Characters are also part of a deep structure. Characters tie events in a story together and provide a thread of continuity and meaning. Stories can be about individuals groups, projects or whole organizations, so from an organizational studies perspective, the focal actor(s) determines the level and unit of analysis used in a study. Stories of mergers and acquisitions, for example, are commonplace. In these stories whole organizations are personified as actors. But these macro-level stories usually are not told from the perspective of the macro-level participants, because whole organizations cannot narrate their experiences in the first person.
(1) More generally, data concerning the identities and relationships of the
characters in the story are required, if one is to understand role structure and
social networks in which that process is embedded.
(2) The personification of a whole organization abstracts away from the particular
actors and from traditional notions of the level of analysis.
(3) The personification of a whole organization is important because stories differ
depending on who is enacting various events.
(4) Every story is told from a particular point of view, with a particular narrative
voice, which is not regarded as part of the deep structure.
(5) The personification of a whole organization is a textual device we use to make
macro-level theories more comprehensible.
The paragraph briefly is about why stories are structured around focal characters.
And why in stories of organizations, organizations have to be personified and focal
characters as organizations cannot narrate their experiences. Option 5 concludes
this chain of thoughts by saying that this kind of personification is a textual device
resorted to bringing coherence.
Option 1 is incorrect as it continues the first part of the paragraph and is unrelated
the second part.
Option 2 is incorrect as it talks about abstracting away from the particular whereas
the paragraph is talking about particularizing.
Options 3 and 4 talk about different points of view, which is irrelevant to the
paragraph.
Hence, the correct answer is option 5.