qtx010 PDF

Communication Theory ISSN 1050-3293
ORIGINAL ARTICLE
In Search of a Latin American Approach

to Organizational Communication: A Critical
Review of Scholarship (2010–2014)
En busca de un enfoque latinoamericano de la comunicación
organizacional: una revisión crítica de la producción
académica de 2010 a 2014
Em busca de uma abordagem latino-americana para

comunicação organizacional: Uma revisão crítica da pesquisa
em comunicação organizacional na América Latina entre
2010-2014
Consuelo Vásquez Donoso1, Lissette Marroquín Velásquez2,

& Adriana Angel Botero3
1 Département de communication sociale et publique, Université du Québec à Montréal, Montreal, Canada
2 Escuela de ciencias de la comunicación colectiva, Universidad de Costa Rica, San José, Costa Rica
3 Departamento de comunicación social y periodismo, Universidad de Manizales, Manizales, Colombia
This article presents a critical review of organizational communication scholarship in

Latin America to explore its distinctive traits. Combining J. Marques de Melo’s (1999)
features of Latin American communication studies with Anglo-American frameworks of
organizational communication, it offers a systematic mapping of Latin American orga-
nizational communication scholarship by focussing on the major trends of the academic
production in peer-reviewed journals from 2010 to 2014. The results show that there are
subtle but consistent signs of a Latin American approach to organizational communica-
tion regarding theoretical miscegenation and the ethics and political commitment of the
researcher. This is mainly manifested in the practical orientation of research and the
growing interest in documenting and intervening in local organizational realities.
Este artículo presenta una revisión crítica de la producción académica referida a la
comunicación organizacional en América Latina, a fin de explorar sus características dis-
tintivas. A partir de la combinación de la caracterización de los estudios comunicacionales
latinoamericanos propuesta por Marques de Melo (1999) y los encuadres angloamericanos
de la comunicación organizacional, el artículo propone un mapeo sistemático de la
producción académica latinoamericana sobre comunicación organizacional, haciendo eje
en las principales tendencias manifestadas en revistas académicas arbitradas por pares de
2010 a 2014. Los resultados muestran signos sutiles pero consistentes de la existencia de
un enfoque latinoamericano, vinculados con la miscegenación teórica por un lado, y con
Corresponding author: Consuelo Vásquez Donoso; e-mail: vasquez.consuelo@uqam.ca
Communication Theory 28 (2018) 155–179 © The Author(s) 2018. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of 155
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Latin American Organizational Communication C. Vásquez Donoso et al.
el compromiso ético y político con la investigación por el otro. Dicho compromiso se expre-
sa principalmente en la orientación práctica de la investigación y el interés creciente por
documentar, e intervenir en, las realidades organizacionales locales.
Este artigo apresenta uma revisão crítica da pesquisa em comunicação organizacional
na América Latina com o objetivo de explorar suas características distintivas. Combinando
os aspectos dos estudos de comunicação identificados por Marques de Melo (1999) com
abordagens anglo-americanas da comunicação organizacional o artigo apresenta um pan-
orama sistemático da pesquisa latino-americana na área com foco nas tendências princi-
pais da produção publicada em revistas científicas entre 2010 e 2014. Os resultados
mostram que há sinais sutis mas consistentes de uma abordagem latino-americana da
comunicação organizacional no que diz respeito à miscigenação teórica e à ética e compro-
metimento político de pesquisadoras e pesquisadores. Tais características se manifestam prin-
cipalmente na orientação prática da pesquisa e no interesse crescente pela documentação
e intervenção em realidades organizacionais locais.
Keywords: Latin American Organizational Communication, Bibliometric Study, Latin

American Tradition, Communication Theory, De-Westernization of Communication Studies.
doi:10.1093/ct/qtx010
Despite the uncontested Western domination of communication studies (Gunaratne,

2010), Latin American communication scholars have progressively moved beyond
foreign approaches to propose their own theoretical frameworks, methodologies, and
objects of study (Kaplún, 2013; Martin-Barbero & Rey, 2000). Marques de Melo
(1999), a firm promoter of a Latin American approach to communication, identifies
four features that characterize communication in this part of the world: (a) the
fusion of foreign and local theories, also called theoretical “miscegenation”, (b) the
methodological hybridity that derives from a transdisciplinary approach to commu-
nication, (c) the ethics and political commitment of the researcher characterized as
an agent of social change, and (d) the extra-national dimension of research that
addresses regional (not only national) issues from a critical standpoint. Taking this
reflection as a starting point, this article explores the major trends of current Latin
American organizational communication scholarship by asking the following ques-
tions: What characterizes this scholarship? Is there a distinctive Latin American
approach to organizational communication?
Two reasons explain our interest on Latin American organizational communi-
cation. First, most of the scholarly work developing and promoting a Latin
American tradition of communication studies has come from media and cultural
studies. Under the umbrella of Latin American social theory—represented by Jesús
Martín-Barbero, Néstor García Canclini, and Paolo Freire, among others—Latin
American communication studies have been recognized and legitimized beyond its
scholarly community (e.g., Ganesh & Zoller, 2012; Mattoni & Treré, 2014) mostly
156 Communication Theory 28 (2018) 155–179

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C. Vásquez Donoso et al. Latin American Organizational Communication
as a critical approach to mass media and cultural studies. As Waisbord (2014)

