Whispering and Yelling: Unfurling the Rhetorical Advocacy Continuum through Mental Health Social Change Communication

Fostering mental health presents an exigency for societies across the globe. Advocates and activists employ societal rhetoric through public relations, yet we lack nuanced understandings of the relationship between different approaches. This study presents U.S. mental health social change communicators’ reflections (38). Through the lens of fully functioning society theory, I illustrate a rhetorical continuum of social change to show how the persuasive forces of advocacy, activism, community organizing, and lobbying coexist across sociocultural and institutional realms. I also explain how the study’s implications can apply beyond U.S. mental health and to a variety of mass communication endeavors.