Ecological Discourse Research Articles

Историческая память и нарратив: экологические контексты (размышления над книгой)

The article reflects on I.O. Shchedrina’s book Historical Memory and Nar­rative: Ecological Contexts. This monograph falls within the current trend of turning ecology into a universal interdisciplinary methodological principle. Significant for a modern person environment, its Umwelt, is understood by the author as a complex configuration of symbolic worlds and narratives. One of the most important tasks of ecology today, without solving which it is impossible to overcome the ecological crisis, is the formation of ecological consciousness. I.O. Shchedrina justifies the importance of nature saving not with the help of the usual rational natural-scientific approach, but through the emotional, personal, humanitarian sphere – through human memory, self-awareness, narrative, psychological context. In her analysis I.O. Shchedrina re­lies on a wide range of concepts and authors: from psychological interpreta­tions of self-consciousness (L.S. Vygotsky, R. Burns, St. Klein, J. Kihlstrom, V.V. Stolin and others) to the problem of historical and autobiographical narra­tive studies (D. Dennett, G. Genette, F. Lejeune). In I.O. Shchedrina’s concep­tion one can see development and reinterpretation of the ideas of N.F. Reymers and D.S. Likhachev about the ecology of the spirit and the ecology of culture, although these authors are not directly mentioned. By including the concepts of narrative and historical memory into the ecological discourse, I.O. Shched­rina makes a significant contribution to the development of the most important trend of post-non-classical science – the humanitarization of natural-scientific knowledge.

An Ecological Discourse Analysis of Faulkner’s The Bear from the Perspective of Transitivity System

The purpose of this study is to review the origin and development of Ecological Discourse Analysis and its relationship with transitive and ergative analysis, and make an ecological interpretation of William Faulkner’s The Bear according to the “participants” and “circumstances” of clauses under the six “processes” of transitivity system in Systemic-Functional Linguistics. It is found that this novel highlights the ecological philosophy of “Diversity and Harmony, Interaction and Co-existence”, and belongs to beneficial ecological discourse. Ecological Discourse Analysis, from the perspective of transitivity system, can enrich the means of discourse analysis, transmits a positive ecological value and orientation, and clean up people’s ecological behavior.

ЭКСПЕРТИЗА СО АН СССР И ВЕДОМСТВЕННАЯ ЭКСПЕРТИЗА ПРОИЗВОДСТВА ВИСКОЗНОГО КОРДА НА БАЙКАЛЬСКОМ ЦБК: ПРОБЛЕМА СОГЛАСОВАНИЯ ПОЗИЦИЙ

The article focuses on the discussions initiated by the Siberian Branch of the USSR Academy of Sciences about the economic feasibility of the Baikal pulp and paper mill (BPPM) in the early 1970s and, more broadly, the late-Soviet economic policy of production location. For the author, the Baikal counterversion is not a borderline issue of Soviet environmental protection or a clash of productivist and ecological discourses in Soviet social thought, which it appears to be for much of the historiography, but a chain of scientific and technical problems, which were or were not resolved in a clash of expert opinions. This exchange of opinions was moderated by the central Soviet agencies represented by the all-union Council of Ministers, Gosstroy and Gosplan of the USSR. The main thesis of the text is that by 1966, when the construction of the first stage of the mill was completed, viscose cord, for the sake of which was created the BPPM, technologically outdated in comparison with the synthetic, and the products of the enterprise have lost their strategic importance. At the same time, the complication of production by environmental requirements made the operation of the BPPM unprofitable, but the State Planning Committee, relying on expectations of technological innovations, up to Perestroika blocked any discussion of the reprofiling or closure of the mill. This was due to the soft budget constraint regime in which, according to J. Kornai, Soviet industrial enterprises were located. Maintaining this regime was generally a matter of state policy, and in the case of the BPPM its political nature was further strengthened by a combination of departmental interests that were under attack by opponents of pulp production at Baikal.