noted, these foundational works have been consequential in giving Latin American
communication studies a strong identity. Yet this same epistemological and analyt-
ical focus has resulted in a narrow view of communication. This “media centrism”
has erased other areas of communication (such as rhetoric, interpersonal, and
organizational communication) from the Latin American landscape “as if mediated
processes completely dominate human communication” (Waisbord, 2014, p. 3). To
fully account for Latin American communication scholarship, we need to look
beyond what has been known “up North” as the “Latin American tradition.”
Second, organizational communication is currently showing signs of expansion
and transformation in Latin America (Kaplún, 2013; Vásquez & Marroquín, 2016).
In the last decade, Latin America’s organizational landscape has been transformed by
the increasing presence of multinational corporations and local “mini-copies” (León
Duarte, 2002) as well as social organizations (Saladrigas Medina, 2005), which have
prompted a need for new organizational communication models. Furthermore, Latin
American organizational communication scholarship is slowly but steadily moving
away from the positivist approach that has historically influenced the field (Bronstrup
Silvestrin, Godoi, & Ribeiro, 2007; Urbiola Solís, 2013). This has led scholars to
engage more directly with actual organizational practices by adopting an “integrated”
view that focuses “on structures, processes and identities and promotes internal dia-
logue with the environment to build desire and collective action” (Kaplún, 2013, p. 1;
authors’ translation). Lastly, we note the progressive institutionalization of organiza-
tional communication in Latin America mostly through the development of associa-
tions, conferences and scholarly divisions, as well as the increase in the number of
publications devoted to this area of study (De Farias, 2005).
Despite these signs of growth, few studies have documented and analyzed the char-
acteristics of organizational communication in Latin America (for exceptions see
Angel, 2013; Guillén Ojeda & Espinosa Velázquez, 2014; Krohling Kunsch, 2011;
Orjuela Córdoba, 2015). This is particularly salient if we compare with the portraits of
Latin American media and cultural studies (e.g., Fuentes Navarro, 1999; León Duarte,
2006; Marques de Melo, 1999; Waisbord, 2014), as well as of Anglo-American1 organi-
zational communication scholarship (e.g., the three editions of the Handbook of
Organizational Communication: Jablin, Putnam, Roberts, & Porter, 1987; Jablin &
Putnam, 2001; Putnam & Mumby, 2014). Documenting this emergent area of commu-
nication studies, located at the crossroad of a Latin American tradition in communica-
tion studies and Anglo-American organizational communication is not just needed,
but can also open interesting avenues for theory building.
The goal of this article is to present a critical review of organizational commu-
nication scholarship in Latin America to explore its distinctive traits. To do so, we
offer a systematic mapping of Latin American organizational communication
scholarship by focussing on the major trends of the academic production in peer-
reviewed journals. The article is based on a larger study that included North,
Central, and South American publications from 2010 to 2014. For this article, we
Communication Theory 28 (2018) 155–179 157

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focused on Latin American publications, which corresponds to a corpus of 92 arti-

cles published in 10 peer-reviewed journals from Spanish- or Portuguese-speaking
countries2 in North, South, and Central America (see Appendix 1).
Theoretically speaking, we combine Marques de Melo’s (1999) features of Latin
American communication studies with Anglo-American meta-theoretical frameworks
of organizational communication, namely, Putnam, Phillips, and Chapman’s (1996)
and Deetz’s (2001), to propose a hybrid analytical framework to assess this corpus. By
means of this theoretical “miscegenation” we aim to set the basis for an equitable dia-
logue between Anglo- and Latin American organizational communication, which gives
voice to indigenous (here Latin American) intellectual traditions and regional realities.
Our analysis shows that there are subtle but consistent signs of a Latin American
approach to organizational communication, which is mainly based on praxis, i.e., the
local, situated improvisations and innovations that are tested to solve concrete pro-
blems and needs (Beltrán, 2016). While some similarities with Anglo-American orga-
nizational communication can be drawn in terms of topics and methodologies, we
argue that this focus on praxis is taking on a different “color” in Latin America, which
is orienting research toward understanding communication as a tool for social change
and the researchers’ role as active participants in this process.
This article makes three main contributions. First, by reviewing the academic
production of Latin American organizational communication in peer-reviewed
Latin American journals between 2010 and 2014, it contributes to putting this area
of communication in the Northern radar of organizational communication studies.
In this sense, it goes beyond the Latin American tradition of communication and
media studies by showing the implications of other objects of study, research
topics, and epistemologies that are also contributing to shaping communication
studies in Latin America. Second, by developing a hybrid analytical framework,
which combines a Latin American approach to communication and an Anglo-
American view of organizational communication, the article advances the theory
building along the lines of Marques de Melo’s (1999) theoretical “miscegenation.”
Third, through the discussion of the specificities of Latin American organizational
communication, the article contributes to setting the agenda for developing a
regional approach that takes into account the historical, social, and political context
of the organizational landscape, as well as local theoretical developments.
Mapping the terrain of organizational communication in Latin America
In order to map the terrain of organizational communication in Latin America, we

present the few studies that have outlined this literature and put them in dialogue
with those pertaining to Anglo-American organizational communication.
Organizational communication in Latin America

Most of the scholarly discussion on organizational communication in Latin
America has been published in essays, research reports, dissertations and editorials

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(Correal, Bustos, Cuevas, & Panqueva Bernal, 2008; De Farias, 2005; Kaplún, 2012;
León Duarte, 2002, 2006; Saladrigas Medina, 2005; Salas Forero, 2011). This section
is based on four systematic analyses of the academic production of Latin American
organizational communication from 1990 to 2015, namely those of Krohling
Kunsch (2011),3 Angel (2013),4 Guillén Ojeda and Espinosa Velázquez (2014)5 and
Orjuela Córdoba (2015).6 Taken together they reveal three major trends that char-
acterize Latin American organizational communication scholarship: (a) a profes-
sional research orientation with a clear focus on communicative skills, (b) the
predominance of a systemic definition of organization and an instrumental view of
communication, and (c) a discrepancy between conference papers and published
articles regarding the prominence of empirical studies.
First, these studies highlight that the academic production on organizational
communication in Latin America is mainly focused on describing the roles and
activities of organizational communication professionals. Research consistently
aimed to increase the effectiveness of communication, mostly through problem-
solving. This is translated into a marked interest for explaining the different
functions of organizational communication such as internal and external commu-
nication, strategic communication, and event logistics. Krohling Kunsch’s (2011;
see also Orjuela Córdoba, 2015) study shows, for example, that the privileged topics
of Latin American scholars address internal, public and strategic communication, as
well as organizational culture and corporate social responsibility (e.g., Pizzolante,
2003; Salas Forero, 2011; Van Riel, 2003). Worth noting here is the “integral com-
munication” framework first proposed by Brazilian scholar Margarida Krohling
Kunsch (2003) to articulate public relations and organizational communication; fur-
ther developed by her Mexican colleague María Antonieta Rebeil (c.f., Rebeil &
Hernández, 2009) for defining organizational communication as the articulation of
marketing, corporate and internal communications.
Angel (2013) and Guillén Ojeda and Espinosa Velázquez’s (2014) studies con-
firmed this professional orientation. In the respective corpus they analyzed, organi-
zational communication was mostly referred to as a management tool, and
research was oriented toward increasing organizational efficiency. Moreover, in
Guillén Ojeda and Espinosa Velázquez’s (2014) analysis, all of the conference
papers referred to applied research and addressed topics such as corporate image,
marketing, and strategic communication. Prieto (2004) explained this professional
tendency in light of the historical development of organizational communication in
Latin America. He noted that organizational communication was first associated
with the professional career of comunicadores organizacionales [organizational
communicators] and DirCom [communication directors] (Kaplún, 2012) rather
than a domain of study. Hence, organizational communication is seen as a profes-
sional field that trains practitioners in managing communication problems in
diverse organizational settings. This professional predisposition has limited the the-
oretical and disciplinary development of organizational communication in Latin
America by orienting theory building toward managerial purposes.

