Travis' Question

Mumby’s chapter “Common Ground from the Critical Perspective: Overcoming Binary Oppositions” outlines the importance of working together, but at the same time questions the positives of finding common ground. In deconstructing ‘common ground’ he writes referencing Don Ellis’ argument, “He goes on to argue that ‘poststructuralists very much want to cling to the idea that reality exists in the human mind and nowhere else” (p. 75). Although Mumby corrects that extremism by writing, “most poststructuralists would be extremely surprised to learn that they are accused of the heresy of locating reality exclusively in the human mind!” (p. 75). This, however, gets at an important distinction between two paradigms of epistemology. Postpositivist and poststructuralist, and how there can (ought to) be a bleeding over of paradigms.

My question is: What would a postpositivist’s research agenda look like if they factored in a poststructuralist’s notion of reality? Is it possible?

My second question is also in relation to the first: If we are to accept Deetz’s emergent/local and elite/a priori model where the differing quadrants are permeable, how can his model help us to answer my first question?