Everyday secrecy: boundaries of confidential gossip

Fan, Ziyun; Grey, Christopher

doi:10.1080/14759551.2020.1799213

Cited by 14 publications

(13 citation statements)

References 52 publications

(35 reference statements)

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Unclassified

Order By: Relevance

“…Two types of secrecy are particularly relevant here, including formal secrecy and informal secrecy that are defined and differentiated through methods of intentional concealment and protection. Formal secrecy is created and regulated in officially established and recorded ways, and informal secrecy takes place via socially negotiated norms and morals, such as confidential gossip (Costas and Grey, 2014a, 2016; see also Fan & Grey, 2020; Fan et al, 2020). In this sense, archival stories involve formal secrecy, as becoming archives requires a process of formal documentation and classification.…”

Section: Concluding Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Decoding secrecy as multiple temporal processes: Co-constitution of concealment and revelation in archival stories

Fan

Liu

2021

Human Relations

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

How can we understand secrecy as temporal processes in organization? How can we address the inherent dynamics between concealment and revelation over time? In this paper, we build on an inherent and yet overlooked character of secrecy as temporal and explores temporalization processes of secrecy. We suggest that secrecy should be reconceptualized as processes of simultaneous concealment and revelation in multiple temporalities. Drawing on such temporal sensitivity, we apply a history-laden analysis of four examples of archival stories as ongoingly completing processes of secrecy. The analysis sheds light on the paradoxical dynamics of secrecy in three interconnected ways: first, writing archival stories offer opportunities to mask and attack the concealed. Therefore, second, archival stories as the site and process that sustain secrecy can become the site where secrecy is revealed. In this sense, as the third way, secrecy is ongoingly and fragmentally formed, producing multiple and subjective experiences of time. This paper also contributes to the methodological potential for using archival stories in organizational studies.

show abstract

Section: Concluding Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Decoding secrecy as multiple temporal processes: Co-constitution of concealment and revelation in archival stories

Fan

Liu

2021

Human Relations

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…In A'uwẽ society, where nearly everything sacred is protected by secrecy from one segment of society or another, including the general public, the distinction fades between what is unknowable and unshareable. Sacred A'uwẽ food plants are not shrouded in "everyday secrecy" (Fan and Grey 2021), but rather in profound secrecy that shapes the social contours of consciousness.…”

Section: Enshrouded Sociologies Of Consciousnessmentioning

confidence: 99%

A’uwẽ (Xavante) Sacred Food Plants: Maize and Wild Root Vegetables

Welch¹

2022

Preprint

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

In lowland South America, sacred food plants have taken an ethnographic back seat to psychotropic plants. Yet, such foods are often central to local understandings of mythology, healing, ceremony, and spiritual well-being. In this article, I elucidate the sacred nature of two kinds of food plants that occupy special sociocultural spaces among the A’uwẽ (Xavante) in Central Brazil: cultivated maize and collected wild root vegetables. Although these are not the only sacred food plants in A’uwẽ society, they are iconic because they are considered uniquely appropriate gifts during certain ceremonial and ritual events. I also explore how I conducted research about ceremonial ethnobotanical topics in a society that considers most sacred and spiritual knowledge privileged. Both sacred plant foods highlighted here continue to be commonly given as presents expressing gratitude to others during popular ceremonial occasions, thereby maintaining them in the collective consciousness as integral components of contemporary social life.

show abstract

“…While Fan et al (2020) bring forward the concept of confidential gossip; they do not provide a specific definition for it. Yet their arguments shed light on an important distinction in drawing attention to the way the conceptualization of gossip largely centers on the dimension of “evaluation,” while confidential gossip also emphasizes the intentionality of concealment (Fan and Grey, 2020). For example, managing space for private conversations with verbal and nonverbal cues draws attention to the sensitivity of the content under discussion and the need for concealment.…”

Section: Gossip and Confidential Gossip In Processes Of Sensemakingmentioning

confidence: 99%

Gossip as evaluative sensemaking and the concealment of confidential gossip in the everyday life of organizations

Fan

Dawson

2021

Management Learning

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Gossip is pervasive at the workplace, yet receives scant attention in the sensemaking literature and stands on the periphery of organization studies. We seek to reveal the non-triviality of gossip in processes of sensemaking. In drawing on empirical data from an observational study of a British Media firm, we adopt a processual perspective in showing how people produce, understand, and enact their sense of what is occurring through gossip as an evaluative and distinct form of informal communication. Our research draws attention to the importance of gossip in the routines of daily practice and the need to differentiate general from confidential gossip. We discuss how gossip continuously informs learning as evaluative sensemaking processes that encourages critiques and evaluation to shape future action and behavior. Within this, we argue how confidential gossip can challenge power relations while remaining part of formal authority structures, constituting forms of pragmatic and micro-resistance. This shadowland resistance provides terrain for learning that both criticizes and preserves espoused values and cultural norms. We conclude that confidential gossip as an evaluative and secretive process provokes a learning paradox that both enables and constrains forms of resistance in reinforcing and simultaneously questioning power relations at work.

show abstract

Everyday secrecy: boundaries of confidential gossip

Cited by 14 publications

References 52 publications

Decoding secrecy as multiple temporal processes: Co-constitution of concealment and revelation in archival stories

Decoding secrecy as multiple temporal processes: Co-constitution of concealment and revelation in archival stories

A’uwẽ (Xavante) Sacred Food Plants: Maize and Wild Root Vegetables

Gossip as evaluative sensemaking and the concealment of confidential gossip in the everyday life of organizations

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About