J11.
Restorying and Narrative Therapy Tutorial
SUMMARY
of TD11: Restorying is based on Narrative Therapy
work by White & Epston and is being applied to organizations
by Barry, and by Rosile. It is related to Storytelling
Organizations work by Boje; Kaye; Boyce, and to restorying work
in interorganizational consultation. |
Similarities to other TD
methods:
- Ô
14.Postmodern
Theatrics
- ¬
12. Transorganization
Development
- %
13. Festival and
Spectacle
- I
16. Critical Theory
- C
5. Action Research
Dissimilar to other TD Methods:
?
7.
Reengineering
|
NAVIGATION
ON THIS PAGE
Part I:
Restorying
Part II: The New Storytellers (post
grads)
Part III Super Advanced Work
|
main site
http://web.nmsu.edu/~dboje/TDgameboard.html
|
Born
on:
September 16, 1999
|
OVERVIEW (Summary of what is below)
Part I - Restorying.
This section introduces restorying and work being done in family
therapy and recently being applied in organization and
Transorganization
settings We include links to Barry & Elmes
(1997 AMR article along with Boyce's work in Organization Studies.
There are also practical items usable in workshops written by Rosile.
(See restorying
reference list). return
to index or see -Part
I Restorying text
For a brief overview of the similarities and differences of
Appreciative Inquiry, Restorying, Emery-Search Conference, and
Hopewell's Congregation approaches to storytelling by Boje,
Alvarez and Schooling (press
here).
PART II: The New
Storytellers. This contrasts of several narrative approaches. (press
here) to give you a table-overview of the varied narrative
disciplines. Czarniawska’s
(1997) Narrating the Organization; Boje (1991, 1995); Boyce (1995) Storytelling
Organization; Clair’s (1997) Embedded Narratives; O' Conner's
narrative approach; TwoTrees (1997) approach to the Living Story;
and Grace Ann Rosile's work on
narration and horse sense. It requires grounding in multiple
narratiologies and deconstruction. The applications are being worked
out. You may not get this level unless you have had grounding in the
first three parts. mainNEW
STORYTELLERS text
For a comparison of four interdisciplinary
approaches to narrative and organization including Narrating
Organization, Stortelling Organization Theory, Equivalency Theory,
and Embedded Narrative approaches (press
here). main
NEW STORYTELLERS text
return
to index
MAIN TEXT SECTION
PART I: Restorying
INTRODUCTION TO NARRATIVE THERAPY AND RESTORYING
Here is the basic difference between the TD Gameboard, Appreciative
Inquiry and Restorying Methods. We also make a number of
connections between the Restorying and other TD Gameboard methods.
We live in a web of stories, with organizations and their members
and stakeholders connected by silver filaments relating plot and
context. Restorying is based in postmodern theory and in
deconstruction (post-structuralism). The assumption is that networks
of organizations and people are mired in saturated, and quite messy
problems, with a history of unresolved conflict, and power/ knowledge
relationships that results in some players having more voice and power
than other more marginal players. There is also an assumption that
people have more than one storyline, and more than one self. The
idea of multiple selves, deconstruction, and postmodern fragmented
selves is opposed by quite a number of psychologists, such as
Glass(1993). My counter to this claim, is that Glass (1993) limits
definitions of postmodern to Lyotard, Baudrillard, and Derrida; these
are not the only postmodern theorists; the view on Derrida does not
include a focus on resituation
(in Storytelling
Gameboard). Resituation is a move often ignored by critics of
postmodern. The idea of resituation is to deconstruct the forces that
bind the system of oppression in place, and move to a new or
resituated set of influences.
We begin with our main contrast; Appreciative Inquiry (AI) is
against deconstruction. The rationale is that in many problem
settings, AI advocates believe that it is not necessary to dredge up
the past or to do a critical assessment of the problems. Rather, the
focus of AI is on the future, and getting people past their problems
and into a climate of finding common ground, so that a network of
collaborative interactions can be developed.
