| Media coverage of natural disasters informs audiences, but it also can serve as a catalyst for the formation of rhetorical communities, groups of people who subscribe to the rhetorical vision purveyed in media coverage of events. Existing research literature on communities and on the role of communities in disaster recovery points to the need for community as a basic part of the recovery process. National media coverage of the April 27, 2011, tornadoes that struck Tuscaloosa, Ala., contained fantasy themes that constructed a rhetorical vision of hope and survival. A fantasy theme analysis of three national sports media articles, when viewed through the lens of Ernest Bormann's symbolic convergence theory, suggests the chaining themes and resulting rhetorical community contributed to the city's continuing disaster recovery efforts. This research contributes to the understanding of rhetorical community and its role in disaster recovery and organizational communications and to the importance of narrative in news coverage of events by demonstrating the nature of rhetorical community as a participatory group. The results provide a look at the way in which rhetorical vision carries motive for action in rhetorical communities and their effectiveness as a body of support in times of crisis. Further research is needed in several areas, including the way in which the expanded rhetorical community contributes to recovery efforts and whether a rhetorical vision represented in the media after a news event matches the measured rhetorical vision of the community. |
