The Bigger Picture of Big Data? Understanding the Organizational Communication of Big Data

• In Event: Organizational Communication Research Escalator - Extended Session

Abstract

Big data is a portmanteau term which has dominated discussions of technological development, yet little coherence has emerged from debates addressing the definition of the term (boyd and Crawford, 2012). This paper traces definitions, assumptions and claims of various organisational actors involved in the mining and management of big data with a particular focus on their discursive construction. By looking at the quantity of data produced and the funding associated with it, the study not only interrogates the organisational communication of big data in relation to questions of ownership, power and control, but it also focuses on the shifts in the life span of those discursive constructions. We posit that it is essential to examine the social constructions articulated by these actors and, in doing so, bring questions of authority, power and accountability back into the debates about big data.

Authors

• Eleftheria J Lekakis, University of Sussex

• Fidele Vlavo, King's College London