Restorying also is focused on building a new story, but uses
deconstruction in order to break the grip of the dominant story that
mires the people in a network in their current situation. Both
approaches help network participants come together to fashion a new
story. In restorying the focus is on finding examples of network
actor tactics for resisting the dominant story, or what is called the
"saturated problem." The consultant's role is to help
the client network confront the influences of the dominant story and
see be able to articulate the ways people are recruited into that
story line. Restorying assumes that the new stories constructed
by network participants are very vulnerable to counter-attack by the
old notions and by outside influences that want to keep the status quo
in place (even when unhealthy).
Another difference between AI and Restorying, is that restorying
includes a methodology to validate the new story so that it does not
relapse into the grip of the old story. A thrid difference is
that in Restorying, the people are not the problem, the problem is the
problem.
The focus of Restorying is to find the pattern of relationships and
scripts in the network that are the problem, rather than find some
individual or focal organization that is the problem. This would mean
working to deconstruct the forces that keep the old story in play, but
at the same time resituate those forces by finding ways to validate
attempts by the network players to institute the new story and resist
the influences of the old story.
Some things to look at in doing restorying consultation work:
- What are the storylines in place? (how are people recruited to
their roles in these stories?)
- Who are the characters in the story? (antagonists,
protagonists, victims, perpetrators, scapegoats)
- What is the composition of the story (What must be added, left
out or rewritten to make this story a new story?).
- What is the dialog? (scripts).
- Who is the author of the dominant story? (there can be many).
- How does the plot (emplotment) unfold over time?
- Whose voices are marginal and dominant in the story?
- What collective assumptions are being played out? (See JoHari,
Part II Bion assumptions)
Both AI and Restorying take a de-opponent stance, that is they try
to avoid turning the situation into an us versus them mentality (i.e.
dualizing network actors into good guys and bad guys). Note this
is quite different from the TD strategy of Community
Development Network Development, where in the early phase,
activists organize participants in ways that set up the bad guys for
provocative action, hoping the situation will shake up and
negotiations will result.
Restorying goes beyond AI and Community Development work by
de-essentializing (a postmodern move). The idea is to avoid
types of analyses that reduce problems to component parts. Rather, the
idea is to expand the program in ways consistent with the Emery
TD approach, such as environmental scanning, so that people avoid
reductionist thinking. This mean the role of the consultant is
to refocus attention on expansion, not reduction to a hunt for
essences. As with the Emery approach, the focus is on the
network participants being the experts in their own storytelling, in
the authoring of a new story, and in doing the restorying work.
As with Emery, there is a good deal of attention spent on building an
informal network of support that reinforces the new behaviors and the
new story. In Restorying, this is done by having network actors
present their new story to an audience that can reinforce their new
script and new voices. This has some kinship to Theatrics and the TD
work of Augusto Boal. Another way restorying uses is having
clients write letters to their consultants and to one another. The
reason for having members of the network write letters is the
assumptions that it is the entire system of relationships that
reinforces what the TD
approach of SEAM. calls the metascript.
Yet, different from Emery, the approach looks at ways to move
beyond symptoms of the problems such as (fight/flight, dependencency)
and get at issues such as perfectionism and systemic issues, such as
we find in the TD
approach of SEAM.
The consult role is to encourage the network stakeholders to engage
in a process of story re-vision (Parry & Doan, 1994; Rosile, 1998
a, b, c; White & Epston, 1990; Zimmerman & Dickerson, 1996). References.
- Good Resource -- Narrative Therapy Page
in Storytelling Organization Game (press
here).
- Table 6: Appreciative Inquiry
and Narrative Deconstruction Approaches (press
here)
- Basic Articles on Storytelling - For
more see Storytelling
Gameboard site
- Fast
Company article Every Leader Tells a Story
by Elizabeth Weil June 1998. - Consultants such
as Noel Tichey are teaching companies to combine
storytelling with their leader training.
- Fast
Company article How the Best Storytellers Win by
Harriet Rubin
- RESTORYING
APPLIED TO TRANSORG CASES by Grace Ann Rosile
- Rosile, G. A.
"Restorying and the Case of the Sci-Fi
Organization" Academy of Management Meetings )1998a).
(press
here). Published in proceedings. This is a case study
in which Rosile does TD work for a Missile Range
- Rosile, G. A.(1998b)
Presentation paper on Sci Fi with roles/frames (press
here). This paper gives some of the various frames and
storied roles.
