Sara's Questions - 11/11

I appreciate that Dougherty & Drumheller (2006) began their article with synopsis of the history of the emotionality/rationality duality and also the broader cultural implications. They cite Putnam and Mumby's (1993) finding that Western culture tends to privilege rationality over emotionality and that the English language plays a major role in the creation and perpetuation of these dualities. Krone and Morgan (2000) posit that this duality is unique to Western business cultures and may not apply to non-Western organizations were emotionality and rationality are viewed as intertwined and inseparable. These ideas were salient to me in two major ways. First, the dangers of constructing a world and organizing principles that use only binary thinking. And second, the cultural implications embedded in this way of thinking.

First, I think the tensions inherent in duality has been apparent in several of our topics thus far. Certainly gender and also organizational tensions, policies, assimilation, and socialization. When we only think in terms of this or that, black or what, one or the other, we leave out all of the complex shades of gray and even black and white that lie in between.

Questions:
I know that from a sense making standpoint it is comfortable and safe to think in these terms, but how are we hurting ourselves in the long-term?
How are these dualities perpetuated through cultural texts that we continue to decode, consume, and embed in our culture?
What do we leave out of the conversation?

Second, the sub theme of wasted time gives us a great example of the cultural dangers of binary thinking. The way that the participants describe time as a commodity, a tangible item that dictates how we spend our days, reflects a monochronic view of time, which is typically in individualistic, certainly Western cultures. Time is money right!?! The alternative or collectivist, typically non-Western view of time is from a polychronic perspective. Time is not a commodity for us to consume, but rather a part of our organizational lives. Relationships are valued more than a strict adherence to time. From this point of view, time cannot be wasted because organizational life does not revolve around the clock. It seems to me that the participants are defining what is a waste of time and the emotions involved through a sense making process of what is not a monochronic orientation, instead of looking at it from a polychronic relationship building perspective. That's where the dangers of binaries can really be seen. Often times feminine is defined by what is not masculine or homosexuality by how it is not heterosexuality instead of letting these constructs be created in their own unique language. These cultural binaries are difficult to avoid given that much of the intercultural research from a Western perspective continues to teach students to think in binary terms. Shoot I just gave you a whole paragraph of binary thinking after I just attacked it. So my final questions are:

As citizens and scholars, how do we resist the Western cultural practices of binary thinking?
What can we learn from non-Western organizations in terms of seeing emotion and rationality as intertwined and inseparable?
How can we increase more culturally inclusive scholarship without "othering"?