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Second, the four studies revealed the dominance of a systemic view of organiza-
tion, and an instrumental definition of communication. Krohling Kunsch’s (2011)
analysis shows a strong allegiance to systems theory in Latin American organiza-
tional communication, which is manifested in the major influence of Mexican
scholar Abraham Nosnik (2000). Nosnik was one of the first Latin American scho-
lars to advance a systemic explanation of organizational communication that would
account for its processual, dynamic and multilevel dimensions, in relation to the
environment. As noted by Angel (2013), a major consequence of using this sys-
temic framework is the dominance of normative discourses and functionalist
approaches to organizational communication, in which communication is defined
as the “exchange of signs” that links the organization with its environment (Ávila,
1998, para.1; authors’ translation). Guillén Ojeda and Espinosa Velázquez’s (2014)
study is consistent with these findings but also stresses that Latin American
researchers, particularly Mexicans, focused on the private sector, the exception
being the few studies carried out in public universities.
Yet some Latin American organizational communication scholars (Manucci,
2005; Tovar Mendoza, 2003; Valle Florez, 2003) have explicitly rejected this instru-
mental view of communication and proposed instead a symbolic, linguistic or con-
stitutive perspective (e.g., Diálogos [2012 special issue] “Pensar la organización
desde la comunicación” [Thinking Organization Through Communication]). That
being said, the critical discourse has been largely absent from the academic produc-
tion. An exception worth mentioning is Mexican scholar Rafael Ávila’s (2004) cri-
tique of organizational communication in which he explores the rationalities at play
in organizations (for similar arguments see also Kaplún, 2001; Tovar Mendoza,
2003). As noted in the introduction, we see in the emergence of alternative
approaches to the systemic view organization an opportunity for theory building
toward more integrated views of organizational communication (Kaplún, 2013).
Third, there seems to be a clear discrepancy between conference papers and
articles published in high impact journals. Between 1998 and 2008, Krohling
Kunsch (2011) noted that most conference papers were empirical studies.
Furthermore, except for 2004, when theoretical studies slightly dominated, and
2008, when the number of empirical and theoretical studies was equal, the other
years of the conference presented an important empirical orientation. Angel’s
(2013) findings are different. For a similar period, she noted that the majority of
the articles were essays, theoretical debates, or frameworks, and that few presented
empirical studies. This result was supported and extended by Orjuela Córdoba’s
(2015) study, which also specified that the few articles that presented empirical
studies did not even mention the methodological design, and in those that did,
quantitative methods such as surveys and questionnaires prevailed. Based on the
results of their study, which combined articles and conference papers, Guillén
Ojeda and Espinosa Velázquez (2014) draw an interesting observation that can
explain this discrepancy. While articles published in high-ranking journals dis-
played normative and prescriptive orientations, conference papers tended to be

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more exploratory and thus mobilized more diverse methodological orientations

and theoretical frameworks.
Anglo-American organizational communication scholarship

A major influence of Latin American organizational communication scholarship
can be found in its Anglo-American counterpart. As in many other areas of com-
munication studies, North America is where organizational communication as a
field began and was institutionalized (Jablin et al., 1987). This preeminence is
mostly manifested in the theoretical and methodological frameworks that have
been mobilized by Latin American scholars (De Farias, 2005). Most of the critics of
the Anglo-American influence in Latin American organizational communication
have highlighted the pervasiveness of a functionalist perspective (Guillén Ojeda &
Espinosa Velázquez, 2014; Salas Forero, 2011); one major effect of this “importa-
tion” is an administrative and businesslike orientation to organizational processes,
which limits the theoretical and practical contributions of organizational commu-
nication research. The portrait presented previously confirms this functionalist and
administrative dominance in Latin American organizational communication stud-
ies. In this section, we review current Anglo-American organizational communica-
tion studies in light of the three major trends that characterize Latin American
organizational communication.
First, regarding the professional orientation of organizational communication and
the focus on problem-solving, there is an interesting parallel with the struggle for
scholarly identity that Anglo-American organizational communication studies went
through in the 1980s, especially with regards to consulting, management and practi-
tioners (Putnam & Mumby, 2014). Jablin et al.’s (1987) first handbook of organiza-
tional communication illustrates well the similarities with the professional tendency
in current Latin American organizational communication. The handbook emphasized
organizational structure, internal/external environments, and a transmission-oriented
view of organizational communication. Scholars primarily centered their research on
communication processes in organizations, studying topics as climate, networks,
superior-subordinate relations, feedback, and performance evaluation.
Second, concerning the predominance of a systemic view of organizational and
an instrumental definition of organizational communication in Latin America, we
note that while these approaches defined the first era of Anglo-American organiza-
tional communication scholarship, they were vividly rejected in the 1980s during
what is known as the interpretive turn (Putnam, 1983). This paradigmatic shift
introduced interpretive, critical, and dialogic perspectives into a field of study that
was dominated by normative and prescriptive views of organizational communica-
tion. Ashcraft, Kuhn, and Cooren (2009) noted in a review of the field that the
major transformation in Anglo-American organizational communication studies
has to do with the strong criticism of the transmission model of communication
that comes from functionalist and systemic approaches. One of the major out-
comes of this criticism is the development in the 2000s of constitutive approaches,