- "Restorying for
Strategic Organizational Planning and Development: The
Case of the Sci Fi Organization." IABD
Presentation (1998c)
(press
here). Note: Has restorying model steps and example.
Published in proceedings.
RESTORYING APPLIED TO PERSONAL
CHANGE by Grace Ann Rosile
- "Restorying for
Personal and Organizational Change." with Robert
Dennehy, Pace University. SouthWest Academy of
Management Meetings - 1998 (press
here). This paper has a brief exercise that can be
used in workshops.
TD Gameboard Implications - For a brief overview of the
similarities and differences of Appreciative Inquiry,
Restorying, Emery-Search Conference, and Hopewell's
Congregation approaches to storytelling by Boje, Alvarez and
Schooling (press
here). return
to index
- GEORGE ROTH ON
STORYTELLING -
Relevant to the connection of narrative and
stakeholder/systems work is "Learning
History" work. (press
here) for George Roth's work at Sloan. Roth uses
story and metaphor analysis to look at Deetz's
"social memory." "As learning histories
are studied for their abilities to promote learning in
and across various organizations," the Learning
History approach has notable Transorg (TD)
implications.
OTHER ITEMS
- (press
here) for "The Learning
Initiative at the AutoCo Delta Assembly
Plant" Chapter 1 by Ann R.
Thomas. It is the story of a
"Company Learning Consultant"
working with a quality operations
committee.
- World Bank
Participation Source Book - Participatory
Stakeholder Examples (press
here). Not sure is this is TD1 or TD2.
- See also
Argyris, C. & Schon, D. A. (1996)
Organizational Learning 11, Reading, MA.:
Addison Wesley.
- "A
Different View of Organizational
Learning" by Sue Gilly February
21, 1997 (press
here) Very much a paradigm shift and a
variety of perspectives in this paper
including Medicine Wheel.
- TRANSORG
RESEARCH WORK - "Learning
with The Natural Step: A Jointly Told Tale of the
Early Stages, 1988-1994." by Hilary Bradbury
March 1998 (press
here). This is "the story of the Swedish
organization Det naturliga steget /The Natural Step.
The Natural Step, or "TNS", was founded in
1989 as an educational foundation to promote
sustainability in society." It is
transorganizational in that "Natural Step is
described by Robert as "a federation or network
of autonomous associations, in which projects are
undertaken to support sustainability. The network's
main goal, however, is for all the members to agree on
and support the concept of sustainability-to hold the
same understanding in their minds about what
sustainability is (Robèrt, 1997.)" The
network collects about a charismatic leader and uses
consensus as its learning approach. Bradbury's work
applies the learning organization theory of Chris
Argyris, among others. "Learning histories can be
to [social] science what a microscope is to the
physical sciences." - Chris Argyris. Critique
- Good use of story analysis to do an historical
study of a learning network of organizations.
- An example of
Transorganizational storying and restorying can be
seen in Boje's
recent analysis of the Nike case. Phenomenal
Complexity Theory and Change at Nike: Response to
Letiche. "As a virtual organization Nike
retains direct (Beaverton, Oregon) control of the
marketing and advertising, while subcontracting both
production and distribution (except for NikeTown which
is owned). Nike's GCC (Global Commodity Chains) embeds
the one factory the University of Oregon marketeers
studied in a complex system of relationships. The
three-tiers of post-Fordist production subcontracting
include an upper tier of semi-peripheral country
factories (South Korean and Taiwan subcontractors
manufacture the most expensive and sophisticated
styles and often subcontract to the next tiers), a
second tier periphery (Indonesia and China doing
volume production using less flexible manufacturing
and vertically integrating the material supplies such
as leather, rubber and assembly), and a third tier of
"developing" sources (Thailand and Vietnam
known also for cheap labor). To study one factory in
Vietnam is to miss the complex interdependent
relationships in this producer network. I would like
to add a fourth tier to Carty's typology. That is, the
sub-contracting that subcontractors do with other
subcontractors (part of the second tier above but
happening as I understand it in all three tiers). The
importance is that while Nike may admit several
professors and Andrew Young to a factory tour, what is
missed is the difference between conditions in such
"model" (ready for inspection sites) and the
subcontractors to the subcontractors of
Nike. In Australia this involves home manufacturing
while in Asia it can and does mean highly
militaristic, even lower wage and higher overtime
sweatshops." The storying and restorying here is
how the NGOs and activists deconstruct and reconstruct
the stories of Nike. And how Nike restories itself Just
In Time to postpone change.
