Open AccessFROM FIELD TO OFFICE: THE POLITICS OF CORPORATE ETHNOGRAPHY
Author(s) -
THOMAS XUEMING LANG SUZANNE L.
Publication year - 2007
Publication title -
ethnographic praxis in industry conference proceedings
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
eISSN - 1559-8918
pISSN - 1559-890X
DOI - 10.1111/j.1559-8918.2007.tb00064.x
Subject(s) - ethnography , reflexivity , politics , sociology , multinational corporation , context (archaeology) , field (mathematics) , public relations , field research , media studies , political science , social science , anthropology , law , history , mathematics , archaeology , pure mathematics
Critical corporate ethnography does not stop at the field or our reports but extends into our day‐to‐day work in the office. Using the example of internal research conducted for next generation internet Café (Cafe) product development in the PRC, we will argue that corporate ethnographers must go beyond self‐reflexive fieldwork to tackle the organizational and cultural politics of our domain expertise. In this latter context, we become conflated with “the field” and, indeed, our corporate value is equated with the veracity of our field representations. The situation becomes eminently more complex in MNCs where in‐depth ethnographic research is analyzed and acted on in multinational teams and where internal cultural differences and professional disagreements parade as divergent corporate interests.