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which conceive communication as the site where the organization emerges and
reproduces itself. This tendency toward alternative approaches to systemic views of
organizational communication was also noted in the reviewed bibliometric studies
on Latin American organizational communication.
Where the parallel between Anglo-American and Latin American organiza-
tional communication studies is less evident is regarding theoretical traditions
based in critical, feminist, and postcolonial theories, which have shown consider-
able growth and legitimacy in the Anglo-American community in recent decades
(Putnam & Mumby, 2014). Anglo-American scholars have problematized organi-
zations in light of the post-bureaucratic era: notions of voice, rationality, work, and
organizational boundaries are increasingly mobilized to critique or describe organi-
zational phenomena. This critical orientation is, as noted, absent from Latin
American organizational communication scholarship, which is particularly intrigu-
ing considering the critical legacy of Latin American communication studies.
Third, Anglo-American organizational communication has, in recent decades,
broadened the methodological approaches to illuminate the centrality of communi-
cation in organizational life by drawing on empirical studies to propose sophisti-
cated theory building. As noted by Putnam and Mumby (2014) in parallel to the
proliferation of theoretical perspective, the field of organizational communication
in Anglo-America is clearly pluralistic in its approach to methods. In contrast to
Latin-American organizational communication, empirical study are here numerous
and central to theory building both in conference and published papers.
As we can see, the current state of organizational communication studies in the
United States and Canada has evolved considerably since its emergence in the
1960s and 1970s, which was characterized by a clear dominance of functionalist
approaches. Comparing the present state of Latin American scholarship with the
field’s development in Anglo-American countries, we could say that the former is
today where the latter was in the 1980s. However, this assertion is problematic
because it denies the possibility of contingent communicational explanations of
organizational phenomena that would be grounded in Latin American issues, his-
tory, and traditions. Thus, instead of adopting a comparative analysis, we develop
next a mestizo analytical framework that combines Latin and Anglo-American tra-
ditions, and informs our analysis study.
A mestizo framework to study Latin American organizational

communication
The framework articulates Marques de Melo’s (1999) features of a Latin American
school of communication with Putnam et al.’s (1996) metaphors and Deetz’s
(2001) discourses of organizational communication. This articulation falls into
what Marques de Melo (1999) calls “theoretical miscegenation,” i.e., the fusion of
local and foreign theories, which allows us to interrogate the distinctiveness of a

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Latin American approach to organizational communication while establishing a

dialogue with its Anglo-American counterpart.
Features of a Latin American approach to communication

Since the 1990s, Marques de Melo has advanced the idea of a Latin American
school of communication. Its specificity lies in considering Latin America as a par-
ticular locus of enunciation (Torrico Villanueva, 2016) from which to interrogate
communication research and the production of knowledge. For Marques de Melo
(1999) the following four features define the most salient studies developed by
Latin American communication scholars during the 1980s and 1990s: theoretical
miscegenation, methodological hybridity, the ethics and political commitment of
the researcher, and the extra-national dimension of research. For the purpose of
this study, we pay particular attention to theoretical miscegenation and the ethics
and political commitment of the researcher. Despite the many debates regarding
Marques de Melo’s proposal (e.g., Fuentes Navarro, 1999; Peres-Cajías, 2015), these
two features have gained a certain consensus among the Latin American research
community as characterizing the diversity of work in communication studies in the
region.
The concept of theoretical miscegenation refers to the way Latin American com-
munication scholars approach theory building. It is characterized by the articula-
tion of foreign and local theories. On one hand, this concept views theory building
as a political practice that is grounded in a particular culture and context. For
Marques de Melo foreign theoretical frameworks are issued from sites of enuncia-
tion that “are far removed from our modes of being, of thinking and of acting”
(Fuentes Navarro, 2014, p. 17, authors’ translation). Consequently, foreign theories
should not be uncritically adopted, but rather contested and adapted, in order to
take into account the particularities of the local context and culture. On the other
hand, theoretical miscegenation foregrounds the emergence of alternative frame-
works as a result of the interplay between foreign and local knowledge.
The ethics and the political commitment of the researcher refer both to the role
of the scholar in the research process and the role of research in society. Following
Marques de Melo (1999), research must have a concrete impact on the social reali-
ties that are studied. Researchers are no longer seen as distant observers; rather,
they are called to act as agents of change. This engagement translates into a hori-
zontal relation between the researcher and the research participants in knowledge
production. Moreover, research participants are valued by their expertise in defin-
ing problems and offering solutions. In this way, they are seen as playing an active
role in the research process but also in changing social reality.
As we can see, Marques de Melo’s (1993) definition of the Latin American
school of communication is deeply grounded in a critical perspective that promotes
an emancipatory orientation of theorization and views research as playing a vital
role in the construction of democratic, prosperous, and pluralistic societies. This
critical ideology offers an interesting starting point to portray communication

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research in this region of the world. However, because of its general attention to
communication, it lacks specificity for considering organizational communication.
We thus combine the features here presented with two meta-theoretical frameworks
that outline the metaphors and the discourses of organizational communication.
Metaphors and discourses of organizational communication

Here we present the metaphors proposed by Putnam et al. (1996) and the dis-
courses advanced by Deetz (2001) to analyze organizational communication.
Although deeply grounded in the Anglo-American tradition, these frameworks are
widely recognized in both Anglo- and Latin American organizational communica-
tion scholarship as offering a strong and exhaustive meta-theoretical structure for
portraying the diverse images of organization and communication (De Farias,
2005; Saladrigas Medina, 2005). As such, combined with Marques de Melo’s fea-
tures, we believe they constitute a common ground that could encourage dialogue
and would allow us to showcase those unique aspects of Latin American organiza-
tional communication scholarship.7
Putnam et al. (1996) developed seven metaphors of organizational communica-
tion based on the different ways the concepts of organization and communication
were articulated in scholarly literature (see Table 1). The metaphors are grouped
into two clusters. In the first cluster, metaphors share a view of communication
that foregrounds information. Hence, in the conduit metaphor information is
transmitted, while in the lens metaphor it is filtered, and in the linkage metaphor it
is the medium through which individuals create connections. In all of these
Table 1 Metaphors of Organizational Communication
Cluster Metaphor Organization Communication
Transmission Conduit Container Transmission of information

and Lens Eye that scans sift and relay Filtering process
information information
Linkage Network of relationships Connection
Interaction Performance Coordinated actions that Social interaction
and meaning imply collective rules
Symbol Complex collection of Interpretation and
representations representation
Voice Chorus of members’ voices Expression, suppression, and/
or distortion of the voices
of organizational members
Discourse Texts or ritualized patterns Conversation or discourses
of interaction that
transcend local
conversations
Note: Adapted from Putnam et al. (1996).

