COM264 EXAM 4 STUDY GUIDE.
What does constitutive mean? How does this term illustrate the basic premise of the constitutive
approaches?
"Making a thing what it is; essential", conceptualization of the organization as a container within
which communication occurs, approach that sees organization largely as a thing that holds
communication processes and that influences the nature of those processes
How are the constitutive approaches a response to critiques of the container metaphor in
organizational communication?
In what sense does the organization exist?
How are the constitutive approaches a response to the modern era in Western culture?
consideration of the organizational world brought on by the Industrial Revolution that focused on
the logic and rationality of science and technology and the search for effectiveness and efficiency
How are the constitutive approaches response to the postmodern era in Western culture?
consideration of the organizational world that focuses on how everything moves fast and life is more
fragmented and less consistent
Industrialization
The Information Age
Urban migration
Transnationalism/blurring of national boundaries
The growth of nation-states
Accessibility, abundance of decontextualized information
Instrumental rationality (means-ends reasoning)
Skepticism toward authority, patriarchy, etc.
Bureaucracy
Instability of identity
What does the acronym CCO stand for?
Communicative constitution of organizations
What is the primary goal of the CCO theorist?
Tries to understand how human interactions create, re-create, and change organizations
Based on social constructionism, interested in "little d" and "big D" discourse
What is social constructionism, and how does it relate to CCO theorizing?
Argues that reality (an organization, for instance, is part of that reality) is not an objective thing but
is an intersubjective construction created through communication, shift in how we understand the
, social world, we create our social world through our words and other symbols, and through our
behaviors
Explain the duality of structure (from structuration theory) with reference to the concepts of
structure and agency.
Social world made up of structures, but humans also have agency about how to respond to those
structures
Structures both constrain and enable our behavior (duality of structure)
Little d
everyday interactions and conversations (spoken, written, verbal and nonverbal)
Discourse
"general and enduring systems of thought", communication about concepts or terms that come to
carry a special meaning
What does it mean to say that CCO theorists are more interested in organizing than in organizations?
CCO theorists try to understand the complicated processes through which our interactions create,
re-create, and change organizations, in moving to this emphasis on communication as a constitutive
process, we start to appreciate the importance of organizing - the verb - rather than organization -
the noun
Summarize the contributions of the Montreal School to CCO thinking in ten words or fewer.
Organizing happens as little-d discourse "scales up" into influential texts through a sequence of six
degrees of separation,
Generally speaking, what process does the degrees of separation model describe?
The intent is embedded into a conversation, the conversation is given a narrative representation,
text is transcribed into a more permanent form, a specialized language is developed that is used in
subsequent texts and conversations, the texts/conversations are transformed into material and
physical frames, the standardized form is disseminated to a broader public
What does it mean to say that texts have agency? With which school of thought is this idea
associated?
The Montreal School, texts often become separated from their authors, understanding the ways in
which texts can make a difference will enhance our appreciation for the complexity of organizational
constitution, also considers the process of ventriloquism in organizational communication,
Summarize the contributions of the Four Flows Model to CCO thinking in ten words or fewer.
"Explicitly structurationist in arguing for the constitutive force of communication in organizing" and
argues that we can understand the communicative constitution of organization by appreciating the
types of communication flows that happen during the process of organizing
What functions are proposed to be part of the membership negotiation flow?
This flow makes clear the point that organizations are communicatively constituted through people
who bring the organization into existence and enter/exit over time, who are members (now), and
how can you tell?
What does constitutive mean? How does this term illustrate the basic premise of the constitutive
approaches?
"Making a thing what it is; essential", conceptualization of the organization as a container within
which communication occurs, approach that sees organization largely as a thing that holds
communication processes and that influences the nature of those processes
How are the constitutive approaches a response to critiques of the container metaphor in
organizational communication?
In what sense does the organization exist?
How are the constitutive approaches a response to the modern era in Western culture?
consideration of the organizational world brought on by the Industrial Revolution that focused on
the logic and rationality of science and technology and the search for effectiveness and efficiency
How are the constitutive approaches response to the postmodern era in Western culture?
consideration of the organizational world that focuses on how everything moves fast and life is more
fragmented and less consistent
Industrialization
The Information Age
Urban migration
Transnationalism/blurring of national boundaries
The growth of nation-states
Accessibility, abundance of decontextualized information
Instrumental rationality (means-ends reasoning)
Skepticism toward authority, patriarchy, etc.
Bureaucracy
Instability of identity
What does the acronym CCO stand for?
Communicative constitution of organizations
What is the primary goal of the CCO theorist?
Tries to understand how human interactions create, re-create, and change organizations
Based on social constructionism, interested in "little d" and "big D" discourse
What is social constructionism, and how does it relate to CCO theorizing?
Argues that reality (an organization, for instance, is part of that reality) is not an objective thing but
is an intersubjective construction created through communication, shift in how we understand the
, social world, we create our social world through our words and other symbols, and through our
behaviors
Explain the duality of structure (from structuration theory) with reference to the concepts of
structure and agency.
Social world made up of structures, but humans also have agency about how to respond to those
structures
Structures both constrain and enable our behavior (duality of structure)
Little d
everyday interactions and conversations (spoken, written, verbal and nonverbal)
Discourse
"general and enduring systems of thought", communication about concepts or terms that come to
carry a special meaning
What does it mean to say that CCO theorists are more interested in organizing than in organizations?
CCO theorists try to understand the complicated processes through which our interactions create,
re-create, and change organizations, in moving to this emphasis on communication as a constitutive
process, we start to appreciate the importance of organizing - the verb - rather than organization -
the noun
Summarize the contributions of the Montreal School to CCO thinking in ten words or fewer.
Organizing happens as little-d discourse "scales up" into influential texts through a sequence of six
degrees of separation,
Generally speaking, what process does the degrees of separation model describe?
The intent is embedded into a conversation, the conversation is given a narrative representation,
text is transcribed into a more permanent form, a specialized language is developed that is used in
subsequent texts and conversations, the texts/conversations are transformed into material and
physical frames, the standardized form is disseminated to a broader public
What does it mean to say that texts have agency? With which school of thought is this idea
associated?
The Montreal School, texts often become separated from their authors, understanding the ways in
which texts can make a difference will enhance our appreciation for the complexity of organizational
constitution, also considers the process of ventriloquism in organizational communication,
Summarize the contributions of the Four Flows Model to CCO thinking in ten words or fewer.
"Explicitly structurationist in arguing for the constitutive force of communication in organizing" and
argues that we can understand the communicative constitution of organization by appreciating the
types of communication flows that happen during the process of organizing
What functions are proposed to be part of the membership negotiation flow?
This flow makes clear the point that organizations are communicatively constituted through people
who bring the organization into existence and enter/exit over time, who are members (now), and
how can you tell?
