Why Matter Always Matters in (Organizational) Communication

Abstract

The so-called “linguistic turn” purportedly has allowed scholars to demonstrate why it seems so important to focus on language, discourse, and social interaction when studying organizational phenomena. However, it could be argued that it also led them to neglect some key aspects of the role material agency plays in organizational processes, a negligence that the more recent “material turn” could be said to be addressing. This chapter proposes to show, both theoretically and empirically, that analysts do not actually need to keep turning in one direction or another, that is, choose between materiality and discourse, so to speak, but that they should rather focus on the multiple ways by which various forms of reality (more or less material) come to do things and even express themselves in a given interaction.

Performing the Responsive and Committed Employee through the Sociomaterial Mangle of Connection

“…There is an increasing interest in the relationship between talk and materiality (e.g. Cooren, Fairhurst & Huët, 2012) and further work may seek to examine in more detail discourses of sociomateriality and their engagement in the mangling process.…”

Epistemic tools for science classrooms: The continual need to accommodate and adapt

“…In these contexts, technological tools are created and applied to the pursuit of scientific understandings. Objects escape their passive materiality to become partners and actors within research teams (Cooren, Fairhurst, & Huët, ). Among scientists, tools mobilize arguments and vie for recognition during the deliberations associated with knowledge building (Lehrer & Schauble, ).…”

From ‘matters of concern’ to ‘matters of authority’: Studying the performativity of strategy from a communicative constitution of organization (CCO) approach

“…By definition, matters of concern convey the idea that there are things that matter to or interest people (Cooren et al, 2012;Latour, 2014). If they matter to or interest them, it also means that they are the objects of a specific attachment on their part (Gomart & Hennion, 1999); attachments that can be heard and felt when people communicate with each other.…”