Purpose: This paper aims to study the role of non-corporeal Actant theory in historical research through a case study of the trajectory of the New Deal as one of the foremost institutions in the USA since its inception in the early 1930s. Design/methodology/approach: The authors follow the...

Purpose: This paper aims to outline the possibilities of intersectional history as a novel method for management history. Intersectional history combines intersectionality and the study of the past to examine discrimination in organizations over time. This paper explores the need for...

Purpose: The authors focus on “writing women into ‘history’” in this study, embracing the notion of cisgender and ethnicity in relation to the “historic turn”. As such, the authors bring forward the stories of the US Pan American Airway’s Guided Missile Range Division (GMRD) and...

Purpose – Between 1927 and 1941 Pan American Airways (PAA) operated international flights from the USA with virtually no competition from US carriers. How PAA established and maintained its monopolistic position – by instrumentally creating a myth of “German threat” – and the...

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to explore the role of history in the creation of gender dynamics at work. Design/methodology/approach – Drawing on an ANTi‐history – which draws on actor‐network theory (ANT) – and critical sensemaking framework, the authors analyze a written...

Purpose: This study aims to examine the textual performance of the Ocean Ranger Disaster inquiry, thus responding to recent calls to “practice context” in historical writing. This study goes beyond the epistemological assumptions about the grounds for knowing about the past as the authors...

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to answer the question of where the course of the collective efforts in historical research on business and organizations has taken this discipline. By raising two key contributions that have sought to reshape the contours of management and organizational...

Purpose: This paper aims to find common ground between the supposed incompatible meta-historical positioning of positivism and post-positivism through a turn to mnemohistory in management and organizational history. Design/methodology/approach: Drawing on the idea of creative synthesis and...

Purpose: This paper features a critique of the treatment of time in modern and postmodern historical organization studies. The authors reply to the critique by drawing on Lefebvre’s notion of rhythm to theorize time in an amodern condition. The purpose of this study is to call on historical...