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metaphors, organizations are viewed as objective and structured realities, which

take the form of a container, an eye, and a network, respectively.
The second cluster of metaphors focuses on communication as interaction and
meanings. In the performance metaphor, communication, defined as social interac-
tion, brings organizational reality into being. The symbol metaphor conceives com-
munication as interpretation and representation; organization is here defined as a
text. Expression and suppression are at the heart of the voice metaphor, which
adopts a critical stance. Organization is here depicted as a polyphonic chorus in
which not all members have equal voices. Finally, the discourse metaphor views
communication as the interplay between conversation and text. The organization
emerges in this conversation/text dynamic.
Deetz posits that to understand a given research program from a communicative
meta-perspective one must understand its discourse “that is, the linguistic system of
distinction, the values enacted in those distinctions, the orientations to conflict and
relations to other groups” (2001, p. 11). Two interrelated dimensions categorize these
discourses. The first relates to conceptual development and problems statements.
These can either emerge from the research participants (local/emergent) or from the
researcher and its theoretical framework (elite/a priori). The second dimension
focuses on the relation of research practices to dominant social discourses, be they
local or global. Two relations are proposed: consensus, which refers to those research
programs that align with the dominant social discourses; and, dissensus, in which
research aims to transform and disrupt dominant structures. The combination of the
two dimensions yields four distinct discourses that we summarize in Table 2.
Deetz’s discourses complement Putnam et al.’s metaphors by evidencing the
assumptions of the images of organization and communication. Both frameworks
place communication in the foreground as a meta-theoretical device to understand
organizational phenomena. They also posit that organizations face a set of challenges
that stress the need for a communicational point of view (e.g., fluidity of new organi-
zational forms, stakeholder model of organization, more participative processes).
Closer to Marques de Melo’s proposal, Deetz’s takes this meta-theoretical discussion
to the moral arena by linking research orientations to larger social concerns.
Methods
As mentioned, the goal of this article is to present a critical review of organiza-

tional communication scholarship in Latin America in order to explore the distinc-
tive traits of a Latin American approach within this area of study. To accomplish
this goal, we set two main research questions: What characterizes current Latin
American organizational communication scholarship? Is there a distinctive Latin
American approach to organizational communication? In order to account for the
main trends in Latin American organizational communication scholarship, we
examined the articles published on this topic in Latin American scientific commu-
nication journals and journals specializing in organizational communication.

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Table 2 Discourses of Organizational Communication
Problem of study of
Discourse View of organization communication approach Types of studies
Normative Independent and stable Effectiveness (for example: Covering laws,

object that lends itself loyalty, influence, and systems theories,
to description, information needs) and
prescription, and communicational
control skills or
performance
Interpretive Social site (community) Maintenance of shared Ethnography
values and common
practices
Critical Socio-historical creation Demonstrate and critique Ideology Critique,
framed by power forms of domination, Communicative
relations asymmetry, and action
distorted
communication
Dialogical Postmodern Micropolitical processes Deconstruction and
and the joined nature of genealogy
power and resistance
Note: Adapted from Deetz (2001).
We considered the article as the unit of analysis, because of the role it plays in
problematizing and propagating new knowledge. We chose the period 2010–2014
for two reasons: first, to complement the bibliometric studies reviewed previously,
and second, to contrast Latin American production from the Anglo-American,
especially considering that the period 2010–2014 represents a new era in Anglo-
American organizational communication (Putnam & Mumby, 2014).
Our selection of Latin American journals was based on three criteria: (a) repre-
sentativeness of a majority of Latin American countries, (b) visibility and readabil-
ity of the journals, in accordance with the Google Scholar H index (Repiso &
Delgado, 2013), and (c) analysis of the journals specializing in organizational com-
munication. Let us note that the only specialized journal that has a significant H
index is the Brazilian publication Organicom. For the other countries, we chose the
journal with the highest H index (see Appendix 1 for the complete list). We con-
sulted all the issues of the selected journals published between 2010 and 2014 and
analyzed all the articles that explicitly addressed organizational communication.8
This brought us to a total of 92 articles.
We designed a questionnaire9 to collect data from the corpus. Then we ran a
test on five randomly selected articles from each journal. This helped us improve
the questionnaire and the codebook. We ran several similar tests before we reached
the final version. Data were collected over a six-month period through QuestionPro,

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Table 3 Criteria for the Corpus Analysis
Criteria Items
1. Authors’ gender: Male, female, or mixed.

2. Authors’ institutional University, independent consultant, organization, or mixed.
affiliation:
3. Authors’ regional North America, Latin America, Europe, Asia, Africa,
affiliation: Oceania, or mixed.
4. Type of article: Research, essay-theoretical reflection, review, state of the
art, profile, interview, prescriptive text, or other.
5. Topics addressed in the Organizational processes, communication and organization,
article: networks and technology, language and discourse,
reflections on the field itself, and/or others.
6. Organizational Normative, interpretative, critical, dialogic, none, and/or
communication discourses: other.
7. Organizational Conduct, lens, linkage, performance, symbol, voice,
communication metaphors: discourse, none, and/or other.
8. Data collection technique: Observation, interview, survey, experiment, document
review, participatory techniques, and/or other.
9. Interpretation or data Econometric-statistic analysis, hypothesis testing, semiotic
analysis techniques: analysis, rhetorical, ethno-methodological, narrative,
discourse, hermeneutical, content, thematic analysis, and/
or other.
10. Corpus analyzed in the Individuals, for-profit organizations, non-profit
research paper: organizations, employees, middle managers, directors,
and/or other.
an online survey application by three trained research teams located in Colombia,

Costa Rica, and Canada. The articles of the corpus were analyzed following the cri-
teria presented in Table 3.
The analysis of topics addressed in the articles was done in two stages. In
the first stage (data collection through the online survey), we started with a list
of 18 topics that expanded to 80 topics after the articles were analyzed individu-
ally. In the second stage (data analysis), we grouped these 80 topics into five
macro-categories that allowed us to establish thematic trends across the corpus
(see Table 4).
Analyzing the terrain of Latin American organizational communication
According to our data, the most recurrent author profile is that of female scholars
affiliated with a university (48.9%). Male authors come in second (2.7%), and
mixed gender authorship, third (30.4%). Razón y Palabra (Mexico) and Organicom
(Brazil) are the main organizational communication journals in the region. Of the
92 articles, 70 were published by these two journals. Very few contributions from

