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<TITLE>Conference CFP: ASCOS 2008: Neophilia and Organization</TITLE>
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<FONT FACE="Times New Roman"><SPAN STYLE='font-size:12.0px'>Forwarded by request.<BR>
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Please direct inquiries to Professor Carl Rhodes at carl.rhodes@uts.edu.au.<BR>
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<B>ACSCOS 2008 <BR>
The 3rd Australasian Caucus of the Standing Conference on Organizational <BR>
Symbolism <BR>
<BR>
Call for Papers <BR>
<BR>
<I>Neophilia and Organization <BR>
</I> <BR>
University of Technology, Sydney <BR>
26-28 November 2008 <BR>
</B> <BR>
<B>Introduction <BR>
</B> <BR>
We are pleased to announce that the 3rd Australasian Caucus of the Standing <BR>
Conference on Organizational Symbolism (ACSCOS) will be held at the University of <BR>
Technology, Sydney from 26 to 28 November 2008. Similarly to the two that <BR>
preceded it in Brisbane in 2004 and in Auckland in 2006, this year’s ACSCOS is <BR>
being held as a meeting ground for those broadly interested in what, for want of better <BR>
words, is referred to as critical and postmodern management and organization studies. <BR>
The colloquium is positioned under the ambit of SCOS both in recognition of that <BR>
body’s long and innovative contribution to critical and <I>avant garde</I> organization <BR>
studies as well as to continue SCOS’s excursions against its own Eurocentricism. We <BR>
sincerely hope that Australian and New Zealand colleagues will respond to this call <BR>
and help to generate a vibrant and productive mechanism for exchange. We also hope <BR>
that colleagues from elsewhere in the world will join us in our corner of the southern <BR>
hemisphere just as we so often trek to the north. More generally we look forward to a <BR>
stimulating, collegial, productive and supportive gathering. <BR>
<BR>
<B>Theme <BR>
</B> <BR>
The theme of this year’s colloquium is <I>neohphilia and organization</I>. Neophilia is a <BR>
fetishishtic love of all that is new. Those afflicted with neophilia become excited <BR>
about novelty; they crave newness. Newness to neophiliacs is a virtue to be upheld <BR>
and a goal to always strive for. The development of the modern world saw the <BR>
excitement for the new become a mainstay of western culture. In a temporal reversal, <BR>
it seems that today we have inherited neophilia from the modern past – a condition <BR>
that permeates management practice and management theory. The colloquium invites <BR>
papers that consider neophilia as it relates to management and organizations. Indeed, <BR>
management practice has long been afflicted with the love of the new, whether it is <BR>
for the creation of new forms of organizations, a pathological desire for change and its <BR>
management, the scrambling after the latest management fashion, or the strategic <BR>
demand for re-invention. Management theory is not immune to novelty: ind <BR>
eed, it is often in the vanguard of both its promotion and demise. Those of us engaged <BR>
in this practice are under constant pressure to define our work in terms of ‘new <BR>
knowledge’ in the assumption of an ever incremental path of progress and <BR>
accumulation, lest we be considered old-hat luddites who fail to move with the times. <BR>
Mainstream management articulates this in terms of creativity, change management, <BR>
innovation, development and growth. Those who theorize with a more critical bent <BR>
are not immune either – such ‘progressive’ theories venture into becoming, <BR>
emergence, utopia, and in days gone by even revolution. <BR>
<BR>
In our region of the world we are the direct bearers of the conflicting legacy of <BR>
neophilia. We are part of the new world, whether residing in the newly discovered <BR>
unknown land of the south (terra australis incognita) or the new land once named after <BR>
the Dutch province of Zealand. With this newness came a disavowal of the old, a <BR>
wiping clean of the slate that created a terra nullis ripe for the creation of the new as if <BR>