- For Classroom
Exercise on this point see Nike
JUST IN TIME Gameboard. The point is to
show how no matter what the allegation, Nike
restories it. In the end Tamara
is all there is.
PART
II: POST-GRAD LEVEL WORK return
to index

Seven Advanced interdisciplinary Approaches to
Narrating Organization(s):
TD Gameboard Contrasts: For a comparison of four
interdisciplinary approaches to narrative and organization
including Narrating Organization, Stortelling Organization
Theory, Equivalency Theory, and Embedded Narrative approaches
(press
here). Three are discussed below. For an overview table of
the many disciplines that are being applied
(press
here).
- 1. Czarniawska’s (1997) Narrating the Organization
Dramaturgy - Barbara
Czarniawska’s (1997) work on narrating organization
applies different narratologies to Swedish public
administration. She seeks to explain organization
narration from a dramaturgical and pragmatist perspective.
Czarniawska applies a pragmatist/social construction
perspective mixed with Burke's dramaturgy (see
Postmodern Theatrics) for a rendering of this
typology. Barbara's work has applications to
transorganization. Her study situates organizational
action within a dramatic context and in the political
economy of Sweden.
- 2. Storytelling
Organization Theory- My own work is an
interdisciplinary mix of folklore, social
construction, poststructuralist, and postmodern
narratology (Boje, 1991a, 1995a). I conceptualized the
firm as a "storytelling
organization," a theory of organizations in
which stories are the medium of interpretative
exchange (Boje, 1991a; 100; 1991b). Storytelling
organization theory been researched and otherwise
adapted by Gephart (1991), Boyce (1995), Kaye (1996)
and Boje et al (1999). In the office supply study
(Boje, 1991a; 1991b), I kept a tape recorder running
to study in situ collective story performance.
Storytelling Organization
Game - Has extensive list of reviews,
definitions (press
here). The transorganizational challenge is to
look at storytelling organizations in
interorganizational contexts.
- 3. Robin Clair’s (1997)
Embedded Narratives
Embeddedness - Robin
Patric Clair’s (1993, 1994, 1996, 1997) work is
different from both of us. For me, Clair’s work
(especially, 1997) resituates the personal narrative
embedded in her ancestral narrative and these embedded in
a political economy analysis.(See Reference List at the
end). Robin's work is already transorganizational
embedding peronal experience narrative in ancesrial,
organizational and societal storytelling.
- 4. Ellen O'Connor
- O’Connor has been doing a resituation of
Taylor, Mayo, Follett, and other foundational
management and organization authorities by researching
the political, economic, social, and autobiographical
narratives. Her (1998b) work traces Mayo’s
relationship with the Harvard Business School, putting
it in political and economic context. This work
combines narrative and organization study, as will as
rehistoricizing these personalities. Her 1998e article
on the pluralism of interdisciplinary narrative
inquiry is on the web (press
here). She makes the following challenges to
organization research (OR) studies of narrative:
- (1) more focus on
methods, particularly more methodological rigor;
- (2) greater
attention to context, as in the ethnographic
tradition, but with more attention to the role of
power and politics as introduced in the critical
tradition; and
- (3) better linkages
to mainstream theories, topics, and debates in
OR. Ironically, narrative, conceptualized as
a means of establishing relationship, has been
marginalized by, and has marginalized itself from,
OR. (A noted earlier, narrative has itself
been narrativized as the opposition to logic,
rationality, and science; and this polarization
has helped neither narrative studies nor OR.)
- 5. TwoTrees (1997) approach to
the Living Story
Living Story - Kaylynn
TwoTrees (1997)
- Stories
have a time. "You tell story at a
certain time of the year, a season, or time of
the day. There are Fall and Spring
stories."
