SCHOLAR: THEORY OF FOLK LORE AND CULTURE

Within organizations there are four types of cultures.  “The Clan Culture,” “The Adhocracy Culture,” “The Hierarchy Culture,” and “The Market Culture” (Cameron 1999).  These culture operate according to a graph.  There are four quadrants, in q1 is “adhocracy”, in q2 is “clan,” in q3 is "hierarchy” and in q4 is “market.”  At the top of the Y axis is flexibility and discretion and at the bottom of this axis is stability and control.  On the right most of the X axis is external focus and differentiation and on the left most of this axis is internal focus and integration.  For example, “adhocracy” is -placed on q1.  This means that the culture within that organization is considerate of flexibility and discretion as well as external focus and differentiation.  Organizational culture is differentiated from the culture found in the community, known as “national culture,” in that its within a contained space and not wide spread.  This makes organizational culture an emic view towards the national culture and the people within society have an etic view of the culture within the organization.  Regardless three important things happen in culture enculturation, acculturalization and assimilation.  Enculturation occurs when an individual is very young.  Acculturation on the other hand occurs when individuals adapt characteristics of a new culture (Ross-Kerr 2006).  And Assimilation results when individuals give up their culture for the dominant culture.  It could be said that organizations hope to affect the dominant culture through social responsibility efforts.  Essentially until they affect the dominant culture, they may be a part of the invisible culture operating their values and beliefs within an enclosed space.  Organizations make moves so that their culture can be visible such move come in the form of offensive and defensive (Coutler 2010) strategies designed to operate the business these can come in the form of corporate strategies in the mission, vision, values and slogan of the company.  Or the culture can come in the form of a Company Manifest or a Code of Conduct.  Regardless, companies’ action corporate social responsibility efforts based on the corporate strategy and the business strategy of the organization which essentially results in a top down vertical culture enforced by those at the top of the company and maintained by those at the base.  Cultural awareness becomes increasingly important because it serves to unite people under collective action. 

Culture is a set of shared beliefs, values and morals (Ross-Kerr 2006).  Ideology on the other hand is a set of beliefs on how society should be (Heywood 2007).  It could be said that ideology is a product of culture.  Ideology emerges because people through social mobilization share their common beliefs, and this becomes a collective.  Before social mobilization takes place however, social movement occurs.  This means people bring up their dissatisfaction for the status quo or these individuals want a change in the way things are done.  Culture brings people together and it is an important part of socialization (social movement) and education (social mobilization) per corporate social responsibility efforts. 

There is the national culture (dominant culture) wherein the organization is subordinate to it and serves as a minority culture.  Within the minority culture of the organization subcultures exist.  If the company has multiple strategic business units with a different corporate strategy ie, different mission, vision, values and slogan- a subculture is created within the larger culture of the entire organization that serves the dominant culture in the society- the national culture.  The subculture operates under the larger culture of the company which have been mentioned as: “The Clan Culture,” “The Adhocracy Culture,” “The Hierarchy Culture,” and “The Market Culture.”  The subculture in the SBU is designed to serve as a cohesion within the people working in the SBU but also serves to maintain the SBU’s individual corporate strategy to ensure that products are harvested, refined, manufactured, produced, distributed or are at retail per that.  Hence it becomes a matter of quality assurance within the SBU similar to having a “seal” of approval or quality.

With those mentioned, it becomes clear that the “slogan” of the corporate strategy becomes a piece of propaganda.  It serves as a reminder and a connection to the values of the company.  The “slogan” is a way to depict the intent and the objectives of the company from a lens of propaganda.  It serves to use “folk lore” to create urban legends within the company.  These “urban legends” are stories told by individuals and they are often fictional but they have an underlying theme and clearly they are from a hyperbolized expirience.  “Urban legends” become folk lore’s after years and years perhaps centuries.  And folk lore’s become fairy tales wherein individuals evidently find what they are seeking.  For example, if the folk lore was about a girl named Amy and that girl went through difficulties and essentially the story left off with an anticlimax not concluding her story. The reinforcing fairy tale precedes the folk lore and, in this story, an individual seeks Amy.  And they end with a climatic and lustful passion of sexual intercourse, or they could run away and elope to another province for a while getting “hitched” hence creating the fairy tale which then reinforces the folk lore.  Folk Lore are stories told because an individual had an actual experience and wanted to say it in a way that people could learn.  Hence it serves to act on the proponents of social learning which then Akers defines it as, people see, people do (2013).  Hence the creation of folk lore becomes a way to provide culture care.  Whether it be in a subculture within a minority culture or a national culture which affects a minority culture, folk care under Leininger’s cultural care theory, is defined as “caring as defined by the people, from health care professionals, which is based on scientific, biomedical caring systems” (Ross-Kerr 2006).  Essentially the objective of a company attempting to make a subculture within its SBU’s is to create a phantasmagoria so as to make the work more meaningful.  Having such phantasmagoria is always considerate of a circadian rhythm in this case a routine by which tasks are completed.  It is supplemented with a diverse and inclusive group of people that operate under the corporate strategy vertically enforced by those at the top.  This is part of culture care.  According to Leininger’s cultural care theory, culture care considers the world view wherein individuals working in the organization have an emic view thus, they observe the world culture from the base – the minority culture.  From the world view are cultural and social structure dimensions.  These could be different companies or ethnicities, essentially these are all political actors operating within the domestic environment under structural functionalism (Powell 2012).  These culture articulate interest and aggregate interest so as to affect their social structure.  The interests are as follows “technological factors,” “religious and philosophical factors,” “kinship and social factors,” “cultural values, beliefs and lifeways,” “political and legal factors,” “economic factors,” and “educational factors.”  These are essentially the basis of the folk lore and serve as a way to depict caring as defined by the people (generic- folk care).  These influence people within the organization and it promotes expression (patterns and practices) essentially resulting in products that are in line with the business strategies and functional strategies of the company.  The purpose of creating subculture within the minority culture (organizational culture) is that it allows for culture care-preservation/ maintenance, accommodation/ negotiation, and repatterning/ restructuring all parts of culture care under Leininger’s cultural care theory.  Hence having multiple subcultures operating within various SBU’s of a conglomerate has benefits with regards to culture care.  The subculture can be supplemented with things such as “corporate dishes” or “cup competitions” all consistent with the corporate strategy of the company designed to create ideologies for the purpose of social movements/ social mobility so that corporate social responsibility efforts can take place. 

WORK CITED

Akers, R., et al.  (2013).  Criminological Theories.  New York, USA.  Oxford University Press.

Cameron, K.  et al. (1999).  Diagnosing and Changing Organizational Culture.  San Francisco, USA.  John Wiley and Sons. 

Coulter, Mary.  2010.  Strategic Management in Action.  Pearson. 

Heywood, A.  (2007).  Political Ideologies.  New York, USA.  Palgrave Macmillan.

Powell, et al.  (2012).  Comparative Politics Today.  Illinois, USA.  Pearson. 

Ross-Kerr, J., et al.  (2006).  Canadian Fundamentals of Nursing.  Ontario, Canada.  Elsevier.