Corporate E-Rhetoric is a style of rhetoric used by corporations and businesses worldwide as a means of advertising, broadcasting, and debating within an organization. Over the last decade, corporations have broadened their rhetorical horizons with new technology. Organizations around the world have used forums such as websites, blogs, and email to display rhetoric and achieve a form of discourse with consumers and employees.
Despite technology taking over corporate rhetoric, all companies trace their rhetorical roots back to Aristotle’s five canons of rhetoric as a way to accomplish the correct form of discourse with the public. Aristotle’s canons are essential to any corporation who wishes to reap the benefits of E-Rhetoric.
Aristotle’s five canons are:
- Invention is the devising matter, true or plausible that would make the case convincing.
- Arrangement is the ordering and distribution of the matter, making clear the place to which each thing is to be assigned.
- Style is the adaptation of suitable words and sentences to the matter devised.
- Memory is the firm retention in the mind of the matter, words, and arrangement.
- Delivery is the graceful regulation of voice, countenance, and gesture. (Caplan, 41)
Aristotle’s five canons are essential to any corporation practicing E-Rhetoric. Each canon is vital because each must followed in a way that makes sense and resonates with the consumer and also with employees. Without E-Rhetoric, corporations cannot effectively advertise, sell, and broadcast their product or service to consumers. Corporate E-Rhetoric is a style that is beginning to define rhetoric as we know it, and may soon dominate the way companies think and act as an organization.
Source: Aristotle. Rhetorica Ad Herennium, Book 1. Translated by George A. Kennedy.