TY - JOUR

T1 - Composing with the terra fluida of interaction: new paths for CCO research as relational practice

AU - Mallette, Simon

AU - Nathues, Ellen

AU - Cnossen, Boukje

AU - Brummans, Boris H.J.M.

N1 - Publisher Copyright: © 2025, Emerald Publishing Limited.

PY - 2025/3/25

Y1 - 2025/3/25

N2 - Purpose: For more than 20 years, research on the communicative constitution of organizations (CCO) has drawn on interactional data to offer novel explanations of how organizational phenomena emerge, change, and stabilize in and through communication. Accordingly, the idea of “never leaving the terra firma of interaction” has become a tenet of CCO research, guiding scholars’ theorizing, data collection, and analysis. The aim of this paper is to reflect on and enrich this tenet. Design/methodology/approach: First, this paper traces the history of the concept of the terra firma of interaction and its usage until now. Second, drawing on ethnographic writings on complicit reflexivity and on the two first authors’ doctoral research experiences, this paper identifies current limitations of the terra firma notion. Findings: Reflecting on these experiences, the idea of composing with the terra fluida (fluid ground) of interaction is proposed as an enrichment of the terra firma of interaction concept because it advances present discussions about CCO researchers’ positionality and reflexivity while opening up new paths for understanding how organizational phenomena unfold as relational fields in processes of communication. Originality/value: This paper questions and reevaluates the role of the researcher in CCO scholarship and, in doing so, offers new insights into the value of acknowledging researchers’ entanglement and complicity with the fluid fields of interaction they aim to understand.

AB - Purpose: For more than 20 years, research on the communicative constitution of organizations (CCO) has drawn on interactional data to offer novel explanations of how organizational phenomena emerge, change, and stabilize in and through communication. Accordingly, the idea of “never leaving the terra firma of interaction” has become a tenet of CCO research, guiding scholars’ theorizing, data collection, and analysis. The aim of this paper is to reflect on and enrich this tenet. Design/methodology/approach: First, this paper traces the history of the concept of the terra firma of interaction and its usage until now. Second, drawing on ethnographic writings on complicit reflexivity and on the two first authors’ doctoral research experiences, this paper identifies current limitations of the terra firma notion. Findings: Reflecting on these experiences, the idea of composing with the terra fluida (fluid ground) of interaction is proposed as an enrichment of the terra firma of interaction concept because it advances present discussions about CCO researchers’ positionality and reflexivity while opening up new paths for understanding how organizational phenomena unfold as relational fields in processes of communication. Originality/value: This paper questions and reevaluates the role of the researcher in CCO scholarship and, in doing so, offers new insights into the value of acknowledging researchers’ entanglement and complicity with the fluid fields of interaction they aim to understand.

KW - Management studies

KW - Communicative constitution of organizations (CCO)

KW - Complicity

KW - Organizational ethnography

KW - Positionality

KW - Reflexivity

KW - Relationality

KW - Terra firma of interaction

KW - Terra fluida of interaction

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=105000846396&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1108/QROM-02-2024-2681

DO - 10.1108/QROM-02-2024-2681

M3 - Journal articles

JO - Qualitative Research in Organizations and Management

JF - Qualitative Research in Organizations and Management

SN - 1746-5648

ER -