Target's Corporate Identity and its Reflection in Employee's Anonymous Reviews of the Company

Abstract

AbstractThe purpose of this case study is to investigate the identity linguistically and cognitively presented by official Target Corporation’s discourse and to unveil any structures or elements that are prominent enough to be included in the employees’ discourse production. The assumption is that the particular language we speak and the structures we choose in various contexts predispose us to think and act in certain ways. As for the approach utilized in this research, it is rather data-driven than data-based. Methods of Critical Discourse Analysis (Wodak and Meyer 2001) are employed and they are supplemented by Critical Metaphor Analysis (Charteris-Black 2005). The sampling of the customers was opportunistic. The identity in and around organization can be effectively investigated through linguistic methods. The study has shown that the vision of the company’s identity is more integrated by the executives and team leaders than grassroots employees. The paper draws attention to the very basic level of communication and its potential of imposing certain conceptualizations – the actual building blocks of any narrative. Moreover, the methodology employed goes beyond mere content analysis and applies rigorous linguistic analysis of company discourse.