This Article Full Text (PDF) References Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Citation Map Services Email this article to a friend Similar articles in this journal Similar articles in ISI Web of Science Alert me to new issues of the journal Add to Saved Citations Download to citation manager Request Permissions Request Reprints Add to My Marked Citations Citing Articles Citing Articles via HighWire Citing Articles via ISI Web of Science (8) Citing Articles via Google Scholar Google Scholar Articles by Samra-Fredericks, D. Search for Related Content Social Bookmarking                   What's this?

Managerial elites making rhetorical and linguistic ‘moves’ for a moving (emotional) display

Nottingham Business School at the Nottingham Trent Universitydalvir.samra-fredericks{at}ntu.ac.uk

This article contributes to sociological studies of emotions in organizations. It resides upon an innovative move to extend the ethnographic approach to include audio-recording, in this case managerial elites’ naturally occurring interactions, to provide the basis for an ‘empirical filling out’ of emotions research. Furthermore, theoretically to develop this field in ways that encompass the simultaneous speaking of emotionality and rationality, Nash’s account of rhetoric as emotion is drawn upon. In particular, the four discursive constituents which orators are said to need for ‘moving an audience’ are deployed to analytically trace how elites intertwine emotional expressiveness and a rhetoric of rationality to influence management/strategic processes. These four constituents are empathetic matter/great theme, stance, utterance design (taxis) and utterance relation (lexis). Three brief transcribed extracts of elites-at-talk are reproduced from one ethnography to illustrate the scope of a fine-grained analysis of elites’ assembly of emotional displays – two are abstracted from the ebband-flow of interaction to illustrate everyday ‘mini-speeches’ of ‘great’ oratory and the third specifically illustrates the intricate nature of inter action revealing the ways emotion can be likened to a ‘barometer of moral and relational ethics’.

Key Words: emotion • linguistic • managerial elites • metaphor • morals • rhetoric • strategizing talk

CiteULike    Connotea    Del.icio.us    Digg    Reddit    Technorati    What's this?

This article has been cited by other articles:

				D. Samra-Fredericks and F. Bargiela-Chiappini Introduction to the Symposium on The Foundations of Organizing: The Contribution from Garfinkel, Goffman and Sacks Organization Studies, May 1, 2008; 29(5): 653 - 675. [Abstract] [PDF]

				A. L. Cunliffe Orientations to Social Constructionism: Relationally Responsive Social Constructionism and its Implications for Knowledge and Learning Management Learning, April 1, 2008; 39(2): 123 - 139. [Abstract] [PDF]

				S. Mantere and E. Vaara On the Problem of Participation in Strategy: A Critical Discursive Perspective Organization Science, March 1, 2008; 19(2): 341 - 358. [Abstract] [PDF]

				S. Minocha and G. Stonehouse Towards a body-aware strategic organization Strategic Organization, November 1, 2007; 5(4): 437 - 445. [PDF]

				P. Myers Themed article: Sexed up intelligence or irresponsible reporting? The interplay of virtual communication and emotion in dispute sensemaking Human Relations, April 1, 2007; 60(4): 609 - 636. [Abstract] [PDF]

				P. Jarzabkowski, J. Balogun, and D. Seidl Strategizing: The challenges of a practice perspective Human Relations, January 1, 2007; 60(1): 5 - 27. [Abstract] [PDF]

				P.-M. Laine and E. Vaara Struggling over subjectivity: A discursive analysis of strategic development in an engineering group Human Relations, January 1, 2007; 60(1): 29 - 58. [Abstract] [PDF]

				H. Hansen The ethnonarrative approach Human Relations, August 1, 2006; 59(8): 1049 - 1075. [Abstract] [PDF]

				D. Samra-Fredericks Strategic Practice, 'Discourse' and the Everyday Interactional Constitution of 'Power Effects' Organization, November 1, 2005; 12(6): 803 - 841. [Abstract] [PDF]