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This special issue of the Journal of Applied Communication Research presents five studies, each using principles and methods of grounded practical theory (GPT) to investigate a topic in applied communication. GPT is a metatheoretical and methodological framework for developing empirically grounded, normative theoretical reconstructions of particular communication practices with regard to their problems, techniques, and situated ideals. GPT uses qualitative methods, especially action-implicative discourse analysis (AIDA). In the traditions of Aristotelian practical philosophy and Deweyan pragmatism, GPT is distinguished from empirical scientific theory, which does not advance normative claims, and philosophical normative theory, which may lack empirical relevance. GPT potentially complements several related approaches including constructivist grounded theory, critical discourse analysis, and other forms of …