This book encourages us to take humor at work seriously. Although humor is
usually associated with trivial or non-serious banter; it is a significant factor in
the construction of organizational culture. This book provides an experience
based organizational account of how organizations are produced and reproduced,
as well as how organizational interaction is coupled with structure
(organizational rules and resources). It is based on two ethnographic studies:
the first, a year-long study of a hotel kitchen, and the second, a three-year
study of a private boarding school. This long term examination of an
organization's interaction is used to illustrate how organizational interaction
produces the duality of organizational structuration over time. An ethnographic
communication-focused approach provides methods for recognizing
multiple sites and levels of the structuration process. As a result, this
approach provides a major contribution to understanding the process of
structuration through agents' actions in the context of their organizational
culture. This book will appeal to those interested in the nuance and complexity
of workplace interaction; specifically it is addressed to students and researchers
in management, sociology, organizational and communication
studies.