Becoming strategic spectators of organizational images: Olympic posters as antenarratives

Antenarratives are the building blocks of stories and exist before a story’s characters, setting, actions, plots or morals can be shared with a clear beginning, middle and end. Antenarratives are also what provide the potential for those elements to be combined into something recognized as a story. The posters produced by the International Olympic Committee commemorating the Olympic Games are an example of visual antenarratives. Scholars in a variety of disciplines have called for greater attention paid to organizational images and improved methodologies for analysing visual data. This essay reviews the development of antenarrative theory, applies that theory to specific artefacts, and invites scholars and teachers to deconstruct them as part of research or classroom instruction.