- Stories
have a place. "You recount stories
at this place and places have their own story.
Every university has a place that has its
story."
- Stories
have a mind. "Every creation, even
a story, has a life of its own. We create a
story and it has a life. The stories have
origins. You must tell a story with
permission."
- Kaylynn's work is
important to TD for many reasons. One is that it
reminds us that stories live and they have
consequences and rights of their own. Certain
stories are sacred and have ownership rights and
telling rights about when and where they can be
told.
- 6. David Barry and Michael
Elmes (1997) Their
work takes storytelling into the jaws of strategic
planning work. David Barry has done several pieces
applying restorying to organization settings. The work
has obvious transorganizational implications. There
abstract reads "Using narrative theory, this
paper explores strategic management as a form of
fiction. After introducing several key narrative
concepts, it discusses the challenges strategists have
faced in making strategic discourse both credible and
novel and considers how strategic narratives may
change within the “virtual” organization of the
future. A number of narratively oriented
research questions and methodological suggestions are
provided." (press
here) for complete pre-publication article. The TD
implication of strategic discourse is that
storytelling matters in and among organizations.
- 7.Grace Ann Rosile - Restorying
and Horse Sense - Grace Ann Rosile has also done
work in restorying applying the narrative therapy work
of White & Epston to organizations. And she has
her own unique way of deconstructing the relations of
human and animal in her Managing as Horse Sense
presentations
- Management With
Horse Sense - Book Excerpts By
Grace Ann Rosile - This is a
more advanced treatment of deconstruction that
has not as yet been applied to TD.
- "Managing
with Ahimsa and Horse Sense" Mar 16,
1999 In Spirit At Work Journal (press
here) for article
- "Management:
Common Sense or Horse Sense?"
March 1999 (press
here).
"Discourse
from the Horse's Mouth"by Grace Ann
Rosile, copyright 1999. Transcript of
Presentation at the Language and
Organizational Change Conference May 15, 1999,
Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio (press
here).
The TD applications of
Rosile's work are being worked out in her writing. Stay
tuned.
Short List of
Papers Available (for more see Storytelling Organization
Game) return
to index
- Notes on the Strategic Stories
fad: Disney and other storytellers June 29, 1999 (press
here).
- Barry, David
1997 “Telling changes: From narrative
family therapy to organizational change and development.”
Journal of Organizational Change Management. 10(1): 30-46.
- Barry, David & Michael Elmes
1997 "Strategy retold: Toward a narrative view of
strategic discourse." Academy of Management
Review, 22(2) 429-452. (press
here) for on line copy. David does consulting to
organizations using a narrative therapy approach.
- Boje, David M.
- 1989 “Bringing performance
back in,” Journal of Change Management. 2 (2).
81-93.
- 1991a “Organizations as
Storytelling Networks: A study of story
performance in an office-supply firm,”
Administrative Science Quarterly, 36,
106-126. This is a research piece on storytelling
organizations.
- 1991b “Consulting and change
in the storytelling organization.” Journal of
Organizational Change Management, 4 (3), 7-17.
Same piece different texts.
- 1994 “Organizational
storytelling: The struggles of pre-modern, modern,
and postmodern organizational learning discourses”
Management Learning Journal, 25(3), 433-461.
This
- 1995 “Stories
of the storytelling organization: A postmodern
analysis of Disney as “Tamara-land.”
Academy of Management Journal. 38 (4), 997-1035.
This is a postmodern storytelling organization
analysis of Disney.
- The Disney (1995)
used deconstruction and postmodern theory to
demythologize the official founding stories of
Walt and the Magic Kingdom by juxtaposing
counter-narratives. For example, placing
Disney’s official story in juxtaposition to
marginal or excluded stories of strikes,
reprimands, and Tayloristic practices. The
supplement narratives were not added to some
"pure" original or founding
narrative the counter-narratives occurred
along side the official story. The idea of an
originary-founding story is a delusion of a
realism narratology. The founding story bears
the traces of past and future discourse
contexts.
- David M. Boje, Rossana C.
