Writing telepathy back into marketing theory

Abstract

Adopting a commitment to the principle of heterogeneity, combined with a concern for subjugated and disqualified knowledge, we unravel the debates around telepathy and telementation in marketing theory and practice. We explicate the conditions of possibility for these deliberations, focusing on the Society for Psychical Research (SPR). A close reading of the scholarly outputs published by members of the SPR helps us unpack the theoretical assumptions underwriting telepathy via the concept of the subliminal self. This material forms the foundations for William Walker Atkinson’s ‘practical occultism’. We review Atkinson’s work, making the case that telepathy was central to exerting personal influence. Our account thus diverges markedly from extant histories of influence. Attention is then turned to the jettisoning of telepathic linkages. Changes in discourse reflect ‘epistemological deflation’ in combination with ‘counter-reversal’. Nonetheless, telepathic and telementative assumptions remain central to our understanding of sales and marketing communications. The same can be said of consumer research. Telepathy may also impact our future in a novel, ‘synthetic’ form.