The Rhetoric of Religious Cults Terms of Use and Abuse

This study's departure point is 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 analyzed 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.

Annabelle Mooney is a Research Associate at the Centre for Language and Communication Research at Cardiff University.