FS II 93-103
The Occurrence of Exoticism in Organisational Literature
Sabine Helmers
Wissenschaftszentrum Berlin für Sozialforschung gGmbH (WZB) Reichpietschufer 50, 10785 Berlin, Tel. (030)-2549l-0
research during m e eighties, a certain kina of vocabulary has been transferred from anthropology into this discourse. When looking at the actual usage made of words like "taboo", "myth, or "ritual" in this context, three types of application can be distinguished.
1. ) The words can be used to signalize that a text has been written with regard to the currently fashionable organisational culture con
cept. Characteristically, the signalizing words as well as the cultural concept as a whole are handled not as a new approach but merely as window dressing which can be easily integrated in the already exist
ing thought.
2. ) The words can be used as exotic spices to give a new flavour to the old organisational stew. With this kind of usage the connotation and sound of the words is used. Many people in the modem world of disenchantment long for remote times ana places, have a wistful yearning for the far away.
3. ) The words can be used as a means of providing a new perspec
tive when looking at familiar phenomena. New insights can be crea
ted by the use o f words in a new context.
When replacing familiar words by exotic ones to describe familiar phenomena, common reactions are irritation and laughter. It may be quite funny to name well known behaviour of the modem business world a ritual. To some, who think they are civilized and that there is a huge gap between them and primitive peoples, this seems ridiculous. Others think that basically the tribesmen of modernity are humans ju s t like all other humans all over the world ana universal cultural phenomena like ritual behaviour or magic thinking can of course be found in western organisational life as well.
(Zusammenfassung)
Mit der Entwicklung des Organisationskulturansatzes während der achtziger Jahre wurden einige Vokabeln aus dem ethnologischen Wortschatz entlehnt. Bei der Verwendung von Worten wie nabu",
"Mythe" oder "Ritual" in diesem Zusammenhang können mindestens drei Nutzungsarten und (vermutliche) Intentionen unterschieden werden, die in dem Papier diskutiert werden.
We need to anthropologize the West: show how exotic its constitution of reality has been; emphasize
those domains most taken for granted as universal (this includes epistemology ana economics); make them seem as historically peculiar as possible;
show how their claims to truth are linked to social
g
ractices and have hence become effective forces in le social world.Paul Rabinow, 1986: 241
THE OCCURRENCE OF EXOTICISM IN ORGANISATIONAL LITERATURE
The eighties have been named the "decade o f culture". Barley, Meyer and Gash (1988: 33) illustrate the enormous increase in papers published on organisational culture in the period between 1979 and 1985 with a sharply rising curve based on a search of six bibliographic data bases. The increase in studies of "culture" not only happened in the subfield of organisation studies but broadly in the social sciences and moreover also at a societal level in general, when 'World Music", Carlos Castaneda, and "Ethnic Art" became popular.
During this "decade of culture" the study of organisations has been noticably influcenced by elements derived from the rather esoteric discipline of anthropology. As an anthropologist, I am intrigued by the interest in this discipline that academics and practitioners have explicitly as well as implicitly expressed in many publications on organisational culture. (I will use the abbreviation OC hereafter).
In general, while the degree of involvement of anthropologists in this discourse has been fairly small, research on OC has been influenced by anthropological theory, methodology, and terminology. The influence of terminology shall be the subject of investigation of this paper. The central questions to be dealt with are: How do people from outside of anthropology use words like taboo, myth or ritual when talking or writing about OC? And, why are they interested in using these words?
The two questions are closely connected, since answers to the former might lead to possible answers to the latter. I would like to describe what I consider plausible interpretations of the motivation for the
"outsider's” interest in anthropological terms.
What Can be Found in the Texts?
Along with the cultural approach to the study of organisations, organisational researchers have introduced a few specific words into the language that have traditionally been employed to name phenomena studied in "indigenous", "primitive" or "native" cultures
Some typical publication titles are "The Company Savage",
"Studying the Natives on the Shop Floor", "Between Totem and Taboo", "Complex Organizations as Savage Tribes", or "Corporate Taboos as the Key to Unlocking Culture". For those who like to have some data, Broms and Gahmberg (1983), for example, have shown the huge increase in the use o f the word "myth" in the early years of OC studies by searching two large data bases for its occurence.
