Temporal deconstructions of modernist systems, structures and agents: Directions for an ontology of becoming in organizational communication analysis
Abstract
This dissertation deconstructs social systems using post-modern conceptions of temporality. It argues that the social sciences have inadvertently reified their analytic concepts of system, structure, culture, communication, and agency by eliminating time from social analysis. Atemporal accounts of sociality remain locked within an ontology of being whereby social constructs are regarded as existentially self-sufficient and self-identical. Such accounts tend to collapse the distinction being the representation and what is being represented. In response, this dissertation suggests how post-modern accounts of time and space can be used to develop an ontology of social becoming. Instead of seeing being as existing in time, being and time are understood as mutually constitutive. In consequence, all identity is seen as precarious and contingent. What is more, by affording temporality primacy in social analysis, the researcher is forced to reconsider the relationship between her/his representations and what is represented. This dissertation argues against the real or ideal transparency or objects and concepts. The ideas developed in this dissertation are exemplified in critique of organizational communication research. Chapter Six points to how organizational communication might be reconceived when framed from the perspective of an ontology of becoming.
Degree
Ph.D.
Advisors
Smith, Purdue University.
Subject Area
Social research|Sociology|Philosophy
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