from nowhere. Here in the new world, neophilia went practical in its attempt to <BR>
sweep clear the old in the name of colonial expansion. <BR>
<BR>
The colloquium seeks to trouble organization and management in relation to both its <BR>
neophiliac roots and its location in tradition. We call for an appraisal of the value and <BR>
values of newness in our dynamic fields of practice and theory, and an exploration of <BR>
the intertwined relation between newness, change and novelty on the one hand, and <BR>
tradition, permanence and inheritance on the other. Papers are particularly welcomed <BR>
that consider neophilia as it relates specifically to our spatial location, cultural <BR>
tradition, and political position in Australasia. <BR>
<BR>
Papers addressing the theme might consider the following issues, although this list is <BR>
far from exhaustive <BR>
<BR>
</SPAN></FONT><SPAN STYLE='font-size:12.0px'><FONT FACE="Helvetica, Verdana, Arial">•</FONT><FONT FACE="Arial"> </FONT><FONT FACE="Times New Roman">The manager as neophiliac <BR>
</FONT><FONT FACE="Helvetica, Verdana, Arial">•</FONT><FONT FACE="Arial"> </FONT><FONT FACE="Times New Roman">Management theory in the space between difference and repetition <BR>
</FONT><FONT FACE="Helvetica, Verdana, Arial">•</FONT><FONT FACE="Arial"> </FONT><FONT FACE="Times New Roman">Avant-gardism in management theory and practice <BR>
</FONT><FONT FACE="Helvetica, Verdana, Arial">•</FONT><FONT FACE="Arial"> </FONT><FONT FACE="Times New Roman">Management as a new academic discipline and its relationship with older <BR>
scholarly traditions <BR>
</FONT><FONT FACE="Helvetica, Verdana, Arial">•</FONT><FONT FACE="Arial"> </FONT><FONT FACE="Times New Roman">Recycling, organizing and the simulacra of the new <BR>
</FONT><FONT FACE="Helvetica, Verdana, Arial">•</FONT><FONT FACE="Arial"> </FONT><FONT FACE="Times New Roman">Neophilia and the process of both creating the new and destroying the old <BR>
</FONT><FONT FACE="Helvetica, Verdana, Arial">•</FONT><FONT FACE="Arial"> </FONT><FONT FACE="Times New Roman">The new managerial classes and social control <BR>
</FONT><FONT FACE="Helvetica, Verdana, Arial">•</FONT><FONT FACE="Arial"> </FONT><FONT FACE="Times New Roman">New organizational forms and their relationship to bureaucracy <BR>
</FONT><FONT FACE="Helvetica, Verdana, Arial">•</FONT><FONT FACE="Arial"> </FONT><FONT FACE="Times New Roman">New technology and organization <BR>
</FONT><FONT FACE="Helvetica, Verdana, Arial">•</FONT><FONT FACE="Arial"> </FONT><FONT FACE="Times New Roman">Old vs. new scholarly value in management research <BR>
</FONT><FONT FACE="Helvetica, Verdana, Arial">•</FONT><FONT FACE="Arial"> </FONT><FONT FACE="Times New Roman">The business school and the new university <BR>
</FONT><FONT FACE="Helvetica, Verdana, Arial">•</FONT><FONT FACE="Arial"> </FONT><FONT FACE="Times New Roman">‘Brand New’: neophilia and consumption <BR>
</FONT><FONT FACE="Helvetica, Verdana, Arial">•</FONT><FONT FACE="Arial"> </FONT><FONT FACE="Times New Roman">The new men and women of organizations <BR>
</FONT><FONT FACE="Helvetica, Verdana, Arial">•</FONT><FONT FACE="Arial"> </FONT><FONT FACE="Times New Roman">Resistance to the new and resistance to the old <BR>
</FONT><FONT FACE="Helvetica, Verdana, Arial">•</FONT><FONT FACE="Arial"> </FONT><FONT FACE="Times New Roman">Newness, identity and self-(re)creation in organizations <BR>
</FONT><FONT FACE="Helvetica, Verdana, Arial">•</FONT><FONT FACE="Arial"> </FONT><FONT FACE="Times New Roman">Organizational life and the desire to for self-reinvention <BR>
</FONT><FONT FACE="Helvetica, Verdana, Arial">•</FONT><FONT FACE="Arial"> </FONT><FONT FACE="Times New Roman">Organizational change and the pleasures of the new <BR>
</FONT><FONT FACE="Helvetica, Verdana, Arial">•</FONT><FONT FACE="Arial"> </FONT><FONT FACE="Times New Roman">Postcolonialism, organization and neophilia <BR>
</FONT><FONT FACE="Helvetica, Verdana, Arial">•</FONT><FONT FACE="Arial"> </FONT><FONT FACE="Times New Roman">Management fads and fashions <BR>
