Publications

Publication details [#4977]

Gherardi, Silvia. 2000. Where learning is: Metaphors and situated learning in a planning group. VI Actas de las Jornadas de Jóvenes Investigadores de la Universidad de Alcalá 53 (8) : 1057–1080. 24 pp.
Publication type
Article in journal
Publication language
English

Abstract

Organizational learning is a root metaphor which sets organizational processes in relation to knowledge and knowing. An action-learning intervention in a municipality provides the stage for observing several metaphors at work in advancing learning within the planning group. The aim of the paper is to explore the role of language in producing and expressing situated knowledge and to further the interpretation of metaphors as organizational artifacts instead of linguistic or mental materials. The understanding of metaphors is always a creative endeavour, and metaphors can be both facilitators of learning and the tangible manifestation of something learnt. Understanding metaphors as the dreamwork of language collapses the traditional distinction among metaphors either as heuristic or generative. (Silvia Gherardi)