Analysis of Ecological Discourse in Animal Novels from the Perspective of Systemic Functional Linguistics

Analysis of Ecological Discourse in Animal Novels from the Perspective of Systemic Functional Linguistics

Adaptation of Soil Ecosystems: An Inventory of SDG Linkages to Achieve the Goals of the UN Decade for Ecosystem Restoration

The aim of the work is to carry out a comparative analysis and links between the loads on soil ecosystems and the social, economic and environmental needs and capacities of the state. The current vectors of the ecological discourse of assessment of degradation and the current state of soil ecosystems and the possible limits of their adaptation to the growing impacts were considered. The system of links between the ecological component and socio-economic needs of development of the regions of the state was created. The study was conducted on the basis of modern data of inventory, analysis and synthesis of available information on the state of soil ecosystems, limiting factors of their use and prospects for sustainable land use. The work was carried out in the following areas: adaptation to soil degradation; impact of land degradation on the economy; current trends in agriculture; biological and economic productivity of soil ecosystems; creation of ESG approach to state planning of soil resources exploitation. Sustainable land management was considered as a science-based procedure to meet food security and the needs of a growing global population while maintaining high quality ecosystems. The approach used allowed to establish a set of indicators and criteria for their evaluation for further scientific research of the need and possibility of restoring the health of soil ecosystems in order to improve state planning of land use.

Wild Design: Gambiarra, Complexity and Responsibility

Abstract: This paper proposes different approaches to design, referring to gambiarra practices and artifacts and their relation to complexity theory, evoking critical theorists that take undecidability into account in order to link gambiarra to operations that breed complexity and responsibility. The word gambiarra comes from Brazilian slang and describes an intervention or artifact meant to provide a provisory solution to an unexpected event or crisis. This kind of alternative design differs radically from conventional design because it does not come from formally trained, engineer-minded, projects. Instead, it lacks control, stability and durability. As it offers no permanent solution, it opens room for further accidents and is messy, especially if compared to a conservative model for creation that praises human predominance, soundness and efficiency. Therefore, gambiarra often has negative connotations that this analysis aims to challenge, by relating it to principles of complexity theory. Complexity theory is a transdisciplinary field for research aimed at the organization of living systems, with a vast understanding of networks and what life and govern are. It gathers insights from different disciplines to explore the interconnectivity between individuals, their systems and environment. It unveils how ambivalent information/noise relationships are fundamental for the increase of diversity in a system. It also displays the intelligent dynamics resulting from seemingly insignificant neighborhood relations that collectively make it possible to adapt and continuously change structures. With that in mind, the “deficient” aspect of gambiarra becomes more valuable, as it hints at a potential to generate new information and structures beyond entropic models that perpetuate the same logics across time. Michel Serres’s information theory presented in the book The Parasite is brought up in comparison to gambiarra, in order to explore the potential of interdependent ambiguous relationships that may not fit in dominant forms of discourse. Concomitantly, Vilém Flusser’s notion of responsibility reinforces the argument that a fabric of dynamic differences can emerge out of mutual engagement and indeterminacy. Underlying, this paper concerns with drafting ecological discourses and practices that can embrace contradictions and the plurality of worlds, noticing complex phenomena that have been pushed to the margins, while also decentralizing from hegemonic models. It questions the predominance of the prevailing design paradigm in the search for non-eurocentric and non-anthropocentric human-environment relationships and forms of provision of human needs.

Ecological Discourse Analysis for Attitude Resources in President Xi Jinping’s Discourses

Nowadays, ecological problems arouses the universal concern of people all over the world. President Xi Jinping’s discourses can fully reflect the ecological value orientation of China’s policy. Based on the EDA paradigm and following the ecosophy view of “diversity and harmony, interaction and symbiosis”, this paper conducts an in-depth study on the attitude resources in President Xi Jinping’s discourses, and probes into the ecological idea and ecological value orientation embodied by the attitude resources. The findings are as follows: (1) In President Xi Jinping’s discourses, the judgment resources are the most, the appreciation resources the second, the affect resources the least; (2) The attitude resources of President Xi Jinping’s discourses show beneficial and ambivalent ecological value orientation, but no destructive one; (3) The attitude resources in President Xi Jinping’s discourses reflect the ecological idea of “ecological priority and harmonious coexistence”.

