Understanding how language works is central to an understanding of how organizations work. This argument is well rehearsed in the organizational literature, and is implicit in many of the modules taught in management education. Yet students of management are rarely given a theoretical base or the tools and skills required for analysing language and other sign systems used in organizations. Using examples from current literature and the authors’ own research, this article argues that this omission should be rectified so that students of management can gain an understanding of how language functions to create particular meanings and serve particular purposes. The article describes the authors’ attempts to provide a theoretical base and relevant tools and skills to management students within their own institution.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.
References
1.
Alvesson, M. (1994) ‘Talking in Organizations: Managing Identity and Impressions in an Advertising Agency’, Organizational Studies15(4): 535-563.
2.
Alvesson, M. and Willmott, H. (eds) (1992) Critical Management Studies. London: Sage.
3.
Bakhtin, M. M. (1986) Speech Genres and Other Late Essays (C. Emerson and M. Holquist, eds, V. W. McGee, trans.). Austin: University of Texas Press.
4.
Barnett, A. (1982) Iron Britannia: Why Parliament Waged Its Falklands War. London: Allison & Busby.
5.
Barthes, R. (1973) Mythologies. London: Paladin Press.
6.
Bate, P. (1990) ‘Using the Culture Concept in an Organizational Development Setting’, The Journal of Applied Behavioural Science26(1): 83-106.
7.
Bate, P. (1994) Strategies for Cultural Change. Oxford: Butterworth-Heinemann.
8.
Baumeister, R. F. and Newman, L. S. (1994) ‘How Stories Make Sense of Personal Experiences: Motives that Shape Autobiographical Narratives’, PSPB20(5): 676-690.
9.
Boden, D. (1994) The Business of Talk. Cambridge: Blackwell.
10.
Boyce, M. E. (1995) ‘Collective Centring and Collective Sense-making in the Stories and Storytelling of One Organization’, Organization Studies16(1): 107-137.
11.
Brown, A. D. (1994) ‘Politics, Symbolic Action and Myth Making in Pursuit of Legitimacy’, Organization Studies15(6): 861-878.
12.
Campbell, K. (1988) The Power of Myth. New York: Doubleday.
13.
Casey, K. (1993) I Answer With My Life: Life Histories of Women Teachers Working for Social Change. London: Routledge.
14.
Clegg, S. R. (1990) Modern Organizations. London: Sage.
15.
Cohen, L. and Musson G. (1996) ‘Entrepreneurial Identities: Reflections from two case studies’, paper presented to the Annual British Academy of Management Conference, University of Aston, September 1996.
16.
Collinson, D. L. (1994) ‘Strategies of Resistance: Power, Knowledge and Subjectivity in the Workplace’, in J. Jermier, D. Knight and W. Nord (eds) Power and Resistance in Organizations. London: Routledge.
17.
Conger, J. A. (1991) ‘Inspiring Others: The Language of Leadership’, Academy of Management Executive5(1): 31-45.
18.
de Saussure, F. (1966) Course in General Linguistics, edited by C. Bally and A. Sechehaye in collaboration with A. Reidlinger; translated by W. Baskin. New York: McGraw-Hill.
19.
du Gay, P. and Salaman, G. (1992) ‘The Cult[ure] of the Customer’, Journal of Management Studies29(5): 616-633.
20.
Dwyer, T. (1991) ‘Humour, Power, and Change in Organizations’, Human Relations44(1): 1-19
21.
Fairclough, N. (1992) Discourse and Social Change. Oxford: Blackwell.
22.
Forester, J. (1992) ‘Critical Ethnography: On Fieldwork in a Habermasian Way’, in M. Alvesson and H. Willmott (eds) Critical Management Studies, pp. 46-66. London, Sage.
23.
Gabriel, Y. (1991) ‘Turning Facts into Stories and Stories into Facts: A Hermeneutic Exploration of Organizational Folklore’, Human Relations44(8): 857-875.
24.
Gabriel, Y. (1995) ‘The Unmanaged Organization: Stories, Fantasies and Subjectivity’, Organization Studies16(3): 477-501.
