Organizational Rhetoric as Subjectification

Abstract

Given arguments that organizational rhetoric is disconnected from contemporary and useful trends in rhetorical theory writ-large, we build a case for rethinking organizational rhetoric’s founding concept of identification through recent innovations in rhetorical theory. Drawing from theories of psychoanalysis, racialization, and coloniality, we argue for an alternative understanding of organizational rhetoric premised on subjectification, where subjectification is the process through which a subject is brought into being on the basis of shifting contexts, relations, and imbrication in forces of power. We highlight three facets of organizational subjectification that can contribute to innovative organizational rhetorical research: differential relations, dependence on Otherness, and uneven mutuality. These facets, we argue, highlight how processes of coloniality and racialization are fundamental to our very being and becoming, providing a means of understanding organizational rhetoric as inherently political.

Violent Enactments and Erasures: A Western Capitalist Ontology of Labor in Organizational Rhetoric About Resettled Syrian Refugees

“…The UNHCR and its stakeholders exist and operate within a capitalist neoliberal system, and, apparently, so must its “subjects.” The resettled Syrian refugees are both a population it serves and also a group represented and depicted as characters in narrative. In this manifestation of subjectification (Hanchey & Jensen, 2021), the narratives corroborate to present a partial depiction of Syrian refugees wherein their formation as subjects to the organization is based on a Western capitalist ontology of labor. This depiction is present regardless of the non-Western contexts and cultures in which this population lived and lives; while some Syrian refugees have resettled in Western nations such as Germany, the majority remain in the Middle East, and others relocate to nations not considered a part of “the West” (Connor, 2018; Todd, 2019).…”

“…The risk further justifies the need to explore "altruistic" organizational rhetoric both for and on behalf of marginalized groups, and investigate whether their representation in ontologies of labor by the organizational voices purporting to serve them additionally contributes to their erasure. In order to do so, this article evokes the lens of subjectification to organizational rhetoric (Hanchey & Jensen, 2021).…”

“…Organizational rhetoric may enact subjectification, the process of subject formation under shifting, inequitable conditions and entangled in the manifestation of forces of power (Hanchey & Jensen, 2021). As a lens for interpreting and critiquing organizational rhetoric, subjectification bears witness to the creation and circulation of incomplete, incoherent subjects to organizations, whose meanings of being are preoccupied by fantasy and are inherently political (Hanchey & Jensen, 2021).…”

“…Organizations have become major actors in the modern rhetorical landscape and scholarship has subsequently explored organizational rhetoric as a form of relatively intentional, persuasive communication to internal and external stakeholders with implications for the commitment to, identification with, and subjectification from an organization (Cheney & Lair, 2005; Cheney et al, 2008; Hanchey & Jensen, 2021; Meisenbach & McMillan, 2006; Sillince & Suddaby, 2008). Organizational rhetoric presents discursive resources, such as a “concept, phrase, expression, trope, or other linguistic device” (Kuhn et al, 2008, p. 163) that direct the interpretation of certain conceptions of experiences, persons, or places, such as those about labor (Kuhn et al, 2008).…”

“…Organizational rhetoric may enact subjectification, the process of subject formation under shifting, inequitable conditions and entangled in the manifestation of forces of power (Hanchey & Jensen, 2021). As a lens for interpreting and critiquing organizational rhetoric, subjectification bears witness to the creation and circulation of incomplete, incoherent subjects to organizations, whose meanings of being are preoccupied by fantasy and are inherently political (Hanchey & Jensen, 2021). This investigation approaches organizational rhetoric from a stance of subjectification to questions how discourse maintains a status quo by positioning certain bodies and existences as subjects of the organization rather than identified with the organization; it not only attests to the processes of coloniality and racialization inherent to organizational communication as suggested by Hanchey and Jensen (2021), but attends to the presence and practices of Western neoliberalism and capitalism.…”