</FONT><FONT FACE="Helvetica, Verdana, Arial">•</FONT><FONT FACE="Arial"> </FONT><FONT FACE="Times New Roman">Neophilia and neophobia and organizational conflict <BR>
</FONT><FONT FACE="Helvetica, Verdana, Arial">•</FONT><FONT FACE="Arial"> </FONT><FONT FACE="Times New Roman">Technology and the neo-luddites <BR>
</FONT><FONT FACE="Helvetica, Verdana, Arial">•</FONT><FONT FACE="Arial"> </FONT><FONT FACE="Times New Roman">Nostalgia and the striving for a new future in an imagined past <BR>
</FONT><FONT FACE="Helvetica, Verdana, Arial">•</FONT><FONT FACE="Arial"> </FONT><FONT FACE="Times New Roman">The temporal character of organizations <BR>
</FONT><FONT FACE="Helvetica, Verdana, Arial">•</FONT><FONT FACE="Arial"> </FONT><FONT FACE="Times New Roman">Neophilia and organizational becoming <BR>
</FONT><FONT FACE="Helvetica, Verdana, Arial">•</FONT><FONT FACE="Arial"> </FONT><FONT FACE="Times New Roman">Progress, the myth of progress and neophilia <BR>
</FONT><FONT FACE="Helvetica, Verdana, Arial">•</FONT><FONT FACE="Arial"> </FONT><FONT FACE="Times New Roman">The relation between tradition, inheritance and neophilia <BR>
</FONT><FONT FACE="Helvetica, Verdana, Arial">•</FONT><FONT FACE="Arial"> </FONT><FONT FACE="Times New Roman">The history of neophilia in organizations <BR>
</FONT><FONT FACE="Helvetica, Verdana, Arial">•</FONT><FONT FACE="Arial"> </FONT><FONT FACE="Times New Roman">Postmodernism and the modern fetish for newness <BR>
</FONT><FONT FACE="Helvetica, Verdana, Arial">•</FONT><FONT FACE="Arial"> </FONT><FONT FACE="Times New Roman">Intolerance to neophilia <BR>
</FONT><FONT FACE="Helvetica, Verdana, Arial">•</FONT><FONT FACE="Arial"> </FONT><FONT FACE="Times New Roman">Neophilia as old-fashioned <BR>
<BR>
<BR>
<B>Guidelines for Submission <BR>
</B> <BR>
Papers and abstracts are invited that directly address the colloquium theme, or address <BR>
other open issues. <BR>
<BR>
Two alternative forms of submission are invited for the colloquium: abstracts of up to <BR>
800 words or full papers of up to 7,000 words. <BR>
<BR>
<B><I>Full Papers</I></B>: Full papers will be independently peer reviewed. Accepted papers will <BR>
be published in conference proceedings. <BR>
<BR>
<B><I>Abstracts</I></B>: Abstracts will be peer reviewed, and made available to delegates prior to <BR>
the colloquium. <BR>
<BR>
Papers or abstracts should be submitted by 1 August 2008. Notification of <BR>
acceptance will be given prior to 5 September 2008. <BR>
<BR>
<B> <BR>
Venue <BR>
</B> <BR>
The colloquium is being hosted by the School of Management, University of <BR>
Technology, Sydney and will be held at the University’s Haymarket Campus located <BR>
at Cnr Quay Street & Ultimo Road, Haymarket Sydney. <BR>
<BR>
<B> <BR>
Registration and Fees <BR>
</B> <BR>
Fees for the colloquium will be A$200. Details of how to register will be posted <BR>
closer to the event. <BR>
<BR>
<B> <BR>
Accommodation <BR>
</B> <BR>
The University of Technology’s School of Management is located in close proximity <BR>
to Sydney’s China Town and Darling Harbour. While participants will book their <BR>
own accommodation, details of nearby hotels are available at <BR>
<a href="http://www.housing.uts.edu.au/hotels/index.html">http://www.housing.uts.edu.au/hotels/index.html</a> <BR>
<BR>
<BR>
<B>Inquiries <BR>
</B> <BR>
Please direct inquiries to Professor Carl Rhodes at carl.rhodes@uts.edu.au. <BR>
<BR>
<B>Local Organizing Committee <BR>
<BR>
</B>Carl Rhodes (Chair), University of Technology Sydney <BR>
David Bunba-Litic, University of Technology Sydney <BR>
Stewart Clegg, University of Technology Sydney <BR>
Martin Kornberger, University of Technology Sydney <BR>
Tyrone Pitsis, University of Technology Sydney <BR>
Alison Pullen, University of Technology Sydney <BR>
Anne Ross-Smith, University of Technology Sydney <BR>
<BR>
<B>Regional Advisory Board <BR>
<BR>
</B>Craig Prichard, Massey University, Palmerston North <BR>
Janet Sayers, Massey University, Auckland <BR>
Bob Westwood, University of Queensland, Brisbane <BR>
Julie Wolfram-Cox, Deakin University, Melbourne <BR>
Loong Wong, University of Canberra, Canberra <BR>
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