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Table 4 Clusters of Topics
Topic Cluster Topics
Organizational processes Organizational change, collaboration and participation, conflict,

crisis, culture and organizational climate, identity, image and
reputation, leadership, power, emotions, corporate social
responsibility, and organizational identification
Communication and Corporate communication and/or strategy, external
organization communication, and/or public relations, and internal
communication
Networks and Technology and organization, social media, and organization
technology
Language and discourse Narratives, communicative constitution of the organization,
communication skills, conversations, and rhetoric.
Reflections on the field Metatheoretical contributions, perspectives, or approaches to the
itself study of organizational communication
other regions are evidenced; most of these are from Spanish scholars (28.3%), and
very few from Anglo-American countries (2.2%).
Research results based on empirical studies dominate the corpus (47.8%). This
finding is encouraging in terms of theory building, given that the publication of
empirical studies stimulates the field by introducing knowledge based on context,
and either validates or refutes prior knowledge. The publication of theoretical
reflections (38%) is also significant because it drives the field forward by circulating
knowledge. Also noteworthy is the low percentage of prescriptive texts (3.3%) that
other research (Angel, 2013) has shown to be characteristic of the field. This type
of article appears to be decreasing in favour of the publication of empirical studies.
Our analysis of the topics showed that most of the articles address problems
related to organizational processes (63%), followed by a significant percentage of
articles (59.8%) that focused on communication and organizations, i.e., corporate
communication and/or strategy. In third place was networks and technology
(23.9%), and in fourth, discourse and language (14.1%). Lastly, there were articles
that addressed the general field of organizational communication (10.9%).
If we consider in more detail these topics, we can see that organizational culture
appears in many articles as an umbrella concept for addressing organizational values
(Figueiredo, 2011), narratives (Vargas Pedraza, 2012), identity (A. Urbiola Solís &
Vásquez, 2010), and organizational change (Dias Baptista, 2014; Moreno Cano,
Arbeláez Luna, & Calderón Dávila, 2014). Another salient theme is internal commu-
nication. Worth noting here is the combination of an informational and relational
view of organizational communication. These views are grounded in a normative and
interpretive discourse respectively (Deetz, 2001). For example, Oliveira and Rodrigues
Alencar’s (2013) article defies the formal–informal divide by showing their interde-
pendence. Monteiro Batistella and Marchiori (2013) articulate the use of information

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(i.e., container metaphor; see Putnam et al. [1996]) with organizational members’
sense-making practices in interaction (i.e., performance metaphor; Putnam et al.
[1996]). Internal communication is also approached by focussing on the concepts of
speech and organizational listening (Sólio, 2010). Sustainability and corporate social
responsibility are also privileged topics (Baldissera & Kaufmann, 2013; da Silva,
Galinkin, & de Oliveira Almeida, 2013; Valarezo González & Marín Gutiérrez, 2013).
Interestingly, in these the main mode of theorizing is consistent with Marques de
Melo’s (1999) theoretical miscegenation as foreign frameworks are combined with
local ones. Some of the most cited foreign frameworks are Morin’s complexity theory
and Schein’s organizational culture dimensions. Moreover, the work of some Latin
American organizational communication scholars is consistently cited, for example,
Krohling Kunsch’s (2003) integrated communication perspective and Baldissera’s
(2009) complex organization.
Worth mentioning is the empirical focus of most of these articles. For example,
Campos Martins (2013) studies the role of oral communication in state-owned
company in the northern region of Paraná, Brazil, while also addressing the profes-
sional significance of the findings (i.e., considering orality as an internal communi-
cation strategy). This can be interpreted as evidence of the emphasis on praxis that
characterizes theory building in Latin American scholarship.
If we read these results in conjunction with the type of article, we find that the
increase in research articles can be understood as a sign of theoretical miscegena-
tion as the foreign frames are put to the test and modified through empirical stud-
ies situated in Latin American organizational contexts. For example, Sólio’s (2010)
study proposes a psychoanalytical reading of two Brazilian companies’ internal
communication. Grounded in Freud and Lacan’s theories, this study considers psy-
chic aspects of workers and shows the importance of subjectivity and emotions for
internal communication. The author suggests conceiving international communica-
tion as a process that involves both speaking and listening within a distributed net-
work of interlocutors (workers and the organization itself), instead of approaching
it as a formal hierarchical process of information transmission.
Metaphors and discourses of organizational communication

Following Deetz’s (2001) metatheoretical framework we found that most of the arti-
cles developed a normative discourse (42.4%) (see Figure 1). This discourse took at
least two forms. On one hand, we found studies informed by a systemic view of
organization that conceives it as sets of interdependent parts (departments or func-
tional units). Communication is here defined as the “process of information genera-
tion, exchange and analysis that allows effective coordination between areas and
levels” (Adame, 2013, p. 133; authors’ translation). On the other hand, we found
studies that focused on organizations as entities that produce messages about them-
selves to communicate with a variety of stakeholders, what Baldissera (2009) refers
to as the “communicated organization” (i.e., the formalized, authorized and
disciplining processes of communication). Andrade Scroferneker’s (2010) study of

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45
40 42.4
35
30
25 27.2
20
15
14.1
10 12
5 8.7
0
0
Other Critical Normative None Dialogic Interpretive
Figure 1 Metatheories according to Deetz (2001) discourse typology.
virtual listening systems built-in the websites of universities and Figueiredo’s (2011)
study of the espoused organizational values displayed in websites of top-ranked
companies are examples of this kind of normative discourse.
Interpretive discourse was found in 27.2% of the articles (see Figure 1). In these
articles, organizations were conceived as social interactional contexts in which
employees as interlocutors “create their strategies, their discourses and make sense
of their lived experiences” (Oliveira & Rodrigues Alencar, 2013, p. 212; authors’
translation). In contrast with the normative discourse, communication was not
limited to its formal, planned, and managerial dimension; rather, it encompasses
“all the sense making flows that configure the transmission, reception and circula-
tion of discourses” (Oliveira & Rogrigues Alencar, 2013, p. 212: author’s transla-
tion). Within interpretative discourse, employees’ meanings and concerns were
seen as valid as those of the managerial apex (Monteiro Batistella & Marchiori,
2013; Sólio, 2010). The use of this approach also expands the understanding of
what counts as an organizationally relevant feature (e.g., Sganzerla Provedel, 2013).
In third place, with 14.1%, are dialogic discourses (see Figure 1). Salgueiro
Marques and Martins Mafra’ (2013) work illustrates some of the features of this
discourse. These authors provide an alternative view of dialogue by taking distance
from harmonious and consensus-seeking conceptualizations. For them, organiza-
tional dialogue does not mean suppressing differences or individual interests but it
is rather considered a discursively constructed site of resistance.
In 12% of the cases, none of Deetz’s four discourse types were found. This can be
explained by the fact that some of these articles were essays or their approach did not
fall under any paradigmatic vision following this typology. Finally, 8.7% of the articles
used critical discourse. For example, Baldissera and Kaufmann’s (2013) study of corpo-
rate social responsibility mobilizes a critical approach to shed light into corporations’
discursive hegemonic practices. The research shows that organizations’ discourses of

