Tietze, S (2019) When is a bed not a bed? Exploring the interplay of the material and virtual in negotiating home-work boundaries. Culture and Organization, 25 (3). pp. 159-177. ISSN 1475-9551

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Abstract

Working from home is often associated with possibilities of anytime-anyplace working and with a fusion of work and home. In this empirical paper, we explore how the sociomaterial contexts of home-working define and tether what is possible for home-workers in their negotiations with others. Drawing on qualitative data sets, Wengerian concepts are used by exploring the role of boundary objects and brokering in negotiating temporal and spatial boundaries around and across work and home. The home-workers’ bodies are shown to be the key boundary objects, through which technology objects and furniture objects are sometimes fused. Yet, such fusion is shown to be only temporary, always precariously situated and also mediated by identity-regulating norms and values of home-workers. The contribution of the paper is to highlight the limits of what is technologically possible by emphasising the role of the body and material objects in the home-working context.

Item Type: Article
Uncontrolled Keywords: working from home; materiality; virtuality; boundary objects
Subjects: H Social Sciences > HB Economic Theory
H Social Sciences > HN Social history and conditions. Social problems. Social reform
Divisions: Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences > Keele Management School
Depositing User: Symplectic
Date Deposited: 03 Jul 2017 14:51
Last Modified: 15 Apr 2019 09:03
URI: https://eprints.keele.ac.uk/id/eprint/3720

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