Baker, Phyllis L.
Bored and Busy

An Analysis of Formal and Informal Organization in the Automated Office.

A picture of machine-bound people exhibiting robot-like behavior is conjured up in our heads. Yet do these common sense suppositions and sociological analyses do justice to the clerical worker? Drawing from participant observation and indepth interviews, Baker argues that there is more to the drudgery of clerical work and the automated office than meets the eye. As she demonstrates, even though the clerical workers operate within a formal context which is subordinating and constraining, the workers mitigate part of that context through empowering strategies including creating unofficial practices, and managing states of boring and busyness. 135 Seiten mit Abb., gebunden (American University Studies. Series XI: Anthropology, Sociology; vol. 52/Peter Lang Verlag 1991) Mängelexemplar/near mint