25.
Later published in M. Reed and M. Hughes (eds) (1992) Rethinking Organization: New Directions in Organization Theory and Analysis. London: Sage.
26.
Gergen, K. (1992) ‘Organization Theory in the Postmodern Era’, in M. Reed and M. Hughes (eds) Rethinking Organization, pp. 207-227. London, Sage.
27.
Gowler, D. and Legge, K. (1986) ‘Images of Employees in Company Reports: Do Company Chairmen View their Most Valuable Asset as Valuable?’, Personnel Review15(5): 9-18.
28.
Halliday, M. A. K. (1978) Language as Social Semiotics. Newcastle: Edward Arnold.
29.
Harlow, E. , Hearn, J. and Parkin, W. (1995) ‘Gendered Noise: Organizations and the Silence and Din of Domination’, in C. Itzin and W. Newman (eds) Gender, Culture and Organizational Change. London: Routledge.
30.
Hawkes, T. (1977) Structuralism and Semiotics. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
31.
Hayes, R. H. and Pisano, G. P. (1994) ‘Beyond World Class: The New Manufacturing Strategy’, Harvard Business Review (Jan-Feb): 77-86.
32.
Kress, G. and Hodge, R. (1985) Linguistic Processes in Socio-Cultural Practice. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
33.
Lakoff, G. and Johnson, M. (1980) Metaphors We Live By. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
34.
Levi-Strauss, C. (1987) The View from Afar. Harmondsworth: Penguin.
35.
Linstead, S. and Grafton-Small, R. (1992) ‘On Reading Organizational Culture’, Organization Studies13(3): 331-355.
36.
McWhinney, W. and Battista, J. (1988) ‘How Remythologizing can Revitalize Organizations’, Organizational Dynamics (August): 46-58.
37.
Musson, G. (1994) ‘Organizational Responses to an Environmental Disturbance: Case Studies of Change in General Medical Practice’, unpublished PhD thesis, University of Sheffield.
38.
Musson, G. (1996) ‘The FACTS Project: Interim Evaluation Report of the FACTS Aspirin Programme’, a Sheffield Business School Publication.
39.
Musson, G. and Cohen, L. (1996) ‘The Enterprise Discourse: An Empirical Analysis of its Effects’, paper presented to the 6th Annual Communication and Culture Conference, Beijing, August 1996.
40.
Pettigrew, A. M. (1985) The Awakening Giant: Continuity and Change in ICI. Oxford: Basil Blackwell.
41.
Pettigrew, A. M. (1987) ‘Context and Action in the Transformation of the Firm’, Journal of Management Studies24(6): 649-670.
42.
Pondy, L. (1978) ‘Leadership is a Language Game’, in M. W. McCall and M. M. Lombardo (eds) Leadership: Where Else Can We Go?Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
43.
Rodrigues, S. B. and Collinson, D. L. (1995) ‘‘‘Having fun?’’: Humour as Resistance in Brazil’, Organization Studies16(5): 739-768.
44.
Sackmann, S. (1989) ‘The Role of Metaphors in Organization Transformation’, Human Relations42: 463-484.
45.
Teece, D. J. , Pisano, G. P. and Shuen, A. (1992) ‘Dynamic Capabilities and Strategic Management’, working paper 90-9, University of California at Berkeley, Centre for Research in Management, Berkeley, CA.
46.
Tsoukas, H. (1991) ‘The Missing Link: A Transformational View of Metaphors in Organizational Science’, Academy of Management Review16(3): 566-585.
47.
Turner, B. A. (1992) ‘The Symbolic Understanding of Organizations’, in M. Reed and M. Hughes (eds) Rethinking Organization: New Directions in Organization Theory and Analysis. London: Sage.
48.
Vander Weyer, M. (1994) ‘Mission Improvable’, Management Today (September): 66-68.
49.
Wells, G. (1987) The Meaning Makers. London: Hodder & Stoughton.
50.
Wilson, D. (1992) A Strategy of Change: Concepts and Controversies in the Management of Change. London: Routledge.
