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The purpose of this paper is to question and reflect on the spatial metaphors that inform Mats Alvesson’s (2009) conception of an organizational home in his description of at-home ethnography. (Cultural) hybridity is proposed as an alternative metaphor because the concept of hybridity can be used to highlight the complex nature of the relationships between an at-home ethnographer and the people she or he studies as they are produced during ethnographic work in an era where multiple (organizational) cultural sites are increasingly connected; where (organizational) cultural boundaries are uncertain; and where the notion of (organizational) culture itself is opaque, rather than transparent. Thus, this paper suggests that it may be more appropriate to speak of “hybrid home ethnography,” rather than “at-home ethnography.”

This paper explicates the concept of (cultural) hybridity and shows that this concept provides a useful metaphor for understanding and studying one’s own organizational home in these times of globalization where complex societies and the social collectivities of which they are composed are increasingly dispersed and mediated. Subsequently, the value of this metaphor is briefly illustrated through a hypothetical study of an academic department.

The metaphor of (cultural) hybridity reveals how studying one’s own organizational home (or homes) entails investigating a web of relationships between other organizational members, nonmembers, and oneself (the ethnographer) that are blends of diverse cultures and traditions constituted in the course of everyday communication. In addition, this metaphor shows that liminality is a key feature of this web and invites at-home ethnographers to combine first-, second-, and third-person perspectives in their fieldwork, deskwork, and textwork. Moreover, this metaphor highlights the importance of practicing “radical-reflexivity” in this kind of ethnography.

This paper provides a relational, communicative view of at-home ethnography based on a critical reflection on what it means to examine one’s own organizational home.

Teachers have recently started to introduce wikis into their courses. However, comparatively few studies have looked at the actual experiences of students who are engaged in building a wiki community for a particular course. To address this limitation, this exploratory self-report study examined student experiences with using a wiki in an upper-level undergraduate course on media effects, their reflections on functioning as a member of this wiki community, and their overall satisfaction with taking this kind of a “hybrid” or “blended” course. Results show that students enjoyed learning about media effects by collaboratively building their wiki community, but were critical about the structure of the hybrid course.

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to investigate how business executives perceive and account for their use of paratextual cues as a means of managing their professional impressions in business e‐mails on their smartphone (i.e. BlackBerry, iPhone, etc.) and office computer. Design/methodology/approach – Semi‐structured, audio‐recorded telephone interviews were conducted with a representative sample of 60 business executives from various sectors in Canada. The interviews examined executives' typical ways of writing e‐mails for business purposes, both on their smartphone and office computer. All interviews were transcribed and then analyzed using a mix of quantitative and qualitative analyses. Findings – This study shows how organizational leaders vary their ways of opening and closing business e‐mails when comparing their smartphone to their office computer communication. To account for these differences, they routinely use folk categories that suggest distinctions between formal and informal relationships, internal and external communication, as well as the recipient's identity and their own. Hence, executives are aware of the social meanings inscribed in paratextual cues and even the absence of these cues is frequently used as a cue in itself. Originality/value – E‐mailing is a crucial part of contemporary corporate communications, yet few studies have examined organizational leaders' e‐mail writing practices on their smartphone in relation to their office computer. While executives might seem very task‐oriented in their communication, this study shows that their everyday e‐mail‐writing practices play an important role in the co‐construction of professional identities and relationships.

Universities are populated with a wide range of disciplines. The science disciplines and their instructors are stereotyped as tech-savvy while in the past humanities faculty have sometimes been seen as technophobic and traditional. As we advance through the second decade of the 21st century, we find instructors in all areas are embracing new technologies in their teaching. Our students have been born digital (Tapscott, 2009) and have not only experienced online games and social networking technologies such as Facebook but thrive in them. It should not be surprising that many of our colleagues are trying out the use of social media in their courses. This volume embodies a sharing of such experiences with the aim of moving you up the learning curve so that your thinking about how these new technologies might spark excitement, interaction, sharing, and enhanced work and learning by your students.

Robert Bodle received his Ph.D. in Critical Studies from the University of Southern California's School of Cinematic Arts. His research focuses on the social, political, and ethical implications of networked media (social media and networks, social reporting, alternative media, mobile and convergence culture, internet governance, information ethics, and new media literacies). As assistant professor of Communication Studies at the College of Mount St. Joseph, Bodle designs and teaches a digital media curriculum that includes Social Media and Social Change, New Media and Society, Human Rights in the Digital Age, New Media Ethics, and Visual Communication. His research appears in the Journal of International Communication, Information, Communication & Society, and the book collection The Ethics of Emerging Media: Information, Social Norms, and New Media Technology.

The meeting, held on 17 May 1990, was opened promptly by the Chairman Andrew Nicholson, who welcomed everyone to the Seminar and introduced Tony Harman, who gave a very good review of the present situation of cleaning electronics assemblies before turning to future developments. In his paper ‘An Assessment of CFC Replacements—Proposed UK Collaborative Programme’, Tony developed the ideas which had led the UK Government to support this work. He did, however, point out that the funding was only now becoming available and this had delayed the start of the programme. Nevertheless, the itinerary of the cleaning trials had been decided and the practical work would commence shortly. In general terms, the programme will cost £¾m and will use between 600 and 700 test boards. As this programme is funded by Central Government, the results will be widely disseminated, especially to Small and Medium Enterprises.

With the established surface mount infrastructure and the temperature constraints of components and printed circuit boards, the melting temperatures of lead‐free solder alloys need to be designed as close to 63Sn/37Pb as practical, and not to exceed 215°C. However, metallurgically, the Sn‐based lead‐free solders cannot approach a melting point as low as 183°C without incorporating a high content of low‐melting elements such as In, Bi or Ga. Incorporating such high contents of these elements involves prohibitive mechanical properties and/or cost. Nonetheless, it has been found that a low dosage of one or more low‐melting point elements within a well designed alloy composition can achieve superior performance to 63Sn/37Pb without incurring an unacceptable cost. To avoid prohibitive cost and/or mechanical properties, whilst achieving the melting temperature requirement, the thresholds for each of these elements, as examples, are found to be In ≤q 6 wt.%, Bi < 4 wt.% or Ga ≤q 0.5 wt.%. This paper summarises the results for one of the lead‐free systems studied within a ten‐year research program.