Purpose: This research sought to explore and systematically review the landscape of literature on the topics of workplace gossip and foreign nationals, in order to cre-ate an aerial shot of the areas of investigation favoured by researchers, the methods employed for inquiry, theories applied to the subject matter and finally openings in research for expansion and in-depth examination. Method: A total of 50 initial articles were drawn from elected databases. The data-bases included, Emeralds insight, Google scholar, Oxford, Taylor Francis, PubMed, Research gate, Sage, the South African journal of industrial psychology Springer link and Wiley online. Keyword searches were iteratively formulated, tracked and repli-cated for searches of each database. The yielded articles were originally pitted against predefined inclusion and exclusion criteria; this was done through a prelimi-nary review of the articles’ abstracts. The articles were subsequently grouped based on their research aims. The findings were written out in prose and presented a snap-shot of workplace gossip and foreign national research in the last decade. Findings: A number of themes were raised through the review process. Prosocial gossip works as an informal discipline system, though the processes of isolation and ostracism. Gossip is a viable tool for social control. Organisational identity and low power interact and also result in lower tendencies to gossip as a means of indirect aggression while high power and low organisational identity result in contrary effects. Greater employee identification with the organisation results in superior perceived cohesion. Job related gossip has an influence on employee cynicism and has a me-diating effect on the relationship between abusive supervisors and cynicism. Psycho-logical contract violation is a predictor of job-related gossip and employee cynicism while the presence of an abusive supervisor predicts both job-related and non-job related gossip. Furthermore, non-whites in white-dominated organisations, racial mi-norities and women experience gossip perpetrated by dominate groups. Dominant groups use gossip to discredit, undermine, exact group exclusion, communicate slurs, communicate subjective evaluations as truth, promote negative talk and opin-ions that minorities do not belong at the top of organisations. Minorities respond in two manners, by acquiescing or avoiding confrontation. Regarding immigrant eco-nomic assimilation, immigrants earn 34% less than their native counterparts. Immi-grants experience greater levels of unemployment than the country natives. Interestingly, immigrants seem to sort into low paying organisations. Moreover, longer re-ported occupation in a host country determines annual increases in pay of around 0.9%. Even more so, immigrants who work at majority native organisations report higher earnings. Residential location plays a role in earnings as the discrimination effect, means employers have biases about who they employ based on their residen-tial address. The relationship between immigrant-native isolation and exposure to immigrant neighbours is negative. Immigrants face barriers to integration through the non-recognition of their qualifications and perception of lower productivity. Employers favour local qualifications and accreditations over those held by immigrants. On the contrary, in some instances local qualifications seem to be considered sporadically and immigrants are put up against lesser qualified natives who are part of the organ-isations racial majorities when seeking career advancement. Immigrants assimilate through focusing on the following behaviours, work-related professional culture, un-derstanding workplace. Non-work related: higher exposure to natives in residential neighbourhoods and intermarrying with locals. Literature displayed that the words immigrant and expatriate are synonyms; however, in the existing international man-agement literature they describe two starkly different groups. Expatriates focused on in management literature are male, of Anglo-Saxon decent, hail from developed countries in North America or Western Europe. On the other hand, immigrants are male and female, hail from developing countries, are racial minorities, earn low wag-es and work in feminized roles that are unskilled and semiskilled. Regarding em-ployee wellness, findings showed that job satisfaction is an indicator of wellbeing. Furthermore, job satisfaction has been connected to organisational commitment in employees and has a negative relationship with employee absenteeism and employ-ee inclination to turnover. In general job satisfaction promotes positive behaviours and limits the negative. Environmental factors, job characteristics and work specific personal factors are just three referenced work-related factors linked to immigrant job satisfaction. Recommendations for future research: A definite need is an empirical enquiry into whether foreign nationals are targets of gossip. Though in light of the current study, this seems to be eminent that there is a need for evidence driven commentary re-search. Another suggestion is inquiry into how gossip influences the wellbeing of foreign nationals. Finally, I recommend exploring the question on what impact; gossip has on foreign national assimilation / Dissertation (MCom)--University of Pretoria, 2019. / Human Resource Management / MCom / Unrestricted

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Internet-based celebrity gossip blog site, TMZ, is a growing cultural force. Employing critical rhetorical analytics, the author examines the TMZ coverage of Chris Brown's assault on his then-girlfriend, Rihanna. This project explicates TMZ's enthymematic invocation of dominant cultural ideologies surrounding race, sex, and domestic violence. Chapter 1 demonstrates the theoretical importance of both celebrities and gossip blogs, signaling the ideological importance of each. Chapter 2 critiques TMZ's reliance on historic myths regarding sex and race in their reporting on this case. Chapter 3 analyzes TMZ's humorous and affective strategies that bolster broader investments in colorblind ideologies. Chapter 4 concludes by examining the interplay of formal rhetorical elements that inform the project's findings. This research reveals that TMZ utilizes affective, enthymematic strategies that camouflage broader racist and sexist ideological impulses that perpetuate domestic violence myths.