Alvarez and Bruce Schooling 1999 "Reclaiming
Story in Organization Narratologies and Action
Sciences" Chapter Six in Westwood &
Linstead's Language and Organization Book, draft dated
September 29. Three excerpts are available: (press
here) for
table of various disciplines of narrative. (press
here)) for
contrast oflsingle-discipline approaches of
Appreciative Inquiry, Restorying, Emery Search
Conference, and Hopewell's Congretation. And (press
here) for
contrasts of several interdisciplinary approaches
including Narrating Organization, Storytelling
Organization, and Embedded Narrative discussed in this
tutorial. .
- Mary Boyce (1995)
"Organizational Storytelling: A Critical
Review" - from a social construction perspective
.(press
here). This is based on her Organization Studies
piece and is also a study of a Storytelling
Organization.
- Clair, R. P.
1993 “The use of framing devices to
sequester organizational narratives: Hegemony and
harassment.” Communicatioin Monographs, 60: 113-136.
1994 “Resistance and oppression as
a self-contained opposite: An organiztional communication
analysis of one man’s story of sexual harassment.”
Western Journal of communication, 58: 235-262.
1996 “Discourse and
disenfranchisement: Targets, victims, and survivors of
sexual harassment.” In E. Berlin Ray (Ed.),
communication and the disenfranchised: Social health
issues and implications. (pp. 313-327). Hillsdale, NJ:
Lawrence Erlbaum.
1997 “Organizing silence: Silence
as voice and voice as silence in the narrative exploration
of the treaty of New Echota.” Western Journal of
Communication. 61(3): 315-337.
- Kaye, Michael
1996 Myth-makers and story-tellers.
Sydney, NSF, Australia: Business & Professional
Publishing Pty Ltd. Kaye, Ann Gilpin and associates do
Storytelling Organization consulting in Australia. Michael
recently passed away.
- Lieber, Ronald B. (with associate
Joyce Davis) 1997 "Storytelling: A new way to get
close to your customer." Fortune Text Edition.
(February 3rd). (press
here).
- O’Connor, E. S.
1996 “Lines of authority: Readings of
foundational texts on the profession of management.”
Journal of management History, 2(3): 26-49.
1998a “Integrating Follett:
History, philosophy, and management.” Journal of
Management History, in press.
1998b “The politics of management
thought: A case study of Harvard Business School and the
Human Relations School.” Manuscript in review.
1998c “Minding the workers: The
meaning of ‘human’ and ‘human relations’ in Elton
Mayo.” Manuscript in review.
1998 e "Pluralism in the field:
Narrative Studies as an Interdisciplinary Inquiry." (press
here).
Storytelling Organization Game - Has
extensive list of reviews, definitions, references and more
links on the topic of storytelling organizations and narrative
therapy work (press
here).
PART
III:
Antenarrative
Trajectory Dynamics return
to index
This theory builds on Antenarrative theory.
It is applied to the Enron case at http://cbae.nmsu.edu/~dboje/enron/antetd.htm
Antenarrative
is defined as a bet that a pre-story can be told and theatrically performed
that will enroll stakeholders in intertextual ways that transform the world
of action into theatrics; at the same time the antenarratives never quite
get there. The antenarrative theory was originally developed in Boje (2001)a
Narrative Methods of Organizational and Communication Research. Antenarrative
is the obverse of the diffusion model of narrative. Bruno Latour (1996: 118)
argues there is a difference between the linear narrative diffusion
model (narratives that erupt fully formed in the mind of Zeus) and the
non-linear whirlwind model of narrative, in my terms, the
antenarrative rhizomatic ensembles that want to change the world, but not as
coherent narratives of diffusion. For on line, Introduction to
Antenarrative, please read this first http://cbae.nmsu.edu/~dboje/papers/what_is_antenarrative.htm
How
do Antenarratives take flight? There
is a good intro study guide. Flight
of Antenarrative. The following papers extend the concept.
-
Boje,
D. M. (2001g). Flight
of Antenarrative in Phenomenal Complexity Theory, Tamara, Storytelling
Organization Theory.
-
Boje,
D. M. (2001h). Before the
Story Can be Told: An Antenarrative of the World Trade Center and
Pentagon Disaster; also see Hybridity
Visuals Presentation in
Netherlands.