Whereas in 1979 they found about 50 business articles with the word 'myth' in them, three years later, in 1981, the word was found in more than 500 articles.
As someone who has been enculturated into the language and ideas of anthropology, I become curious when I find words of my "native language" employed in other "foreign" contexts in a way which is different from what I have learned to consider proper usage. There are quite a few anthropologists to whom a transfer of
"anthropological" words in a redefined and often simplified form,
"lifted from an ordinary dictionary, or snipped out of the corpus of a lengthy ethnological discussion" (Gamst 1989: 15) "... has produced moments of cognitive dissonance" (Sachs 1989: 1).
Take for example the word "taboo". Taboo is the Polynesian word for a sacred prohibition, sanctioned by supernatural powers, with
1) Anthropologist are often hesitant to give their favourite group of cultures such general labels. So am I.
serious punishment - quite often capital punishment - for offenders.
Tabooed objects, persons, animals or words are sacred yet impure at the same time. According to this "original" understanding of the term, taboos are prohibitions of a very special kind. In organisational literature the name taboo might be given to profane prohibitions such as the unseemliness of mentioning business problems, joking about those at the top of the corporate hierarchy or wearing white socks with a business suit. In this profane realm offenders only have to fear mortal judges, not the damnation of supernatural punishment. In a book on OC I was astonished to find the word taboo applied to profane prohibitions in the main text, whereas the glossary added the Polynesian understanding, stressing the sacred nature of this prohibition, and thus contradicting the implicit definition within the text.
The "taboo" is universal to humankind, whereas the tabooed objects, words, thoughts or actions can be veiy different depending on the specific cultural context. Of course, anthropologists too have been trapped by the nostalgia and enchantment of exoticism, when they call the profane "don’t" of wearing white socks with a business suit a
"taboo". The topic is also taken up by Czamiawska-Joerges (1992:
50f, 65ff, 1993: 126-128). She criticizes exoticism - introducing an exotic frame of reference to analyze a phenomenon in the native culture - and called it "the new sin" of anthropologists. When it comes to transferring words, ideas, methods or artifacts from one cultural context into another, modifications or redefinitions often become necessary to avoid an inadequacy caused by superficiality or a wishful thinking that "we are all the same" regardless of different cultural backgrounds.
When studying the use made of "anthropological" words in OC literature, I distinguish three different approaches. To illustrate these kinds of usage a few examples will be given. I will not provide any bibliographical references for these examples. Instead, I would like to quote them anonymously here to illustrate patterns that I perceive when observing this group o f "native speakers" in the same way anthropologists usually quote statements of anonymous people under study. You will undoubtedly have your own examples which
correspond to the ones mentioned here, and perhaps the examples you might think of will form similar types and fit the ones I suggest.
1) Using Words to Make a Calculated Impression
In articles on the cultural phenomena of organisations a narrative is called a "myth" when perhaps "story", "legend" or "fairy tale" would be more appropriate from an anthropological point of view. Or, some strongly forbidden behaviour in the realm of the profane is called a taboo. Or, an organisation is called an organisational culture, but no further ideas are developed on this cultural perspective.
Characteristic for this type of usage is first of all that the exotic words can be replaced easily by "native" ones, and that after a
"translation" the result would be a conventional text. Second of all, it is important to note that such texts did not occur before the high point of the OC fashion, when people perhaps felt obliged to use
"cultural" words, perhaps in order to prevent themselves from being acccused of not keeping up with the times.
2) Using the Special Sound of Words for Their Emotional Impact At first glance, the second type seems to be very similar to the first
one, but a closer look will make the difference visible. Here too the
"cultural" words used in OC contexts can be replaced too easily by others which are more conventional in the tradition of organisational research. But here I would presume a somewhat different intention by the authors of the texts. Whereas with the first type I have the impression that the words are added more or less out of a sense of unpleasant duty, in the second the words are scattered into the texts because they are so exotic. This type is not dependent on the rise and decline of a fashion.
3) Using the Meaning of Words in an Effort to Create a New Understanding
The words can be used as a means of providing a new perspective when looking at familiar phenomena. Through estranged usage, the words enable us to create a new perspective which can perhaps provide new insights. This idea is not novel and can be found, for example, in the "Lettres Persanes" by Montesquieu (1973), "Der
Papalagi" by Scheurmann (1973), Castaneda’s (e.g. 1972) (fictive?^-) discussions with the Yaqui-Indian Don Juan, or - leaving this planet and using the Melmakian point of view - the comments and questions of TV star ALF. Exotic words can be used to create an awareness that home can be as strange or as familiar a place as any.
