Images of the “other”

Abstract

This article explores the relationship between Pan American World Airways (Pan Am) and Latin America to understand the role of Western multinational corporations in the historical processes of postcoloniality-that is, the representation of the non-Western "other" to Western audiences. Informed by postcoloniality and the use of a critical hermeneutics method, we draw on 64 years of archived materials from the Pan American World Airways Collection 341, housed at the Otto Richter Library at the University of Miami, as well as numerous histories of the airline. Our findings show how Pan Am gained a powerful position, both politically and economically, which facilitated its ability to construct influential images of Latin American employees, citizens, and the idea of Latin America. Although Pan Am ceased operations in 1991, its years of dominance in South America had the capability to contribute and provide insights into our understanding of the continued postcolonial processes and the idea of (North) "Americanism." More importantly, our article demonstrates how using a postcolonial framework can assist organizational and business scholars to better understand the role that historical patterns play in organizations still today. We hope that using alternative methodologies and theories such as postcolonialism to examine contemporary management culture, we will better be able to understand how history has been "written" in an effort to lessen "Western" ideologies and include diverse epistemological perspectives.

Reflections on the evolution of a long-term study of airline cultures: an interview with Albert J. Mills and Jean Helms Mills

“…For example, along with our students, we have studied the gendered character of piloting (Mills, 1995; Helms Mills, 2002), the making of the gendered history of an airline (Durepos et al. , 2008; Mills, 2006), the use of tourism material, brochures from a decolonial perspective (Mercer et al. , 2017; Paludi et al.…”

“…To reiterate, our methodological approach has often been dependent on what focus or what aspect we want to focus on within the materials. For example, along with our students, we have studied the gendered character of piloting (Mills, 1995;Helms Mills, 2002), the making of the gendered history of an airline (Durepos et al, 2008;Mills, 2006), the use of tourism material, brochures from a decolonial perspective (Mercer et al, 2017;Paludi et al, 2019), the junctures in the history of the airline that has led to significant changes (Mills, 2010). More recently, we were drawn to study the way individual actors make sense of discrimination (Helms Mills and Mills, 2008) and built on debates around agency in organization studies (Nord and Fox, 1996;Weick, 1995).…”