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Toggling with Taylor: A Different Approach to Reading a Management Text*
Author(s) -
Monin Nanette,
Barry David,
Monin D. John
Publication year - 2003
Publication title -
journal of management studies
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 4.398
H-Index - 184
eISSN - 1467-6486
pISSN - 0022-2380
DOI - 10.1111/1467-6486.00344
Subject(s) - subtext , reading (process) , argument (complex analysis) , rhetorical question , meaning (existential) , rhetoric , epistemology , identification (biology) , sociology , criticism , linguistics , philosophy , literature , art , biochemistry , chemistry , botany , biology
This paper identifies influential, but previously unrecognized, subtexts in the writings of Frederick Winslow Taylor. Working with analytical methods developed from reader‐response theories of literary criticism, we look at the words of the text as we share the standard meaning‐making of the management community, as well as through the words of the text searching out the worldview that emerges from our particular reading of the subtext. We have described our approach to reading as ‘toggling’: that is, switching between reading text ‘rhetorically’ and reading it ‘philosophically’. We conclude that reader identification with textual voices may appear in philosophical as well as rhetorical reading outcomes – that Taylor's text may inveigle readers into accepting a moral worldview wrapped up in a seemingly rational argument – and that ‘toggling’ would empower management theory readers.