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Gossip can be used to manage personal reputations. It can also act as a social mechanism for defending and subverting the power structure. If it is to function smoothly, the formal hierarchy of job descriptions is dependent upon the support of those who participate in it and, at the social level, it is supplemented by personal and group reputation. In the earlier discussion on Weber, it was shown that the participants in a formal system must believe in its legitimacy. Belief however, even in something formal, falls within the realm of the social and personal. Therefore, anything that threatens or manipulates this belief has the potential to undermine the formal hierarchy. Gossip has a palpable influence on the individual's status within the organisation. It is used by individuals to legitimise their own formal positions, as well as to improve their social standing so that they are treated as though they have greater

formai status than is actually the case. It is also used to manipulate the reputation and standing of rivals, enhancing or damaging the social support available to them.

Everyday life is based upon "face-to-face" interactions where there is a "fund of common knowledge about all members of the community" (Bailey 1971: 1-25 following Goffman) whether in small communities where most people know one another, or in this case, in an office amongst co-workers. Reputations are based on people's opinions about an individual and it matters who those people are. The greater the importance placed upon reputation in a community, the more people are likely to interact and to gossip. While life in the modern city is sometimes characterised as lacking in community feeling, "those who live the so-called anonymous life in the facelessness of urban surroundings, nevertheless derive their identity, find their reputations and so find themselves within interaction with a circle of people who know one another, who talk about one another and who therefore matter...to one another" (ibid. 5).

In the battle for reputation, community may be viewed as composed of individuals seeking to "advance their separate causes against their ostensible friends who are their enemies." (Gluckman, 1963: 312). Gossip can be used by the individual to disseminate information about him or herself that is deemed to be socially desirable (Cox 1970; Heppenstall: 1971; Paine 1967: 283). This can take the form of pure bragging, the dropping of subtle hints, or confession. Self-revelation is often complemented by a similar attempt to down-play negative personal features.

The use of gossip can extend beyond the elaboration of individual reputations to that of the entire group. An example of this can be drawn from a non-office context. Amongst Hopi Indians, disputes between Councilmen and Traditionalist factions were carried out by attacks on reputation, largely within each group to emphasise their difference from their rivals. The factions tried to attach stigmatised terms to their opponents in an attempt to limit their access to political power. In discussing how these factions used gossip as a form of competition and to degrade the credibility of rival groups, Cox (1970)

employed the term "impression management" derived from Paine (1967) and Goffman (1967). This is the means that the individual or group uses to emphasise certain desirable traits and characteristics while simultaneously playing down the importance of others.

Gossip also serves to maintain hierarchical and power structures within a group. Hutson (1971) found that in a small French alpine village, the degree of formality in interaction depended on factors of ascribed status such as age, sex and kinship. In this instance, differences due to achieved status were played down and people were unwilling to take on leadership roles since these set them above the other villagers. Despite the assumption of equality however, villagers appeared to rank one another. Criticism and evaluation of others was the chief pastime observed by Hutson who noted that the criticism given behind peoples' backs was in contrast to the assumed politeness between equals in open interaction. The chief situation in which ranking occurred was when the ideology of equality was challenged. In this situation, the gossiper usually tried to reduce the status of the target while simultaneously raising his own. The status positions of both were thus equalised, at least in the opinion of the gossiper (41-68).

The office workers also use gossip to defend their own positions. Whilst the managers do not tend to gossip negatively about others, particularly juniors, they talk about themselves. They do this to put themselves into a favourable light to gain respect from their subordinates and perhaps also to justify their positions of greater relative power. This is a purely social mechanism that augments existing formal relationships. Within the course of informal office interaction, distinct themes can be identified. I will give three examples where managers attempted to earn the (social) respect of their juniors in what can best be described as boasting. Various managers elaborated the same themes, at different times and to different audiences. Perhaps the same ground was covered by all because they had proved successful in the past, perhaps only because they had become habituated topics of light conversation that were satisfying to the tellers.

The first theme of reputation defence regards the manager’s destiny. The theme is that they achieved their status position against all odds and that the individual had to overcome almost impossible obstacles in order to achieve their present position. There are various purposes to be served by this sort of reputation management. First, to demonstrate character in having moved beyond one's station in life. Second, to serve as an excuse for any failings, since those would only be a residual effect of the bad beginnings. And finally, to foster a sense of camaraderie with juniors - i.e. that they grew up in scarcity of poor and humble parents with few modern conveniences and that they, through sheer determination, left all that behind and have achieved their present career status. They would imply that they are still humble at heart and can therefore understand the difficulties faced by those less fortunate than they, notably their juniors.

