What he meant was that specific genres of literature pre-existed the authors that contributed to them, so, for example, the detective story comes before Hammett. Fulfilling the code of the genre, the author is an effect of the discourse, not its originator. The slogan of semiotics became 'The death of the author'. A form, mode or genre of language-use. In a media sense, an example of a discourse would be the news, reflecting in its choice of language and style of presentation the social, economic, political and cultural context from which the discourse eminates.
Most institutional ethnography continues to concentrate on interactions within institutions.
It is common for everyday work sites to become the object of ethnographic studies - from office blocks to scientific laboratories. The challenge for ethnographers is to define and 'control' their presence on site as a mediating factor in the results produced. The subjective nature of institutional ethnographic studies is the subject of intense debate. The theory holds that certain patterns are expressed in a given culture's narrative structures. As a way of making sense of the world, the theory tries to uncover these underlying patterns and what this might ultimately say about us.