Linguistics: towards metatheorising organisational discourse Philosophical Investigations

Linguistics: towards metatheorising organisational discourse Nur in einer Sprache can ich etwas mit etwas meinen. (It is only in a language that I can mean something by something.) Wittgenstein, L. Philosophical Investigations 1.0 Introduction Over the past two decades or so, changes in society, the sciences and technology have induced a significant shift in knowledge production, not only in the sense of what knowledge is produced but also in the sense of how knowledge is produced. This new mode of knowledge production, referred to as Mode 2, involves a variety of mechanisms of creating/communicating knowledge, participants from numerous disciplinary backgrounds, and a great diversity of sites in which knowledge is produced (Gibbons et al. 2005). In result, there are more actors (not necessarily scholars) in the process of knowledge creation, there is less pressure to institutionalise, so the knowledge produced is more dispersed and transient, which in turn, makes it highly (socially) contextualised. Unlike traditional forms of knowledge (Mode 1) which are disciplinary, homogenous, hierarchical and dictated by the interests of academic communities, Mode-2 knowledge production is transdisciplinary, heterogenous, heterarchical and transient (p. 3). In consequence, it is more socially accountable and reflexive.