-
How
does ANTENARRATIVE relate to FRAMES?
Antenarrative is a building block to Narrative Frames? (Review Frames
definitions).
Enron examples are worked out in
-
Boje,
D. M. (2002a). Critical Dramaturgical Analysis of Enron Antenarratives
and Metatheatre. Plenary presentation to 5th International Conference on
Organizational Discourse: From Micro-Utterances to Macro-Inferences,
Wednesday 24th - Friday 26th July (London).
http://cbae.nmsu.edu/~dboje/papers/ENRON_critical_dramaturgical_analysis.htm
-
Boje,
D. M. (2002b) Enron Metatheatre: A Critical Dramaturgy Analysis of
Enron’s Quasi-Objects. Paper presented at the Networks, Quasi-Objects,
and Identity: Reintegrating Humans, Technology, and Nature session of
Denver Academy of Management Meetings. Tuesday August 13, 2002.
http://cbae.nmsu.edu/~dboje/papers/enron_theatre_LJM.htm
Enron is a network of rhizomes, what I call antenarrative trajectories. Through
antenarrating, bits and pieces of real events were inserted in the Enron
executive's dialogs, along with Star Wars and Jurassic metaphors, and
blanket assurances of increasing profitability. The antenarratives flirted
between fiction and reality in ways that seduced spectators and stakeholders
into willingly suspending disbelief. Through antenarrative trajectory
dynamics, the ground moved, and cracks began appearing in the Enron facade.
There came a time, when stakeholders, one by one, no longer were willing to
suspend disbelief, and began to see cracks in Enron's financial reality.
Figure 1 presents eight antenarrative trajectories.
The trajectories are each antenarrative ensembles, pre-narrative strands,
and the ensembles are intertextual to one another. The antenarrative
trajectories can be thought of as strands that take rhizomatic paths. A
rhizome (Deleuze
& Guattari, 1987, p. 6- 7) is defined as a network of subterranean
trajectories (with root stem strands, radicles, bulbs and tubers). The
alleged fraud at Enron, its 3,500 off-the-balance-sheet partnership is an
example of rhizomatic network The raptor partnerships burrowed beneath the
surface images of Enron from 1991 (with Cactus) on through 1997 (with
Chewco, LJM1, LJM2) and deeper still with the secretive Southampton Place
and RADR partnerships.
REFERENCES
Boje,
D. M. (2001g). Flight
of Antenarrative in Phenomenal Complexity Theory, Tamara, Storytelling
Organization Theory.
Boje,
D. M. (2001h). Before the Story
Can be Told: An Antenarrative of the World Trade Center and Pentagon Disaster;
also see Hybridity Visuals
Presentation in Netherlands.
Boje,
D. M. (2002a). Critical Dramaturgical Analysis of Enron Antenarratives and
Metatheatre. Plenary presentation to 5th International Conference on
Organizational Discourse: From Micro-Utterances to Macro-Inferences, Wednesday
24th - Friday 26th July (London).
http://cbae.nmsu.edu/~dboje/papers/ENRON_critical_dramaturgical_analysis.htm
Boje,
D. M. (2002b) Enron Metatheatre: A Critical Dramaturgy Analysis of Enron’s
Quasi-Objects. Paper presented at the Networks, Quasi-Objects, and Identity:
Reintegrating Humans, Technology, and Nature session of Denver Academy of
Management Meetings. Tuesday August 13, 2002.
http://cbae.nmsu.edu/~dboje/papers/enron_theatre_LJM.htm
Glass, James M. (1993). Shattered Selves:
Multiple Personality in a Postmodern World. Ithaca/London: Cornell
University Press.
Parry, Alan & Robert E. Doan (1994). Story
Re-Visions: narrative Therapy in the Postmodern World. NY/London:
The Guilford Press.
White, Michael, & David Epston (1990).
Narrative means to therapeutic ends. New York: W. W. Norton
& Company.
Zimmerman, Jeffrey L. & Victoria c.
Dickerson with afterword by Karl Tomm. (1996). If Problems Talked:
narrative Therapy in Action. NY/London: The Guilford Press.
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