No Going Back: Un-Fixing the Future of De-Extinction

Extinction is a colossal problem facing the world’ proclaims the Colossal Laboratories & Biosciences website, adding, ‘And Colossal is the company that’s going to fix it’. For Colossal, this involves combining the science of genetics with ‘the business of discovery’ in order to bring back the woolly mammoth, which will not only help ‘rewild’ lost habitats, but also contribute toward ‘making humanity more human’. De-extinction is the process through which extinct species can be brought back into existence, often with the goal of reintroducing species to the wild and restoring ecosystems. While still in its nascent state, the science of de-extinction is currently expanding and advancing through, for instance, projects like Colossal’s, raising numerous ethical, social and technological debates about what defines a species, and thus its regeneration; how such definitions shape conservation paradigms; and, ultimately, what we mean when we talk about life, death and species extinction. With their commitment to ‘reversing climate change’ while also ‘advanc[ing] the economies of biology and healing through genetics’, Colossal’s work has not only been deemed ‘game-changing’ in terms of “saving” endangered species, but also in terms of ‘future proofing’ the environment by reshaping how the world thinks about the power of genetics for solving pressing challenges in the life sciences today, including the challenge of extinction. In this de-extinction example, then, the problem of extinction is actualized in relation to solutions aimed at enacting further control over the planet, this time by ‘rewinding’ and ‘reversing’ ecological destruction, so as to fix the human-caused disaster, and in so doing, fix the future. In this essay, I trace the line between ‘the business of discovery’ and ‘making humanity more human’ in order to draw out what I see as some of the broader refrains and fixations that have come to infect future-oriented ecological discourse in these times of dying. Looking to the example of Colossal, I examine the ways in which extinction, and the corollary project of de-extinction, has become at once a territorializing force that works to re-install monohumanist fantasies of planetary control, and a potentially deterritorializing force for letting go and giving up.

Resistance in Murals: Critical Discourse Analysis of the Local Movement in Rejecting the Establishment of a Cement Factory in Rembang

This research examines the discourse on rejecting the establishment of the Semen Indonesia factory in Rembang. Taking the murals in Tegaldowo Village, Rembang, as the object study, this study discussed the production of knowledge about the rejection of the factory establishment and power relations in such conflict over the factory establishment. This study applies a visual discourse analysis model developed by Gillian Rose, which includes several essential elements in the text: key themes, justification strategies and their effects, contradictions, positions of the subjects, and location and time of production. This research finds that the movement against the establishment of a cement factory, in addition to going through legal channels, was carried out through cultural media, including by forming discourses that strengthened this rejection. The justification for refusing the establishment is generally based on both traditional and modern ecological discourses. The subjects presented in the text represent the polarization of interests and groups within the local communities, between groups that are pro and contra to the construction of the cement factory, as well as justifying that the cement factory establishment causes such polarization.

Opposition in ecological discourse: An ecostylistic scrutiny of speakGreen ecological posts

Abstract This article explores the posts with ecological concerns published by the community organization speakGreen on its website and Facebook page. The analysis falls within the aims and scope of ecostylistics, and is undertaken by applying Lesley Jeffries’ stylistic model of opposition. The main research purpose of this article is to identify the stylistic strategies promoting beneficial stories and those controverting destructive stories, in Arran Stibbe’s terminology. A broader research purpose is to assess whether the stylistic model of opposition can fruitfully be utilized to examine ecologically-oriented short texts and the non-literary text type of the speakGreen post. This ecostylistic study firstly demonstrates that unconventional opposites are more effective than conventional opposites in conveying beneficial stories, since their unexpected contrasts surprise the speakGreen website and Facebook users. Secondly, the study proves that two structural triggers of opposition, namely negation and especially parallel structure, are the most frequent in the sample of posts under investigation, due to the stylistic and discursive characteristics of the speakGreen post text type. The sample was also found to feature: (1) The visual trigger of green and red color-coding, which indicates contrast between beneficial stories and destructive stories; (2) Such stylistic devices as foregrounded end-focus and phonological parallelism. All these stylistic traits contribute to making the posts articulate texts relaying refined ecological messages in very few words.