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40
35
34.5
30
25
26
20 23
15
10
11
5 7 8
0 5 5
0
Figure 2 Organizational communication metaphors according to Putnam et al. (1996).
CSR promote a partial understanding of sustainability that serves the organization’s

interests.
In addition to the discourse, we analyzed the organizational communication meta-
phors following Putnam et al.’s (1996) typology. As Figure 2 shows, most of the arti-
cles favoured viewing communication as a form of linkage (34.5%), performance
(26%), or conduit (23%). These metaphors are consistent with the normative and
interpretive discourses found in a significant number of the articles we reviewed.
Concerning the linkage metaphor, da Silva, Giroldo Miguel, and de Cássia Rossi’s
(2014) study on corporate use of social media shows how communication establishes
or breaks the links between organizations and their stakeholders. Communication is
viewed as “the fundamental basis for the maintenance of life and the production of
new sensitivities” (p. 245). Monteiro Batistella and Marchiori’s (2013; see also Oliveira
& Rodrigues Alencar, 2013) study of employees’ understandings of sustainable prac-
tices offers a relational view of communication that echoes the performance metaphor.
They argue through interactions members construct a sense that leads individuals to
enact the daily practice proposed by the organization. Andrade Scroferneker’s (2010)
study illustrates the conduit metaphor for virtual listening systems are assessed in
terms of their capacity to transmit information effectively from stakeholders to the
university’s administration and vice versa. The other metaphors, such as a lens (0.7%),
discourse (.5%), and voice (.5%), were less present, which is also consistent with the
small presence of dialogic and critical discourses.
Discussion
This article was motivated by two related questions: “What characterizes current
Latin American organizational communication scholarship?” and “Is there is a dis-
tinctive Latin American approach to organizational communication?” In what fol-
lows, we discuss these questions in light of our findings.

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First, we can say that, while normative discourses maintain their prominence in
this scholarship, interpretive discourse (e.g., Monteiro Batistella & Marchiori, 2013;
Oliveira & Rodrigues Alencar, 2013; A. Urbiola Solís & Vásquez, 2010) is increasingly
consolidating a legitimate position in Latin American scholarship on organizational
communication. This does not mean that interpretive discourses have just recently
entered the field of organizational communication. What we want to highlight is their
legitimization as “scientific” and “recognized” forms of knowledge in the academic
community, which can be seen in the increase of studies adopting interpretive and
constitutive approaches compared to previous years (Angel, 2013; Orjuela Córdoba,
2015). As noted, these studies were previously mostly confined to conference papers
(Guillén Ojeda & Espinosa Velázquez, 2014; Krohling Kunsch, 2011). Their increasing
presence in high-ranking journals can be seen as a step toward their legitimization
and a promise for future development. Worth noting is a tendency, particularly in
Brazilian scholarship, to combine interpretative and functionalist perspectives in the-
ory building (see Campos Martins, 2013; Monteiro Batistella & Marchiori, 2013;
Oliveira & Rodrigues Alencar, 2013; Sólio, 2010). We see in this combination a
specificity of Latin American organizational communication with respect to its
Anglo-American counterpart, in which interpretative perspectives emerged in strong
opposition to functionalism, a division that still remains in current scholarship.
The same cannot be said about critical and dialogic discourses, which are
almost absent from Latin American scholarship on organizational communication.
This finding is not surprising if we consider previous studies (Angel, 2013; Guillén
Ojeda & Espinosa Velázquez, 2014). Yet, when recalling the strong critical history
of the Latin American tradition in communication studies, and its important legacy
in both research and teaching in schools of communication (which is where orga-
nizational communication scholarship is based), we wonder why Latin American
organizational communication scholars have not embraced this approach in the
same way their colleagues in media and cultural studies have.
Kaplún (2012) offers the following explanation: organizational communication
scholarship in the region has been characterized by a strong orientation toward
pragmatism, which has led to the dominance of functionalist discourses. Moreover,
the critical approach in Latin American communication studies has mostly been
media-centred (see also Waisbord, 2014). In this sense, organizational communica-
tion scholarship in the region does not generally identify with the main emancipa-
tory agenda of a Latin American school of communication, which is grounded in a
critical tradition (Marques de Melo, 1999).
However, one of the critical strands in Latin American communication studies
that began with Freire’s education movement and evolved into what Kaplún (2013)
calls the “alternativist” perspective is gaining attention in Latin American organiza-
tional communication scholarship. This explains the small percentage of critical
(Baldissera & Kaufmann, 2013; Sólio, 2010) and dialogic studies (Salgueiro Marques
& Martins Mafra, 2013) present in our findings, which, according to Deetz’s (2001)

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discourses, aim for the disruption of social structures and define the production of
knowledge, as well as the researcher’s role, in terms of social transformation.
Our findings also suggest a strong focus on professional and applied research as a
second characteristic of Latin American organizational communication scholarship.
Latin American organizational communication scholars privilege themes related to
organizational processes (e.g., culture, identity, conflict, and organizational change),
discourse and language, and the role of technology. Interestingly, we can see a corre-
spondence with Anglo-American organizational communication scholarship (Putnam
& Mumby, 2014). The difference lies, however, in the sustained interest of Latin
American scholars to apply these topics in understanding or prescribing professional
practices. This is reflected, for example, in the proliferation of studies on internal com-
munication (Adame, 2013; Campos Martins, 2013; Dias Baptista, 2014; Sganzerla
Provedel, 2013) and strategic communication (Salas Forero, 2013). Some of these stud-
ies are concerned with documenting success stories and sharing best practices. While
the professional and applied orientations of Latin American organizational communi-
cation research is not new (Kaplún, 2013), our findings suggest that they seem to have
moved from a strictly professional to an academic field.
Third, compared with the previous bibliometric studies (Angel, 2013; Guillén
Ojeda & Espinosa Velázquez, 2014; Krohling Kunsch, 2011; Orjuela Córdoba, 2015),
our findings reveal an increase of empirical studies in high-ranking journals. This
increase is combined with a decline of the publication of essays on the field of orga-
nizational communication, which was most prominent in the 1990s and 2000s.
Worth noting here is their anchoring in local contexts: the economic and political
realities of the Latin American organizational landscape have increasingly attracted
the interest of Latin American organizational communication scholars. For instance,
in line with the previously mentioned alternativist perspective, some researchers have
studied the role of communication as a tool for social change in phenomena such as
recovered factories in Argentina (Calloway, Colombari, & Iorio, 2013). This implies,
as mentioned, an adaptation of foreign theories to local contexts, as well as the
search for alternative and local frameworks for understanding local realities.
We argue that this local anchoring, combined with the use of both local and
foreign approaches, are testimonies of two of Marques de Melo’s (1999) features of
a Latin American communicational approach: theoretical miscegenation and ethics
and political commitment of the researcher. The first refers to a critical reading
and adaptation of foreign approaches in light of the particularities of the social
context being studied which was mainly present in the combination of interpreta-
tive and normative discourses and in theory building derived from empirical stud-
ies locally situated. The second corresponds to the redefinition of the role of the
research and researchers in terms of social transformation, which was particularly
found in the alternativist perspective. In the case of Latin American organizational
communication, we argue that these two features joined together promote a more
respectful and accurate understanding of the “real” concerns and issues of Latin
American organizations, they also offer renewed ways for theory building.

