The Work of Communication ― Constituting Materiality, Agency, and Organization in Contemporary Capitalism

The Work of Communication: Constituting Materiality, Agency, and Organization in Contemporary Capitalism revolves around a two-part question: "What have work and organization become under contemporary capitalism--and how should organization studies approach them?" Changes in the texture of capitalism, heralded by social and organizational theorists alike, increasingly focus attention on communication as both vital to the conduct of work and as imperative to organizational performance. Yet most accounts of communication in organization studies fail to understand an alternate sense of the "work of communication" in the constitution of organizations, work practices, and economies. This book responds to that lack by portraying communicative practices—as opposed to individuals, interests, technologies, structures, organizations, or institutions—as the focal units of analysis in studies of the social and organizational problems occasioned by contemporary capitalism.

Rather than suggesting that there exists a canonically "correct" route communicative analyses must follow, The Work of Communication: Constituting Materiality, Agency, and Organization in Contemporary Capitalism explores a set of approaches to how communication can be profitably foregrounded in studies of work and organization. Across these approaches, the book shows how novel visions of materiality, agency, and organization emerge from our commitments to seeing communication as a relational practice. It goes on to illustrate the benefits that investigations of work and organization can realize from distinctly communicative approaches by presenting innovative analyses of (a) affect and the body, (b) creativity as a communicative accomplishment, (c) the constitution of start-up entrepreneurship, and (d) firms as political actors.

Aimed at academics, researchers and policy makers, this book aims, is to make tangible the contributions of communication for thinking about contemporary social and organizational problems.

• Tim Khun is Associate Professor in the Dept. of Communication, Univ. of Colorado at Boulder, USA
• Karen Ashcraft is Professor in the Dept. of Communication, Univ. of Colorado at Boulder, USA
• Francois Cooren is a Professor in the Department of Communication, University of Montreal, Canada