[ecrea] one day conference on Marketing (as) Rhetoric

1ST INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON MARKETING (AS) RHETORIC

CALL FOR PAPERS

Bournemouth University, U.K., June 14th 2017

*Introduction*
It is fifteen years since Tonks (2002) argued that “rhetoric needs to 
have a more central location in making sense of marketing management” 
(p. 806). How far has this clarion call been answered? Are we any closer 
to an understanding of what it might mean to recast marketing theory and 
practice as a rhetoric? Or are we all still in thrall to the latest 
logic? To what degree has the ‘rhetorical turn’ in the human sciences 
had an influence on scholarship and teaching in marketing? We hope to 
enlist your contribution in starting to answer these and related 
questions at the 1st International Conference on Marketing (as) 
Rhetoric, to be held at Bournemouth University, June 14th, 2017 under 
the auspices of the Promotional Cultures and Communication Centre’s 
Advertising Research group.

While rhetorical approaches have become part of the standard toolbox in 
management studies (Bonet & Saquet, 2010; Hartelius & Browning, 2008) 
and have made a notable impact in economic scholarship (McCloskey, 1983, 
1985) their adoption in marketing has been comparatively slow. A small 
but dedicated group of advertising scholars have perhaps had the most 
visible success in applying rhetorical criticism to a marketing topic 
area (McQuarrie & Mick, 1992, 1996, 2003; Phillips & McQuarrie, 2002, 
2004; Scott, 1994; Stern, 1998, 1990). At the same time, there has been 
some investigation of the substantial part that rhetorical strategies 
play in the success of our most valued marketing scholars and marketing 
concepts (Brown, 2004, 2005; Hackley, 2003; Miles, 2010, 2013, 2015; 
O’Reilly, 2000) as well as efforts to situate aspects of marketing 
practice within a rhetorical frame (Marsh, 2013; Nilsson, 2015; 
O’Shaughnessy & O’Shaughnessy, 2004; Palmer et al, 2014; Persuit, 2013; 
Press & Arnould, 2014).

Given the historically central place that strategies of persuasion and 
control have at the heart of marketing thought it is remarkable that 
rhetoric remains such a rare framework for marketing thinking and 
scholarship. Has academic marketing’s (unrequited) love for the 
trappings of ‘science’ made rhetoric an unworthy research partner? Is 
there something at the root of rhetoric that makes marketers 
uncomfortable? Why are some young marketing scholars happy to adopt 
discourse analysis but remain wary of the far more developed traditions 
of rhetorical criticism? The International Conference on Marketing (as) 
Rhetoric hopes to deals with these challenging questions. Additionally, 
we are keen to encourage engagements with rhetorical themes across all 
aspects of marketing theory and practice. Below is an indicative (but 
not exclusive) list of possible research areas for papers:

* Rhetoric and the 'attention economy' (Lanham, 2007)
* Rhetorical strategies as marketing strategies
* Advertising/PR and rhetoric
* Rhetoric and social media marketing
* The rhetoric of marketing relationships
* The rhetoric of marketing pedagogy
* Rhetoric as a unifying theory for marketing
* Propaganda, political marketing, and rhetoric
* Sales and rhetoric
* Critical marketing / postmodern marketing and rhetorical theory and 
criticism
* Explications of particular rhetorical figures and schools and their 
relevance for marketing
* Contemporary rhetorical criticism and marketing theory
* Kairos and marketing techniques
* Logos/ethos/pathos as marketing frames
* Copia and marketing pedagogy
* Sophism and modern marketing

We particularly welcome contributions that examine the legacy of Sophism 
as it relates to the marketing function and to the overall understanding 
of marketing. Given that Laufer and Paredeise's (1990) dictum that 
"marketing is the bureaucratic form of Sophism" was so clearly an 
inspiration for Tonks’ (2002) own stance and that the reappraisal of 
Sophism continues to go from strength to strength (Poulakos, 1983; 
Lanham 1993, 2007; Cassin, 2000; Corey, 2015; Tindale, 2010), we would 
encourage scholars to continue this line of investigation and submit 
abstracts which examine the relationships between Sophism and all 
aspects of marketing.

We also invite contributions from scholars with an interest in marketing 
and rhetoric but residing in fields other than marketing, including 
organization studies, human resource, management, leadership, etc., as 
well as scholars from other disciplines, including rhetoric, sociology, 
philosophy, linguistics, cultural studies, etc.

*Practical information*

Conference Date: 14 June 2017

Keynote Speakers:
* Dr. Nicholas O'Shaughnessy (Visiting Professor in the Department of 
War Studies King's College London, Centre for Strategic Communications; 
Professor of Communications, Queen Mary University of London)
* Dr. Chris Hackley (Professor of Marketing, Royal Holloway University 
of London)

Conference Location: Bournemouth University, Talbot Campus, Dorset, 
United Kingdom.

Conference registration: £50

Conference website/registration page: 
https://marketingasrhetoric.eventbrite.co.uk/

Abstracts: Abstracts of 250 words to be submitted to 
(cjmiles /at/ bournemouth.ac.uk) by 14th March

Review procedure: Notification of acceptance of abstracts will be 
communicated by 5th April.

