strands of cultural web
Tracking evolving meaning
o Several benefts:
Provides rich descriptons, including processes of communicatons & sensemaking
Captures subtle points overlooked by traditonal research methods
Exposes sources of power & resistance
Reveals values & beliefs otherwise taken for granted
Stmulates cultural dialogue
Encourages defning the workplace as a community
Communicaton within an organizaton
o Pacanowsky, symbolic approach
o Metaphors reveal meaning
o Stories/ narratve dramatze organizatonal life
o Rituals/ rites can be “texts” that artculate aspects of cultural life
Organizatonal symbolism
o Culture is revealed through language, stories, nonverbal messages & communicatve
exchange
o Broadens focus
Includes subtle ways communicaton works to build, reproduce & transform
reality of organizatonal culture ofen taken for granted
Useful for focusing on how people communicate and create meaning
Stories or narratve about organizatons culture provide insight & serve as
resource for everyday sensemaking
Organizatonal stories represent the interest & values of the storytellers
Different narrators= different stories
Critcal & Postmodern
o Call to look specifcally at issues of power & dominaton in development, maintenance,
or transformaton of partcular culture
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“engaged”
Culture is a site of multple meanings & organizatonal truths that change with
ones perspectve
Critcal & postmodern views
o Joanne martn: taxonomy of perspectves
o Integraton perspectve:
Culture in terms of consistency and clarity
o Differentaton perspectve:
Highlights difference
Cultural manifestatons ofen inconsistent
o Fragmentaton perspectve
Ambiguity inevitable & pervasive & necessary component of dialogue
Characteristcs of theories of organizatonal culture
1. Culture is paterns of behavior
2. Everyday communicaton as important as “ofcial” communicaton
3. All nonverbal communicaton is studied
4. Each organizatons culture is a nexus of forces outside the organizaton
5. Acknowledges multple motves for reaching culture
Chapter 21—Critcal Approach
Critcal organizaton theory
o Examines and opposes many of the assumptons of other dominant frameworks
o Critcal theory raises important questons about the unfair exercise and abuse of power
by revealing the ofen hidden but pervasive control that organizatons have over
individuals
Power
o Central to critcal theory
o Early atempts defne power as something a person or group possesses and exercised
through actons
o French and raven’s 5 types of social power
Reward (+,-)
Coercive (-)
Referent (+)
Expert (+)
Legitmate (-)
o Critcal theory extends this work by raising questons about covert, or hidden, structures
of power
Corporate Colonizaton
o Stanley Deetz
University of Colorado
Critcal organizatonal communicaton
o Critcal approach is “pro-people” vs. “pro-proft”
Critcized as not realistc
Unwilling to account for organizatonal constraints & need to be proftable
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shared via CourseHero.como Deet’s model: balance organizatonal fnancial interest with societal/human interests
o The corporaton as a dominant force
As politcal & economic insttuton
Replacing other insttutons
Ownership of media outlets
Marketplace/capitalism dominates other indices/measure of quality
Post 911: consumerism=patriotsm
Other ideas?
Corporatons “control & colonize”
What are the consequences?
What about current issues, rehousing market?
The Stats
o Quality of (work) life
Average workweek has increased from 40 to 50 hours
Leisure has decreased by 10 hours
The workforce
At large standard of living has decreased
85% of families with children is dual income
FT workers with income below poverty line has increased by
50%
For CEO’s compensaton has increased from 24X to 175X
Deet’s critque:
Is what’s good for the corporaton/ organizatonal good for the country/
citzens?
Informaton Vs. Communicaton
o Informaton model of organizatonal practce
Conduit, pipeline metaphor
Reality as reported, language as neutral
o Communicaton model of organizatonal practce
Reality as produced & reproduced
Communicaton as consttutve
Meaning in formaton
o Extension of “lingo” beyond organizaton?
Critque of managerialism: A 2X2 approach
Informaton model Communicaton model
Managerial Control Strategy Consent
Codeterminaton Involvement Partcipaton
Strategy: Overt Managerial Control
o Managerialism: discourse based on systematc logic, routne practce & ideology that
values control (Grifn, 2006)
o Lack of representaton re: policy
o Either/or
Managers control: “either my way or”…
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Stockholders dilemma: hold or sell
Strategy: Overt Control
o Quest for control
Can exceed strive for efciency or performance
Fuels aversion to public conflict
Creates worker resentment & resistance
How might we understand our perceptons of whistle-blowers?
At individual level?
At organizatonal level?
Consent: Willing Allegiance to Covert Control
o Defne as the process by which an employee actvely, though unknowingly,
accomplishes the interest of management in fault atempt to fulfll own interests
o Developed through corporate culture:
Language, informaton & symbols
Rituals, & stories
o Promoted through managerialism’s systematcally distorted communicaton
o Is restrictve
Hierarchical structure
o Discursive closure
Form of distorted communicaton
Is suppressive
Who is privileged?
What is natural?
What is valued?
