Queering the organization

• Main Author: Taylor, Alan Gordon
• Published: University of the West of England, Bristol 2009
• Subjects: 658.40019
• Online Access: http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.500784

Queering the organization is an action research inquiry into 'healthy organizations', leading to an understanding of how organizations are predicated on phallogocentric thinking, with power, shame and exclusion as powerful determinants. Through shameless exploration of my experiences I provoke dialogue on how sex and sexuality are played out in organizing. have developed new understandings through attending to conversations, using storytelling to capture otherwise unspeakable tales of organizing. I integrate these with my readings of queer theory, post-structural thinking and postfeminism to reach innovative understandings of organizing. Modern organizations function in a way that reinforces gender differences. Management and leadership are customarily heterosexual and male. This is taken for granted and is undiscussable. We assume that particular ways of thinking, - phallogocentric masculine ways - are normal. We prefer certainty, energy, activity and measurement. We cannot tolerate doubt and unknowing. But life is not knowable, and people get anxious.