Second, those who have been doing office work for many years attempt to instil a sense of history in their juniors. The purpose in this case is to demonstrate that they should be listened to and that their advice should be followed because it is based upon wide and varied experience. The story usually starts with "When I was in my former job" and ends with a flattering tale of how the story teller achieved amazing results, usually by thwarting some former boss or aspiring colleague. These stories are often offered by someone in a senior position to firmly establish to a junior that no matter what is going wrong under his supervision, things were much worse when he was himself a junior. If the current junior complains that the word processor is not working properly, expressing his frustration that he cannot complete his report by that afternoon's deadline, the manager will reply that in his last job he had to send entire documents back to an incompetent typing pool in order to correct a single mistake. The underlying message to the junior is that he should stop complaining because there are always problems to overcome with the implication that the senior is handling the situation quite well compared to how it could be with someone else in charge.

Propinquity to people of greater status is a final theme, as managers and others in senior positions name-drop to show that they are within a

glamorous inner circle. This is a device employed by those who wish to retain or supplement their status by showing that they are accepted by, and are therefore themselves part of, an elite. The usual avenue is to mention who was spoken to in a meeting, on the telephone, or at a luncheon. These are causally dropped remarks, dissemblance meant to feign inconsequentiality, yet the message is clear: "I know somebody important that you don't and I know what they are thinking."

These status ploys are usually aimed at juniors by seniors, and are meant to defend power positions. The juniors however do not wish to be kept in their places, and while they appear to accept the stories to the tellers' faces, conversations out of the senior's earshot would belie their credibility. The stories are subverted, turned on their heads, and made a mockery of by those who were supposed to be impressed. Junior pub-talk will be carried out with much hilarity with ripostes such as: "He wouldn't be happy unless his father had died in a pit - too bad he's still alive and is a solicitor!", or "Of course they had to send it back to typing - that was so long ago they hadn't even invented computers yet!"

Attacks on reputation and ranking to equalise status are often the symptoms of frustration. People who are subject to character assassination are those who are preventing others from getting what they want, such as acknowledgement of achievement, help in times of need, or doing as one wishes. The catalyst for gossip of a vicious nature can be thwarted desire. By engaging in the act of gossip, and in some cases slander and fantasy, the speaker is able to pervert existing power relations by inflicting damage to esteem in a safe and "faceless" manner, usually without fear of retribution. Since gossip cannot take place in a social vacuum, the participation of others temporarily enhances the position of the speaker and simultaneously hardens the participants against the offender. Group loyalties can be formed within this context which will then serve as an emotional aid for the participants in the present and the future. Vindication against the villain may only be a willing delusion and may serve no tangible goal, but it is comforting. Fantasy therefore is another important catalyst for gossip.

To illustrate, I will use the example of a former manager. He was universally hated by all his staff. Their shared antipathy for him was a strong bond. It seems that they gossiped about him when they worked for him and those who suffered most continued to do so for many years after he left. Staff who had never met the man listened, fascinated, as they were told of his misdeeds and outrages. Over afternoon tea, I observed a large group of techs engaged in an animated conversation about the man. At that time, he had been gone from the office for over two years. The conversation was animated. A principal stated with a wicked grin on his face that he had bad news for everyone: the former manager was doing well and quite liked his new job. I heard some snorts. He then asked the gathering if it really was true - had he been having an "intimate personal relationship" with that woman consultant that had done some work for the office years ago? The man who had worked most closely with him and who despised him most intensely shuddered at the suggestion and stated with vehemence that he simply couldn't imagine anyone having an intimate relationship with that man - except perhaps a rabid rotweiler. There were some chuckles. Tea was sipped. The conversation drifted. First there was idle speculation about how he could have such a perfectly presentable wife. Nobody could understand why she would tolerate him. That being a dead-end, they switched to his sideline business of selling antiques brought from exotic ports of call which he then sold for an enviable profit closer to home. Both main gossipers became engrossed in fantasies where they watched drooling as he "emptied his bank account to buy a precious Ming vase and then dropped it." Their laughter continued as they went back to their desks, satisfied that if they hadn't been able to best him while he was actually a daily fixture in their lives, at least they could inflict humiliating punishments in their daydreams.

But gossiping about him has lost many of its satisfying qualities since he was no longer around and his authority could not be undermined. A more immediate source of frustration came from one of the managers who was strong willed, highly intelligent and headstrong. The principals in particular favoured him as a topic of discussion though the junior techs also had

difficulties with him because he had referred to them as "interchangeable cogs", implying that they were not as intelligent as they believed themselves to be. Admin complained about him because he was inconsiderate and wanted work done by them with insufficient warning and would not follow office procedures. Because he was a continual annoyance to so many of the office workers, there were frequent and detailed discussions of his shortcomings, always outside of his hearing, between various groupings of office workers. Even if two individuals had nothing in common, complaints about him would almost always illicit a response. Gossip about him was therefore a safe topic - conversation would never run dry. Over the years, I listened to many discussion of this particular manager. It emerged when he blocked other people's aspirations, or when he succeeded in being an unusually successful rival or a disorganised manager who blamed his staff for his own shortcomings. He was rarely discussed when he was behaving in a manner in which the others approved. His defamation was a means for his staff to fight back in a way that he could not counter, no matter how formally powerful he became.