Addressing Corporate Ties to Slavery: Corporate Apologia in a Discourse of Reconciliation
Year: 2012
Type: article
Abstract: Pressured by activists to take responsibility, American corporations recently found themselves in the spotlight for their past ties to slavery. Responding to the issue, they stepped into a complex discourse of reconciliation. Taking a rhetorical approach, this article analyzes the response of Aetna Inc. It explores how corporate rhetoric functions within present discourses about historical injustices and illustrates that Aetna's response informed by common strategies of corporate apologia inhibited meaningful reconciliation. The article thus furthers criticisms of (corporate) apologia in the context of historical injustice and raises questions about the potentialities and limitations of corporate rhetoric for reconciliation.
Source: Communication Studies
Author: Claudia I. Janssen
Institution: Eastern Illinois University
Language: English
Subfield: Communication
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
Funder: Aetna
OpenAlex ID: W2045889136