Defining, refining, and redefining metaphor: A reflective and generative discussion with Gareth Morgan

This chapter draws upon a recorded conversation in which the authors discussed the role and status of metaphor in organization theory with Professor Gareth Morgan. There are three mains sections to the chapter. The first reviews and reflects upon the original formulation of metaphor, offered in Images of Organization (Morgan, 1986), as a device involving the carrying over of properties from a concrete source domain (i.e., a metaphor) to a relatively abstract target domain (i.e., an organization). The second section explores an alternative perspective which draws attention to the provisional, emergent, and transitory properties of metaphor (i.e., concerning what the authors refer to as "residual patterns of understanding" and the "grab of solutions"). The chapter concludes with a discussion of the scope for complementing the dominant resonance-based approach to metaphor use (i.e., the privileging of similarity) by advocating the deployment of dissonance-based metaphorical projections (which foreground dissimilarity).