Keywords

rhetorical myth, strategic management discourse, ethnography

Abstract

This article explores how rhetorical myth can be used as a tool for persuading employees to accept change and to maintain consensus during the process. It defines rhetorical myth using three concepts: chronographia (a rhetorical interpretation of history), epideictic prediction (defining a present action by assigning praise and blame to both past and future), and communal markers (using Burkean identification and rhetorically defined boundary objects to define a community). The article reports on a 3-year ethnographic study that documents the development of a rhetorical myth at Iowa State University’s Printing Services department as it underwent changes to its central software system.

Original Publication Citation

Rawlins, Jacob D. “Mythologizing Change: Examining Rhetorical Myth as a Strategic Change Management Discourse.” Business and Professional Communication Quarterly 77/4 (2014): 453–72.