In wireless sensor networks (WSNs), flooding is usually adopted by broadcast services to disseminate broadcast messages. However, flooding produces an excessive number of unnecessary control packets, markedly increasing overhead. This work proposes a new gossip-based scheme, in which nodes forward broadcast messages with dynamic probability to decrease the number of redundant messages and thereby improve energy efficiency. By using the novel probability table and adjustment mechanism based on neighbor conditions, nodes can obtain a suitable gossip probability. Furthermore, this work considers some special cases of uneven sensor deployment such as that contains nodes with a low degree. An efficient algorithm was also developed to maintain the stability of the proposed protocol. Hence, the proposed approach can deal with various topologies and node failure. Simulations demonstrate that applying the proposed scheme to control messages forwarding improves performance compared with that of existing gossip-based broadcasting schemes.

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Purpose– The purpose of this study was to determine whether there is a difference in the perceptions of diverse individuals, from different racial groups and genders, regarding office gossip. Design– This paper followed a qualitative interpretivist research design, and content analysis was used to analyse the transcribed data. Findings– The findings indicate that the perceptions of office gossip are not gender specific, whereas there were indications of race specific perceptions related to office gossip. A definition of office gossip was compiled and the nature of and the participants in office gossip were identified, while the reasons why people gossip in the workplace and the impact of gossip on an organisation and its employees were emphasised. Furthermore, the characteristics that can be used to draw a line between healthy communication and gossip were identified. Research limitations– The limitations of this study were that the results were limited to the respondents and the specific work context used. In addition, seeing that the focus of this study was the diverse perspectives of individuals from different genders and racial groups, other factors, such as personal and organisational factors that could also have influenced their perceptions of office gossip, were not considered. Practical implications– The results of this study should alert employers to the need for controlling office gossip effectively. Also, formal channels of communication should be utilised effectively to ensure that the grapevine is not misused. Furthermore, employers need to develop a policy against malicious office gossip which should be contextsensitive and detailed. Because gossip is not gender specific, attention also should be given to gossip across genders. Lastly, culture-sensitivity training could prevent different cultures gossiping about one another. Originality– This paper makes a contribution to the literature on gossip in organisations, as there is little known research in South Africa or elsewhere that explores the diverse perceptions of office gossip among employees from different racial groups. / Dissertation (MCom)--University of Pretoria, 2011. / Human Resource Management / unrestricted

Thesis (M.S.)--Florida State University, 2003. / Advisor: Dr. Arthur A. Raney, Florida State University, College of Communication. Title and description from dissertation home page (viewed Oct. 1, 2003). Includes bibliographical references.

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Student Number : 0315885J - PhD thesis - School of Journalism and Media Studies - Faculty of Humanties / This study responds to the generalization by traditional agenda setting or media effects studies, especially media agenda-setting hypothesis that people accept as important whatever the media considers to be so; and being so, have the capability to structure issues for its audience. Also, the thesis is uncomfortable with the media’s blanket use of the term ‘mass’ to refer to its audience particularly when considered against the background of Africa’s rurality. This study therefore is an attempt to stake out a new conceptual approach to the media’s agenda-setting capabilities with an emphasis on the ‘other neglected agents of power’, that is, this study’s proposition as ‘the established structures of community’ in Africa, especially rural Africa, in setting be it the media or ‘territorial’ agenda. Using the multifaceted and predominantly qualitative methodology of histories and the triangular orientation of personal interviews, survey questionnaires and content scanning of relevant media, the thesis amongst other issues of conceptual relevance re-awakens the theoretical issue of ‘whose agenda is the media agenda?” and whether the media and its agenda setting capabilities are not an urban phenomenon? The universality and applicability of the theory especially in Africa’s rural setting where language, illiteracy, poverty and the lack of access to modern media constitute obvious barriers is also a major concern of this study. With the above as a background, the three part (I – conceptual framing of the problem and relevant issues, ii – a proposition and iii – data presentation and research findings) study then agues, proposes and concludes that: [a] Media agenda is ‘source’ oriented as its sources quite often are identifiable and that, the media serves better (as against the overwhelming claim of agenda-setting) as a conduit or arena for contending issues, views, opinions, even sentiments; there is therefore no significant category of intellectual analysis called media agenda, at least, in Nigeria. [b] Media is urban based and centred, urban driven and even urban cultured …it is simply an urban phenomenon. [c] Indeed there are significant indicators that the ‘established structures of community’ functions and play major roles both in setting the media-agenda (where there is one) and in political power dynamics. [d] Media agenda is plausible but an ‘uncertain’ agenda; in Africa, especially rural Africa.