I would like to point out that the three type models cannot be clearly separated from one another. They are rather vague, and they tend to overlap due to the multitude of motives that writers may have.
What Might Motivate the Producers of the Texts?
Here I would like to present some interpretations of authors' intentions in using exotic "anthropological" terms.
1. ) The Trendy Users
Words like taboo, myth or ritual can be used to signalize that a text has been written with regard to the currently fashionable organisational culture concepts. They are used as catch words to fit a more or less conventional text into what seems to be the leading trend of the time. The indicating words, as well as the cultural perspective as a whole, do not constitute a new approach. The words are merely window dressing which can be easily added on to the already existing tradition of thought. This employment as a ’facade' can be compared with redyeing an old piece of clothing with a hip colour.
2. ) The "Fernweh" Users
The words can be used as exotic spices to bring new flavour into the old organisational stew. With this kind of usage the connotaton and sound of the words is used. Many people in the modem world of disenchantment long for remote places and times, for which there is
2) One of the many Castaneda books, "Journey to Ixtlan" (1972), has been
accepted as a doctoral dissertation at UCLA. However, many anthropologists have expressed serious doubts about the credibility of his research, see e. g.
de Mille (ed.) 1980.
a special expression in German: "Fernweh", which corresponds in its temporal aspect with the English "nostalgia" There is, however, no exact English equivalent for the spatial aspect, "longing for that which is far away".
These kinds of users dream of far away peoples, things, places while staying at home, whereas the next type of users, the Melmakians, place themselves at a distance to observe home from a new perspective.
3.) The Melmakian Users
Melmak is the home planet of a fat, hairy and friendly TV series creature by the name of ALF. When this alien life form comments on what to him as a foreigner seems to be strange, ridiculous and funny about the normal American life style of the terrestrial American family he lives with (mom, dad and the kids, a middle-class home in suburbia), the TV audience may share his distant perspective and see things which are taken for granted in a new light.
These type of users can be further subdivided:
3.a.) The Melmakians who maintain a foreign perspective to show themselves and their readers that "home" might be a very strange place when viewed this way.
3.b.) Other Melmakians who view things from a distance so that their readers become estranged from the familiar in order to then reapproach and refamiliarize themselves with the well-known. The point is that the well-known can be just as strange or familiar to us as any place on earth or - presumably - in outer spaced.
With the first two types of usage the words are employed more or less for the sound and connotation, as a symbol to demonstrate to others or to oneself that the author is following a trend, or enjoys exotism. With the third type, the meaning of the word is used for the purpose of understanding phenomena described by the words - perhaps in a more anthropological way. This third type of
3) The latter seems at least highly likely although we have no empirical evidence to prove i t :-)
employment of exotic words can provide qualitatively new knowledge if it goes along with a new perspective that has not been used in organisational research before the development of OC.
When replacing familiar words by exotic ones while describing familiar phenomena a common reaction is laughter. It may be quite funny to name well-known behaviour of the economic world a ritual.
To some who think they are civilized and that there is a huge gap between them and primitive peoples, this seems ridiculous. The employment of exotic words has been criticized by some who think that drawing parallels between phenomena in what they judge to be modem cultures and primitive ones seems to be inappropriate.
These two classes of cultures are said to be incommensurate, at least when it comes to applying concepts derived from the study of small scale or tribal societies to business organisations. Some anthropologists also share this opinion.
The following pictures illustrate this view:
--- —--- --- »W issenschaft«
m a n a g e m e n t: Steinzeitliche Rezepte fü r die Unternehmens kultur
Zurück zur Urhorde
Management-Gurus verkaufen Corporate Culture als Erfolgsgeheimnis.
Für Mitarbeiter und Aktionäre ist ihr Produkt von zweifelhaftem Wert.
(Translation of the German text:)
"Management: Stone Age Recipes for organisational culture.
Back to the horde.
Management gurus sell corporate culture as the secret of success.
Their product is of doubtful value for staff members and shareholders alike."
Source: E. Wenger, 1989: Zurück zur Urhorde. Wirtschaftswoche No 42, p 109.
