Environmental myth-work: the discursive greening of the Olympic Games

Since the 1990s, the Olympic Games has styled itself as an environmental leader, devoting part of its platform to promoting sustainability. Analyzing official Olympic environmental communication reveals a strategy of environmental discourse that is undertheorized in scholarship on environmental communication. Discourse analysis shows Olympic sustainability discourse being punctuated by myth-work: strategic appeals to deeply sedimented myths of humankind’s place in nature. These myths are transmitted as meta-messages bound with the Olympic platform and ethos. The Olympic humanist tenets of virtue and unity dilute and undermine explicit environmental communication, producing a reassuring effect and ensuring the continuation of business as usual.