Our knowledge and understanding of organizations is both enabled and constrained by invisible relationship of power that are embedded in the ways in which we act and speak. The notion of discourse has been used by many authors to describe and study these phenomena, and this volume offers a succinct but comprehensive introduction to the vast field of critical organizational discourse analysis. Targeted at graduate and doctoral students, and at non-specialist academic who need to familiarize with the academic debate on the subject, the book harnesses the power of metaphors to describe the many faces of discourse.

The SAGE Handbook of Organizational Discourse has received the 2004 Outstanding Book Award from the Organizational Communication Division of the National Communication Association `Organizational discourse is not a new topic but is one that has grown in significance and citations in recent years. Thanks to the new The SAGE Handbook of Organizational Discourse there is now a definitive set of up-to-the-minute resources available, by distinguished as well as emergent researchers. It should have a prominent place on all organization researchers bookshelves′ - Professor Stewart Clegg, University of Technology, Sydney `Organizational researchers interested in discursive philosophies, methods and practices will be grateful for the much-needed background and guidance this handbook provides′ - Mary Jo Hatch, Professor, McIntire School of Commerce, University of Virginia. Co-author The Three Faces of Leadership: Manager, Artist, Priest (Blackwell) `Discourse analysis has become increasingly popular in organizational studies over the past decade or two. The SAGE Handbook of Organizational Discourse will make it even more popular by helping scholars of organizations understand the range of domains, methodologies, perspectives and focal organizational phenomena available to them within this analytic approach. Beyond classifying and describing current literature in the various areas, the chapters in this important new handbook suggest new directions for research using discourse analysis, a valuable service that should help novice and experienced researchers alike′ - JoAnne Yates, Sloan School of Management An increasingly significant body of management literature is applying discursive forms of analysis to a range of organizational issues. This emerging arena of research is not only important in providing new insights into processes of organizing, it has also informed and influenced the broader fields of organizational and management studies. The SAGE Handbook of Organizational Discourse is the definitive text for those with research and teaching interests in the field of organizational discourse. It provides an important overview of the domains of study, methodologies and perspectives used in research on organizational discourse. It shows how discourse analysis has moved beyond its roots in literary theory to become an important approach in the study of organizations. The editors of the Handbook, all renowned authors and experts in this field, have provided an invaluable resource on the application, importance and relevance of discourse to organizational issues for use by tutors and researchers working in the field, as well as providing important reference material for newcomers to this area. Each chapter, written by a leading author on their subject, covers an overview of the existing literature and also frames the future of the field in ways which challenge existing preconceptions. The SAGE Handbook of Organizational Discourse is indispensable to the teaching, study and research of organizational discourse and will enable readers to develop a level of understanding of organizations commensurate with the most recent, state of the art, theoretical developments in the broader field of organization studies.

This major work from renowned scholars in the field, analyzes the role of language and symbolic media and shows how this enables us to move to new levels of understanding of contemporary organizational issues. An introductory chapter examines the role and growing importance of discourse in the study of organizations. It critically evaluates the contributions of various disciplines and defines organizational discourse as a subject area. The chapters in the first section, Talk and Action, explore the relationship between discourse, action and interaction and their impact on organizational structure and behaviour. Stories and Sensemaking focuses on the analytical potential of the `story' as a means of illuminating the ways in

Providing an overview of domains such as study, methodologies and perspectives used in research, this text shows how discourse analysis has moved beyond its roots in literary theory to become an important approach in the study of organizations.

This much-needed systematic 2006 exploration of the emerging field of organizational discourse addresses scholarly perspectives as well as empirical applications of the concepts. The interpretive, functional, critical, and structurational perspectives are examined in detail, and application chapters illustrate how discourse theory can be employed in field research.

How can we study organizations from a discursive perspective? What are the characteristics, strengths and weaknesses of each perspective on organizational discourse? To what extent do discourse and communication constitute the organizational world? This accessible book addresses these questions by showing how classical organizational themes, objects and questions can be illuminated from various discursive perspectives. Six approaches are presented and explained: semiotics, rhetoric, speech act theory, conversation analysis/ethnomethodology, narrative analysis, and critical discourse analysis. These six perspectives are then mobilized throughout the book to study coordination and organizing, organizational culture and identity, as well as negotiation, decision making and conflicts in the context of meetings. The unifying thread of this volume is the communicative constitutive approach (CCO) to organizations, as implicitly or explicitly advocated by the great majority of organizational discourse analysts and theorists today. Throughout Organizational Discourse, this theme will help readers distinguish between discursive perspectives and other approaches to organizational life, and to understand how discourse matters in organizations.

In spite of the day-to-day relevance of business communication, it remains underrepresented in standard handbooks and textbooks on applied linguistics. The present volume introduces readers to a wide variety of linguistic studies of business communication, ranging from traditional LSP approaches to contemporary discourse-based work, and from the micro-level of lexical choice to macro-level questions of language policy and culture.