Zwischen
Totem und Tabu
Wenn statt Korpsgeist nur Hahnenkämpfe den Stil im Unternehmen prägen, raten Psychologen und Völkerkundler heute zu Management by Rituals. Die heilsame Macht der Gewohnheit soll den Betrieb befrieden und einen Kreativitätsschub auslösen.
(Translation of the German Text:)
"Between Totems and Taboos
When cock fights rather than an esprit de corps become typical for a corporation, modem psychologists and anthropologists advise management by ritual. The healing power of habit is supposed to pacify the corporate climate and arouse creative impulses."
Source: C. Demmer, U. Sapper, 1989: Zwischen Totem und Tabu.
Manager Magazin No 8, p 206.
But others think that basically the tribesmen of modernity are humans just like other humans all over the world and of course universal cultural phenomena like ritual behaviour or magic thinking can be found in western organisational life as well. At a time when OC was not bom yet, Trice, Belasco and Alutto (1969: 41) wrote about ceremonials in organisations: 'The discussion of ceremonials is usually associated with anthropological descriptions of primitive peoples. In reality, of course, ceremonials constitute an essential element of all social systems..."
Still today, anthropology has often been mistakenly considered to be an esoteric science dealing with remote exotic cultures and one which is specialized in strange things like cannibalism or hula dances.
Anthropologists have been very lucky in their public image. Sociologists, it is well known, are humourless, left-wing purveyors of nonsense or truisms. But
anthropologists have sat at the feet of Hindu saints, they have viewed strange gods and filthy rites, they have boldly gone where no man has gone before. The reek of sanctity and divine irrelevance hangs about them.
(Barley 1983: 9)
Anthropologists themselves largely cultivate and encourage this public image and often find themselves playing the part of the
"harmless idiot" or "court jester" on a foreign stage, including in the OC theatre. If I may comment on this, I would suggest that it might be worthwile to look for more useful employments than merely playing the joker, because anthropology has more to offer for OC research than exotic terminology (Helmers 1993a, 1993b, Czamiawska-Joerges 1992, Götz and Moosmüller 1992, Linstead
1991, Hamada and Jordan (eds.) 1990, Gamst 1989).
Importation and Exportation
It was not my intention to make value judgements on the three types of word usage described in this paper. Every type of usage has its own justification.
Half of a pen to decorate a face
Source: Roland Garve, 1991: Irian Jaya. Leipzig, Kiepenheuer. P. 58.
638 l-f'8)
A chess figure as reliquary attached to a chalice. Displayed at the exhibition "Europa und der Orient", Berlin 1989.
The relic itself is stored in a container carved out of rock-crystal;
This container is actually a chess figure imported from the Orient (Egypt?, 9/10 century), which has simply been turned upside down ana thus transformed into a vessel for a sacred relic (13/14 century, northwestern Germany).
Source: G. Sievernich, H. Budde (eds.), 1989: Europa und der Orient, 800 - 1900. Gütersloh, Bertelsmann. P 547?
The phenomenon of taking things from a "foreign" context, importing them into one's "home" context and using them in one's "native"
way, thus somehow transforming the foreign thing into something native, has been an interesting field in anthropological research.
Photographs of a New Guinea highlander who had a traditional feather or bone put in his/her pierced septum replaced by a toothbrush or a pen imported from abroad are widely known and have even been used in advertisements over here.
The foreign objects are not used to brush teeth, to write something or to play chess but to decorate a face or to store a sacred object.
There is nothing wrong with this. Exchanges of ideas and artifacts between cultures in general have the potential to stimulate and enrich if they are used for mutual benefit^. The exchange between anthropology and organisational culture research could similarly be of mutual benefit. Perhaps anthropologists will find that one can use a term like "taboo" or "culture" to decorate a septum. Perhaps OC researchers will find that using a pen to write something might make a pen more useful than to just employ it for decorative purposes.
And transferring in the other direction, anthropologists will perhaps import things from OC and find them useful for traditional or foreign purposes. Who knows what other uses we can discover for our terms and objects through this ongoing process of exchange of ideas and experiences? The possibilities seem endless - indeed we can only barely imagine them if we cling to our accepted definitions of terms and uses of objects.
4) It is, however, not acceptable in my opinion, to import exotic words to make fun of so-called primitive people.
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