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Palgrave Macmillan

The Rhetoric of Religious Cults

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  • Book
  • © 2005

Overview

Authors:
  1. Annabelle Mooney

    1. Centre for Language and Communication Research, Cardiff University, UK

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Table of contents (9 chapters)

  1. Front Matter

    Pages i-x
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  2. Introduction

    • Annabelle Mooney
    Pages 1-9

  3. The ‘Cults’ and the Canons

    • Annabelle Mooney
    Pages 10-40

  4. The Church of Scientology

    • Annabelle Mooney
    Pages 41-71

  5. The Jehovah’s Witnesses

    • Annabelle Mooney
    Pages 72-104

  6. The Family

    • Annabelle Mooney
    Pages 105-128

  7. Is ‘Cult’ Language Distinctive?

    • Annabelle Mooney
    Pages 129-154

  8. ‘Cults’: What They Are

    • Annabelle Mooney
    Pages 155-168

  9. Cults, Cults Everywhere?

    • Annabelle Mooney
    Pages 169-176

  10. Conclusion: McKinsey as Cult?

    • Annabelle Mooney
    Pages 177-181

  11. Back Matter

    Pages 182-208
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Keywords

About this book

The Rhetoric of Religious Cults takes as its departure point the notion that 'cults' have a distinctive language and way of recruiting members. First outlining a rhetorical framework, which encompasses contemporary discourse analysis, the persuasive texts of three movements - Scientology, Jehovah's Witnesses and Children of God - are analysed in detail and their discourse compared with other kinds of recruitment literature. Cults' distinctive negative profile in society is not matched by a linguistic typology. Indeed, this negative profile seems to rest on the semantics and application of the term 'cult' itself.

Authors and Affiliations

  • Centre for Language and Communication Research, Cardiff University, UK

    Annabelle Mooney

About the author

ANNABELLE MOONEY is a Research Associate at the Centre for Language and Communication Research at Cardiff University, UK.

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