Involvement: Expression without voice
o From autocracy/managerialism to codeterminaton/ liberal democracy
o Provides
Opportunity for involvement
Forums for expression
o Lacks
Representaton, voice
Effect on outcome
Partcipaton: Stakeholder Democracy
o “meaningful democratc partcipaton creates beter citzens and beter social choices
and provides important economic benefts (1995, p.3)
o Goal: reclaim negotaton of power
Partcipaton: Stakeholder democracy
o Six groups of stakeholder (needs &wants)
Investors
Workers
Consumers
Suppliers
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Greater society & the world community
o Counter to traditonal privileged perspectve, stockholders & management
Deetz: Multple stakeholder model
o Advocates workplace model
Every member thinks and acts like an owner
Workers produce knowledge
Informaton treated as a resource disseminated/shared
Social structure grows from the botom instead of being reinforced from the top
o Afrms democratc principles
Limitatons
o Idealism
Inherent right to partcipate
Biased
o Politcal realism
Theoretcally radical to managerialism
Difcult to implement
Chapter 27—Cultural studies
Critcal cultural theory/theorists
o Queston the scientfc focus of mainstream communicaton research on media
influence
o Are ofen influenced by a Marxist interpretaton of society
o Most want to change the world to empower people in the margins of society
The media and ideology
o Ideology: those images concepts, and premises which provide the framework through
which we represent interpret understand and make sense of some aspect of social
existence
o As powerful ideological tools media functon
To maintain dominance
To exploit
The media
o Somes balls somes strikes but my calls tend to beneft the team that’s ahead
o For hall, struggle to determine meaning of key societal events and trends is dominated
by those in power whose interests are supported by the umpires the purveyors of the
mass media
o Meaning created through communicatve acts with effect of control & dominaton
o Cultural studies=social constructonism with ideological twist
Struart hall
o Professor emeritus of sociology open university, England
o Jamaican-born
o Follower of Frankfurt school
o Neo-marxism
o Leading scholar in & proponent of cultural studies
o Critcal of social scientfc media research
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shared via CourseHero.como Myth of democratc pluralism—the prestense
o Every media theory possesses ideological content
o Hence, cultural studies—study of media, power, & cultural dimensions not media
studies
o Cultural studies—neo-marxist critque that sets forth positon that mass media
manufacture consent for dominant ideologies
From the early cultural critcs
o Frankfurt school theorists
Marx enconmic determine & the means of producton
Marx economic determinism & the means of producton of culture corporateowned media control public discourse
o Roland barthes & semiotc analysis
o Michel Foucault discourse and the discursive turn
To struart hall
o Hall draws from
Concepts of economic determinism & hegemony of Marxist scholars from
Frankfurt school producton of consent
Deep textual analysis of barthes, semiotcs & mythic signs mediated images
as mythic signs
The discursive turn—foucault
Concept of discourse—bridges societal power & mass media
communicaton; semiotcs & economics determinism
Framework of interpretaton at macro and micro determined by
dominant discourse
Making meaning: the what & who
o Where do we get meaning?
Producton & exchange of meaning culture & communicaton
Discourse functons to make meaning
Meaning through discourse
Arbitrary distnctons to real, physical effects= discursive formaton
to ideologies
Corporate control
o Not what informaton but whose informaton
Media representatons of culture reproduce social inequalites corporatzed,
commodifed world
o Hall
Study communicaton within cultural context
Examine power relatons & social structures
Hegemonic encoding—regulaton of discourse
Ideological discourse of constraint—limitaton & presentaton
Chapter 37—Muted Group theory
Deborah Tannen
o Two culture hypothesis—it’s a cross cultural experience when men and women
communicate
o Genderlect—distnct cultural dialect
o Men—communicaton focuses on achieving status and independence
o Women—communicaton focuses on achieving intmacy and connecton
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o Biological determinism
Deborah tannen
Nature
Sex
Male/female
Biological determined
o Differental socializaton
Cheris kramarae
Nurture
Gender
Learned
Varies
Masculinity/femininity
Muted group theory
o Atempts to explains why certain groups in society are “muted” meaning they are either
devalued or silenced. Cheris Kramarae
o Language is a man-made constructon
Language has been formulated by the dominant group
Women and other subordinate groups have not contributed to language
formaton in an equal manner
Words & norms for their use favor dominant group
Women & other subordinate groups thus become the muted group
Language favors the male experience
Hence, language us a man-made constructon
Origins of muted group theory
o Edwin & Shirley ardener
Anthropologists
Field research ethnography
Inatenton to women as cultural informants research based on views of men
only
Muted group are mere black hold overlooked mufed and rendered invisible in
society and have no part in the making of the rules
Cheris Kramarae
o Public vs. private distncton
o Power & the division of labor
o Male system of percepton + power/politcal dominance men name experiences
o Mens control of dominant mode of expression
Men as gatekeepers
Mainstreammalestream
Mens control over mass media
Women in fcton vs. women in history
Taking of husbands name?
The internet
Programmers/designers vs. users
Male-orienated internet norms
o Dominant public modes, canonized
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shared via CourseHero.com In the workplacem a value system structured by man, therefore a language
reflectng male values
o Subversions
Alternatve channels
Feminist dictonary
o Biological vs. social
o Objectve vs. interpretve
o Research supports both camps…so the debate contnues
Sexist and gender-biased language
o Saleman
o Mailman
o Fireman
o Male doctor
o Male flight atendant
o In today society a typically college student knows what he wants from an educaton
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