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Conclusion and future directions
This article aimed to present a critical review of organizational communication

scholarship in Latin America in order to explore the distinctive traits of a Latin
American approach within this area of study. Our results show that there are subtle
signs of a Latin American approach to organizational communication, which
mainly come from a privileged focus on praxis, i.e., the local, situated improvisa-
tions and innovations that are tested to solve concrete problems and needs (Beltrán,
2016). This praxis-oriented approach takes shape in a professional and applied ori-
entation to research that is conducted in the respect of local organizational realities.
The focus on practice is also what explains the important presence of normative dis-
courses and the pragmatic orientation that can be found in interpretive, critical, and
dialogic studies. While the latter are few, the critical legacy of Latin American com-
munication studies and the noted interest in organizational communication toward
rethinking the role of the researcher as an agent for social change make us believe
that they will gain more attention. Reflecting on the situated nature of knowledge is
what makes us think of praxis as a central feature of the region’s theory building
and the fuel that can enhance our capacity as Latin American organizational com-
munication scholars to imagine a better society. It is here that we can foresee a
promising research agenda for organizational communication in Latin America.
Notes
1 This term includes the United States and Canada, the first being significantly more
influential in the constitution and development of the field of organizational
communication.
2 We make this idiomatic distinction to include Mexico, since it has greater similarity with
Central and South American countries in terms of language, historical development, and
shared identity than with the United States or Canada.
3 Krohling Kunsch’s (2011) bibliometric study is based on an analysis of 136 papers
presented in the organizational communication and public relations thematic group in
the context of the bi-annual conferences of the Asociación Latinoamericana de
Investigadores de la Comunicación (ALAIC) held from 1998 to 2008.
4 Angel’s (2013) study is based on a bibliometric analysis of 120 articles published from
1990 to 2009 in five of the most recognized Latin American scientific journals in
communication studies.
5 Guillén Ojeda and Espinosa Velázquez’s (2014) bibliometric study is based on an
analysis of 16 publications in EBSCO journals and 49 online papers presented from 2008
to 2012 in the organizational communication thematic group of the Asociación Mexicana
de Investigadores en Comunicación’s (AMIC) annual conference.
6 Orjuela Córdoba’s (2015) doctoral thesis is based on a bibliometric study between 2006
and 2011 of 10 Latin American journals specializing in communication studies,
representing seven Latin American countries and a total of 542 articles.
7 While several Latin American authors have advanced metaphors (e.g., Ávila, 2004) and
thematic categories (e.g., Orjuela Córdoba, 2015; Montoya Robles, De la Rosa Gutiérrez,
& De la O Burrola, 2013); these analytical criteria are still a work in progress and thus

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have not yet been recognized in the organizational communication Latin American
community as meta-theoretical devices.
8 For the purposes of this article, we considered public relations as a distinct field.
However, it should be noted that in some Latin American countries (such as Brazil) the
similarities and differences of both fields have been considered, leading to a greater
interaction between them (see Marroquín Velásquez, 2015 and Organicom’s 2009 special
issue Comunicação organizacional e relações públicas: pesquisa, reprodução, aplicação.
Organicom, 6(10/11)).
9 The design of this research tool was based on a similar questionnaire used and tested to
study the field of communication for development and social change (Barranquero
Carretero & Angel, 2015).
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Communication Theory ISSN 1050-3293

In Search of a Latin American Approach

Em busca de uma abordagem latino-americana para

Consuelo Vásquez Donoso1, Lissette Marroquín Velásquez2,

This article presents a critical review of organizational communication scholarship in

Corresponding author: Consuelo Vásquez Donoso; e-mail: vasquez.consuelo@uqam.ca

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Keywords: Latin American Organizational Communication, Bibliometric Study, Latin

Despite the uncontested Western domination of communication studies (Gunaratne,

156 Communication Theory 28 (2018) 155–179

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as a critical approach to mass media and cultural studies. As Waisbord (2014)

Communication Theory 28 (2018) 155–179 157

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focused on Latin American publications, which corresponds to a corpus of 92 arti-

Mapping the terrain of organizational communication in Latin America

In order to map the terrain of organizational communication in Latin America, we

Organizational communication in Latin America

158 Communication Theory 28 (2018) 155–179

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Communication Theory 28 (2018) 155–179 159

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160 Communication Theory 28 (2018) 155–179

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more exploratory and thus mobilized more diverse methodological orientations

Anglo-American organizational communication scholarship

Communication Theory 28 (2018) 155–179 161

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A mestizo framework to study Latin American organizational

162 Communication Theory 28 (2018) 155–179

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Latin American approach to organizational communication while establishing a

Features of a Latin American approach to communication

Communication Theory 28 (2018) 155–179 163

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Metaphors and discourses of organizational communication

Table 1 Metaphors of Organizational Communication

Cluster Metaphor Organization Communication

Transmission Conduit Container Transmission of information

Note: Adapted from Putnam et al. (1996).

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metaphors, organizations are viewed as objective and structured realities, which

As mentioned, the goal of this article is to present a critical review of organiza-

Communication Theory 28 (2018) 155–179 165

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Table 2 Discourses of Organizational Communication

Normative Independent and stable Eﬀectiveness (for example: Covering laws,

Note: Adapted from Deetz (2001).

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Table 3 Criteria for the Corpus Analysis

1. Authors’ gender: Male, female, or mixed.

an online survey application by three trained research teams located in Colombia,

Analyzing the terrain of Latin American organizational communication

Communication Theory 28 (2018) 155–179 167

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Table 4 Clusters of Topics

Topic Cluster Topics

Organizational processes Organizational change, collaboration and participation, conﬂict,

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Metaphors and discourses of organizational communication