a routinised type of behaviour which consist of several elements, interconnected to one another: forms of bodily activities, forms of mental activities, ‘things’ and their use, a background knowledge in the form of understanding, know-how, states of emotion and motivational knowledge.

Although there are a number of approaches to understanding how the material (technology) and the social are constitutively entangled Orlikowski argues that it is necessary to “give up on treating the social and the material as distinct and largely independent spheres of organizational life” (p. 1438). Instead, in acknowledgement of that entanglement, she puts forward the ideas that pratices should be seen as ‘sociomaterial’. Such an approach:

challenges the deeply taken-for-granted assumption that technology, work, and organizations should be conceptualized separately, and advances the view that there is an inherent inseparability between the technical and the social (Orlikowski, 2007, p. 434).

Indeed, Orlikowski proposes “that we recognize that all practices are always and everywhere sociomaterial, and that this sociomateriality is constitutive, shaping the contours and possibilities of everyday organizing” (p. 1444).

Within the community using strategy-as-practice, the work of Kaplan (2011) is cited as an exemplar because of its adoption of sociomateriality. In her paper, Kaplan considers both the dicusive and technological components evident in the use of PowerPoint, or as she says “this study analyzes PowerPoint as part of the epistemic machinery that undergirds the knowledge production culture in one organization” (p. 342).

The research shows how the production of knowledge, through an ‘epistemic machinery’ “serve to stabilize and naturalize facts and define acceptable courses of action” (Kaplan, 2010, p. 343).

So, what is at stake in this paper—and is it truly an exemplar in its use of sociomateriality?

The answer to both questions is that Kaplan clearly demonstrates the entanglement of the social and the material, and in doing so she demonstrates how ‘things’ can be a (necessary) component of a practice. Her main finding is that strategy practices are about collaboration and cartography.

What is unclear to me is the difference between the creation/production of knowledge–by epistemic machinery–versus the creation of discourse. Are these two thing really different?

Paula’s on-the-spot response was that Lewin’s model was static, inasmuch as it presupposed there were stable conditions (for the unfreezing, moving, re-freezing to occur). In other words, her contention was that Lewin’s model didn’t handle continuous change well–in modern life there are no periods of stability. However, I seem to recall that Lewin’s model assumed quasi-stable conditions, and not actual stability.

It then occurred to me that many (most) people have not read Lewin in the orginal; they rely on others interpretations. Over the years, this may have resulted in a overly simplistic understand of Lewin and his work. It also reminded me that it had been a long time since I read Lewin myself. So, I thought I should briefly revisit his work.

My starting point turned out to be a Manford Kuhn’s (1951) review of a collection of Lewin’s works. Kuhn argues three things.

1. Field theory has not advanced much since it was first articulated in the 1930s (recall, the review was done in 1951).
2. Many of the concepts from field theory have counterparts in symbolic interactionism (i.e., the social). However, it is not the case that all of symbolic interactionism can be readily translated into field theory.
3. There has been considerable more impact by field theory on the consideration of the individual (e.g., the psychological).

Overall, Kuhn seems to argue that Lewin and his field theory can span both the micro (individualist) and macro (societist) approaches in the creation of a “general school of social psychology” (p.147).

And now I need to re-read Lewin’s work …

So, as part of my New Year’s resolutions, I plan to post here at least once a month.

For the past few weeks we’ve been talking about learning and knowing; what they are and how they relate to one another … and how they are connected to theories of practice.

Learning and knowing; why use gerunds (-ing)? Perhaps it comes from from Weick’s (1969) admonishment to so do. However, for me, it reflects an underlying view that things can be learnt or known, rather they are dynamic and contextually dependent, and so learning and knowing only exist in the doing. Such a stance probably owes something to the notion of social becoming (Sztompka, 1991), but it is hard to judge exactly what has influenced ones thinking.

What has, specifically, influenced my thinking is the work of Kelly (1955) and his notions around personal construct psychology. Although not as widely read/popular as other theories of personality and thinking, 50-years on, I find his work compelling and largely consistent with what we know from neuroscience. This probably means that I should do a small entry on PCP as it is known.

The desire to ‘go back’ to earlier principles is something of a habit with me. I recall that when I was doing electrical engineering, in examinations I could never remember the necessary formulas. So I would always quickly work them out at the start of the exam; it just seemed easier than recalling a rather abstract pattern of symbols, letters, and numbers. Lisa has read some of my writing and comments that I’ve a tendency to do a lot of ‘definitional work’. I do tend to build up to things. I also like to have the historical context of things too. I rarely accept an idea without looking at where the idea came from. It can make reading a slow process … and writing even slower. Such an apporach is probably why I’m drawn to notions of situated action (Suchman, 1987) and the like.

Anyway, back to PCP (eventually).

References