Abstract
This paper explores how communication and media studies have engaged with the concept of the Anthropocene in recent years. The purpose of this study is to outline the most relevant theoretical and conceptual contributions from communication science and media studies to issues related to climate change, global sustainability and the Anthropocene. A literature review on the matter shows that the field of communication research is diverse and heterogeneous, and that it puts forward different concepts and theories that deal with media as the environment or the environment as media. Environmental communication and environmental humanities frame approaches to media representations of environmental issues, whereas elemental analysis focuses on the essence of media, its material dimensions and its entanglements with social practices. From the dialogue and interdisciplinary debates among these disciplines, new approaches such as environmental media studies arise. Differences among theories have to do with the definition of media or the consideration of humanity in relation to nature or technology. In sum, communication and media studies offer interdisciplinary approaches and a nuanced understanding of our socio-natural relations, which will become more and more mediated in the years to come.
Highlights
Framed within social sciences and the humanities, communication science and media studies are situated within a wider field of research that is concerned with communication— face to face or computer-mediated, media ownership and the production, distribution and effects of texts that have a relevant role in contemporary societies
This paper explores how communication and media studies have engaged with the concept of the Anthropocene in recent years
Communication science and media studies are well equipped for the interdisciplinary analysis that the Anthropocene demands
Summary
Framed within social sciences and the humanities, communication science and media studies are situated within a wider field of research that is concerned with communication— face to face or computer-mediated—, media ownership and the production, distribution and effects of texts that have a relevant role in contemporary societies. The general objective of this paper is to introduce the ways of theorizing media and the environment from the perspective of communication science and media studies This text is interested in the implications of media in the supposed new geological epoch, given that our socio-natural relations are and will be mediated by technology (Arias-Maldonado 2015a) and that media and technology are more and more present in today’s societies and in our everyday life (Deuze 2012). Hartley et al (2021) introduce the idea of the digital semioshpere as a complex system at the planetary scale that incorporates the biosphere and digital technologies These are some examples of the wide-ranging research topics and initiatives that are influenced by the broad field of communication science and media studies. For the purpose of this article, the following section will go through some traditions that have discussed climate change and the Anthropocene under the umbrella of communication and media studies
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