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Dr Sylvia D'souza

International Lecturer in Business Management

Sylvia D'souza

University House

LA1 4YX

Lancaster

Research overview

My key research interests include ethics, morality, culture, and embodiment. I adopt a highly interdisciplinary approach in my work, drawing from influences in philosophy and sociology. My present aim in simple terms is to embed what are generally seen as universal categories (e.g., ethics) into embodied and culturally specific categories through a practice-based lens.

My interest in practice necessitates taking a complex view of phenomena. It has led me to interrogate how macro-social and meso-organisational aspects interact, shape, modify, and orient individual embodied stances towards choice and action—particularly the ethical dimension—in diverse social worlds. This links to my concern with organisational technologies such as performance management, which have the power to reconfigure local modes of being by rewiring goals, values, interests, and so on to an instrumental logic in market-driven economies.

The broader goal of my work is to surface culturally situated modes of embodied being, seeing, knowing, and in this way, reclaim these modes from the universalising logic of dominant epistemologies and representations. This is also to say that I have a broader interest in the question of difference/otherness, and the performativities that go into the production and maintenance of difference/otherness (including the underlying politics).

Current Research

My current work builds on the practice-theoretical perspective to develop a more nuanced understanding of ethical decision-making in practice. I also aim to further a sociological understanding of ethical decision-making/action in the Indian socio-cultural-historical context (this is an empirical counterpart of what I am doing theoretically).

Recently I have also been grappling with the question of how to use qualitative research methods to access the embodied dimension.

Research Interests

Key interests: ethics, morality, culture, practical wisdom/phronesis, embodiment, difference, performativity

Theoretical approaches/interests: practice theories (particularly Bourdieu), phenomenology, Aristotle’s virtue ethics

Qualifications

PhD (Lancaster), MA, BCom

Career Details

Prior to moving into academia, I worked in various capacities in the information technology and digital communications spaces. My most recent stint was as Deputy General Manager, Group Corporate Communications, Tata group (2011-2016).

Current Teaching

Module Convenor:

CNMNGT110: Introduction to Management and Leadership

CNOWT314: Ethical Responsibility in Business

External Roles

Member of the UKRI Talent Peer Review College (PRC)

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