Conference Organizers:
* Dr. Chris Miles (Department of Corporate and Marketing Communication, 
Bournemouth University, UK). Email: (cjmiles /at/ bournemouth.ac.uk)
* Dr. Tomas Nilsson (Department of Marketing, Linnaeus University, 
Sweden). Email: (tomas.nilsson /at/ lnu.se)


/References/
Bonet, E., & Sauquet, A. (2010). Rhetoric in management and in 
management research. Journal of Organizational Change Management, 23(2), 
120–133.
Brown, S. (2004). Writing Marketing: The Clause That Refreshes. Journal 
of Marketing Management, 20(3–4), 321–342.
Brown, S. (2005). Writing Marketing: Literary Lessons form Academic 
Authorities. London, Sage.
Cassin, B. (2000). Who’s Afraid of the Sophists? Against Ethical 
Correctness. Hypatia, 15(4), 102-120.
Corey, D. (2015). The Sophists in Plato’s Dialogues. Albany, State 
University of New York Press.
Hackley, C. (2003). “We Are All Customers Now . . .” Rhetorical Strategy 
and Ideological Control in Marketing Management Texts. Journal of 
Management Studies, 40(5), 1325–1352.
Hartelius, E. J., & Browning, L. D. (2008). The Application of 
Rhetorical Theory in Managerial Research: A Literature Review. 
Management Communication Quarterly, 22(1), 13–39.
Lanham, R. (1993). The Electronic Word: Democracy, Technology, and the 
Arts. Chicago. University of Chicago Press
Lanham, R. (2007). The Economics of Attention: Style And Substance In 
The Age Of Information. Chicago, University of Chicago Press.
Laufer, R., & Paradeise, C. (1990). Marketing Democracy: Public Opinion 
and Media Formation in Democratic Societies. London, Transaction Publishers.
Marsh, C. (2013). Classical Rhetoric and Modern Public Relations. 
London, Routledge.
McCloskey, D. (1983). The rhetoric of economics. Journal of Economic 
Literature, 21(2), 481–517.
McCloskey, D. (1985). The Rhetoric of Economics. Madison, University of 
Wisconsin Press.
McQuarrie, E. F., & Mick, D. G. (1992). On Resonance: A Critical 
Pluralistic Inquiry Into Advertising Rhetoric. The Journal of Consumer 
Research, 19(2), 180–197.
McQuarrie, E. F., & Mick, D. G. (1996). Figures of Rhetoric in 
Advertising Language. Journal of Consumer Research, 22(4), 424–438.
McQuarrie, E. F., & Mick, D. G. (2003). Re-Inquiries: Visual and verbal 
rhetorical figures under directed processing versus incidental exposure 
to advertising. Journal of Consumer Research, 29(4), 579–87.
Miles, C. (2010). Interactive Marketing: Revolution or Rhetoric? London, 
Routledge.
Miles, C. (2014). The rhetoric of managed contagion: Metaphor and agency 
in the discourse of viral marketing. Marketing Theory, 14(1), 3-18.
Miles, C. (2014). Rhetoric and the foundation of the Service-Dominant 
Logic. Journal of Organizational Change Management, 27(5), 744–755.
Nilsson, T. (2015). Rhetorical Business: A study of marketing work in 
the spirit of contradiction. Lund, Lund University.
O’Reilly, D. (2000). On the Precipice of a Revolution with Hamel and 
Prahalad. Journal of Marketing Management, 16(1–3), 95–109.
O’Shaughnessy, J. & O’Shaughnessy, N. (2004). Persuasion in Advertising. 
London, Routledge.
Palmer, M., Simmons, G., & Mason, K. (2014). Web-based social movements 
contesting marketing strategy: The mobilisation of multiple actors and 
rhetorical strategies. Journal of Marketing Management, 30(3–4), 383–408.
Persuit, J. (2013). Social Media and Integrated Marketing Communication: 
A Rhetorical Approach. New York, Lexington Books.
Press, M., & Arnould, E. J. (2014). Narrative transparency. Journal of 
Marketing Management, 30(13–14), 1353–1376.
Phillips, B. J., & McQuarrie, E. F. (2002). The development, change, and 
transformation of rhetorical style in magazine advertisements 1954-1999. 
Journal of Advertising, 31(4), 1–13.
Phillips, B. J., & McQuarrie, E. F. (2004). Beyond Visual Metaphor: A 
New Typology of Visual Rhetoric in Advertising. Marketing Theory, 4(1), 
113–136.
Poulakos, J. (1983). Toward a Sophistic Definition of Rhetoric. 
Philosophy & Rhetoric
16(1), 35-48.
Scott, L. M. (1994). Images in advertising: The need for a theory of 
visual rhetoric. The Journal of Consumer Research, 21(2), 252–273.
Stern, B. B. (1988). Medieval allegory: Roots of advertising strategy 
for the mass market. The Journal of Marketing, 52(3), 84–94.
Stern, B. B. (1990). Other-speak: classical allegory and contemporary 
advertising. Journal of Advertising, 19(3), 14–26.
Tindale, C. (2010). Reason’s Dark Champions: Constructive Strategies of 
Sophistic Argument. Columbia, University of South Carolina Press.
Tonks, D. (2002). Marketing as Cooking: The Return of the Sophists. 
Journal of Marketing Management, 18(7–8), 803–822.
​


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