The search for a conceptual framework: Quest for a holy grail, or hunting a snark?
Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal
ISSN: 0951-3574
Article publication date: 1 August 2005
Abstract
Purpose
The paper is an exercise in “metaphoric defamiliarisation”. The metaphor of the search for a conceptual framework as “quest” is unpacked and an alternative, based on Lewis Carroll's The Hunting of the Snark, is proposed in its place.
Design/methodology/approach
Many points of correspondence between Carroll's unlikely expedition and the work of standard setting bodies are noted and developed. The possibility that a conceptual framework might turn out to be a “Boojum” is examined.
Findings
Noting that timing precludes the possibility that The Hunting of the Snark is an allegory of accounting standard setting, a possible social explanation drawing on Cornford's Microcosmographia Academica is proposed.
Originality/value
Examines the use of the quest metaphor and what it tells us about standard setters' approaches. An alternative metaphor is proposed as being more appropriate and, by contrasting the two, the content of the first is thrown into sharper relief.
Keywords
Citation
Page, M. (2005), "The search for a conceptual framework: Quest for a holy grail, or hunting a snark?", Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, Vol. 18 No. 4, pp. 565-576. https://doi.org/10.1108/09513570510609360
Publisher
:Emerald Group Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2005, Emerald Group Publishing Limited