Hidden in full view: the organization of public secrecy in Miéville’s The City and the City
Publikation: Beiträge in Zeitschriften › Zeitschriftenaufsätze › Forschung › begutachtet
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in: Culture and Organization, Jahrgang 25, Nr. 2, 15.03.2019, S. 91-103.
Publikation: Beiträge in Zeitschriften › Zeitschriftenaufsätze › Forschung › begutachtet
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TY - JOUR
T1 - Hidden in full view
T2 - the organization of public secrecy in Miéville’s The City and the City
AU - Otto, Birke
AU - Pors, Justine Grønbæk
AU - Johnsen, Rasmus
N1 - Publisher Copyright: © 2018, © 2018 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.
PY - 2019/3/15
Y1 - 2019/3/15
N2 - In this article, we explore China Mieville’s novel The City and the City as a literary experiment for analyzing the dynamics of public secrecy. We explore public secrets as an intrinsic part of organizational life and as a framework for paying attention to the politics of organizing. First, we focus on the novel’s invention and use of the verb ‘unseeing’ to bring out the embodied and sensuous aspects of public secrecy as part of organizational processes. Second we unfold how, although the content of public secrets may turn out to be less spectacular than expected, it is exactly their mundaneness which is key to their political importance. This is important because in an increasingly disorganized and uncertain world, secrecy proliferates and the visibility of secrecy is often a strategic move to justify certain hidden actions.
AB - In this article, we explore China Mieville’s novel The City and the City as a literary experiment for analyzing the dynamics of public secrecy. We explore public secrets as an intrinsic part of organizational life and as a framework for paying attention to the politics of organizing. First, we focus on the novel’s invention and use of the verb ‘unseeing’ to bring out the embodied and sensuous aspects of public secrecy as part of organizational processes. Second we unfold how, although the content of public secrets may turn out to be less spectacular than expected, it is exactly their mundaneness which is key to their political importance. This is important because in an increasingly disorganized and uncertain world, secrecy proliferates and the visibility of secrecy is often a strategic move to justify certain hidden actions.
KW - China Mieville
KW - embodied unseeing
KW - fiction in organization studies
KW - Organizational secrets
KW - public secrecy
KW - The City and the City
KW - Sociology
KW - Cultural studies
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85058411319&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1080/14759551.2018.1537277
DO - 10.1080/14759551.2018.1537277
M3 - Journal articles
AN - SCOPUS:85058411319
VL - 25
SP - 91
EP - 103
JO - Culture and Organization
JF - Culture and Organization
SN - 1475-9551
IS - 2
ER -