Temporality and Space in knowledge work
Session for the AAG 2019 (Washington DC)
Anna Growe ([log in to unmask]) and Suntje Schmidt ([log in to unmask])
The transformation to the knowledge economy led to a fundamental re-organisation of knowledge-driven work. From a spatial perspective three dimensions particularly characterize this shift: First, work is increasingly organized in temporary settings, such temporary and cyclical clusters (Maskell et al., 2006; Power and Jansson, 2011) like fairs or congresses (Maskell, 2014; Schüßler et al., 2015). Second, knowledge work is increasingly multi-local. Rather than performing work in a permanent firm location, contemporary work is implemented at multiple places, such as the clients’ locations, other locations of service provision (e.g. at construction sites) as well as in projects (Grabher, 2004; Vinodrai and Keddy, 2015; Bakker et al., 2016) or in other forms of temporary settings such as business meetings. Additionally, work is also increasingly performed outside organisations. For instance, freelancers, artists, designers, and (startup)-entrepreneurs work in studios or seek collaborative work spaces such as open creative labs (Schmidt and Brinks, 2017) or coworking spaces (Merkel, 2015). Thirdly, careers are no longer linear processes developed within, but rather across multiple organizations, through a-typical employment forms and oftentimes by multiple jobholdings (Throsby and Zednik, 2011; Panos et al., 2014; Ibert and Schmidt 2014).
Even though research on temporary forms of knowledge exchange has significantly in-creased over the past few years, only little research has dealt with the interplay of temporarily organizing work and the materiality of places apt for working as well as with the possible interrelations of social practices and the design and use of specific physical places. Following Rutten (2017: 159) the “geography-of-knowledge-creation research inadequately connects social context to physical place”. The interrelation of physical environments dedicated for work can support social practices and interaction, e.g. in creating or using specific creativity- or trust-enhancing workplaces (Growe, 2018a) where places and practices mutually support each other (Growe, 2018b). However, until now possibilities to enhance creativity by temporarily locate work practices in a dedicated physical surrounding are mainly discussed in management literature (e.g. Oksanen and Ståhle, 2013) and in architecture and design (e.g. Thoring et al., 2018) and has received only limited attention in geography. This session therefore addresses the state of research on knowledge exchange and creativity in temporary work settings and seeks to discuss actor constellations and their social practices in relation to physical places.
The session invites papers that deal with these and related issues. In particular, we encourage studies related to the following aspects:
• Conceptualizing the interplay of time, place and social practices in knowledge work,
• Methodological contributions to capture time-spatial processes of knowledge and creativity driven works,
• Empirical contributions e.g. on actors using or constructing temporary spatial settings for work or case studies on specific physical places enhancing knowledge exchange and creativity,
• Contributions dedicated to practical implications for regional and municipal economic development.
If you are interested in presenting a paper in this session, please send your abstract (of 250 words) to Anna Growe ([log in to unmask]) and Suntje Schmidt ([log in to unmask]) by October 15th.
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