ABSTRACT
This chapter explores organizational communication or the study of the role of communication in organizational settings/contexts. Organizational communication is a lively area of research in communication studies. The field originated in the 1930s and 1940s with studies of business and management structures/organization. Organizational communication can be defined in two ways: studying communication as something that exists in organizations;as the study of communication as a way to understand, describe, and explain organizational settings/contexts. While sociologists, psychologists, and economists can explain organizational processes in unique ways, so can communication researchers. Systems theory is similar to covering laws in some ways; however, systems theories focus on understanding the processes that transform/alter communication and organizations. In essence, this line of research explores the process of organizing and not organizations. Interpretive studies focus on showing how individual realities are socially constructed and maintained via talk, rituals, heroes, and other daily cultural activities within an organization.
