Engagement and the Nonprofit Organization: Voices from the Margins

Abstract

Little academic attention has been focused on the experiences of communities situated at the margins in receiving nonprofit services. In this essay, we draw on the culture-centered approach to critically interrogate the concept of engagement among a range of nonprofit organizations. We analyze ethnographic fieldwork conducted in a low income suburban area in Aotearoa New Zealand, in which narrative accounts of 60 residents formed the basis of our deliberations with an advisory board. Our findings indicate that many nonprofit organizations are constructed as spaces of othering that do not attend to the cultural norms or needs of those situated at the margins. Alternatively, the Head Hunters outlaw motorcycle gang and Destiny’s Church, both vilified in mainstream media outlets, were sites of significant community engagement. Our study illuminates the impact of dialogic group engagement and of initiatives being developed and driven by the community.

Violent Enactments and Erasures: A Western Capitalist Ontology of Labor in Organizational Rhetoric About Resettled Syrian Refugees

“…Even the communicative practices of “altruistic” organizations showcase subjectification with regards to the agendas and powers of colonial-capitalist structures (Elers et al, 2021). These organizations and their communication have been critiqued as complicit in the reifying of neoliberal ideology through their organizational rhetoric alongside their altruistic aims (Dempsey, 2009; 2012; Mynster & Edwards, 2014; Sanders, 2012).…”

Granted Utility, a Proposal for the Rhetoric of Nonprofit Wrongdoing

“…Other prior research has explored communicating change in nonprofit organizations (Lewis, et al, 2001(Lewis, et al, , 2003, communication about careers in nonprofit setting (Smith, et al, 2006), "organizational narcissism" exhibited in an Indian nongovernmental organization (Ganesh, 2003), occupational identity for nonprofit fundraisers (Meisenbach, et al, 2019), and marginalized communities served by nonprofit organizations (Elers, et al, 2021). Recently, a special issue of Management Communication Quarterly explored nonprofit and voluntary organizations (NPVOs) including topics such as nonprofit engagement scholarship, the glorification of unpaid and underpaid labor in NVPOs, and future areas of focus for nonprofit organizational communication (for overview see Peterson & McNamee, 2021).…”