Ecological discourse analysis of green content in English language textbooks in Pakistan

Ecological discourse analysis of green content in English language textbooks in Pakistan

Sulle tracce perdute dell’urogallo: un approccio ecocritico a Stagioni di Mario Rigoni Stern

Stagioni (2006) is the last work by the Italian writer Mario Rigoni Stern and it is like an autobiography that delves into the most important phases of his life and explains his relationship with history and, above all, with nature, the focal point of his literary production. In this contribution, starting from an overview of some theoretical fundamentals of ecocriticism, such as Pastoral and Wilderness, and considering the relationship between ecocriticism and literary studies, we intend to analyze Rigoni Stern’s environmen- talist approach, placing Stagioni in the more complex ecological discourse that the writer built in his long literary career.

Storytelling, a(nother) Discourse Elicitation Instrument: Protocol and Materials

The study of oral narrative discourse allows for the description of several features of the speakers (e.g., belonging to social or age groups, pathologies or special educational needs, stages of acquisition or learning, among many other attributes). This type of semi-structured tasks also allows speakers to generate ecological discourses with comparable lexical and semantic structures, as well as being easily replicable independently of the examiner. In this framework, we present a retelling instrument composed of three stories made from 15 static images each based on a central event. In order to demonstrate its usefulness, we presented an automatic analysis of discourses generated by 50 university students and 13 people diagnosed with schizophrenia. The results showed homogeneity of the texts, based on the comparison of the types of words prompted. We observed that one of the stories generates more abstract content, which makes it especially useful for the study of certain populations.

Ecocriticism and the Pastoral Tradition in Romantic Poetry

Ecocriticism, an interdisciplinary approach that examines the relationship between literature and the physical environment, has gained prominence in recent decades. This paper explores the interplay between ecocriticism and the pastoral tradition in Romantic poetry, focusing on the works of William Wordsworth, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, and John Clare. By examining the poets' depictions of nature, this study highlights how Romantic poetry reflects and critiques contemporary environmental concerns. The analysis underscores the relevance of Romantic pastoral poetry to modern ecological discourse and its potential to inspire environmental consciousness.

Greenwashing and the Strategy of Real Estate enterprises in the Commercialization of Nature

This essay integrates continued research, with the objective of analyzing the sustainable certifications and greenwashing practice that are being used to validate the exploitation of nature in the interest of capital. Based on a bibliographical and exploratory research of primary and secondary sources, it is proposed to discuss the phenomenon of the exploitation of the natural good and the ecological discourse by the real estate enterprises, bringing as a case study the MARAEY mega-venture, located in the Environmental Protection Area of the city of Maricá, In the state of Rio de Janeiro. In this context, the relation among legislation, urban policy and the maneuvers carried out by the real estate market with the public authorities and regulatory bodies is discussed.

Концепция управления временем В.Н. Муравьева в эпоху антропоцена: диалог естественного и искусственного

This article analyses the teaching of Valerian Muravyov, a Russian cosmist, in the context of modern ecological discourse. It is emphasized here that at present, due to the active technological development, society is faced with the Anthropocene crisis. Its manifestations and ways of overcoming it are reflected in the works by representatives of Russian cosmism. The object of the research is the philosophical heritage of Muravyov as a prominent representative of the Russian philosophical thought. The purpose of this article was to study the concept of mastering time, developed by Muravyov, in order to find ways out of the dangerous socio-ecological situation in which the society of the Anthropocene epoch found itself in the late 20th and early 21st centuries, as well as to determine the possibilities of maintaining a balance between the natural and artificial human habitats under these conditions. Achieving this goal requires accomplishing a number of tasks, such as: a general analysis and assessment of the relevance of the idea of mastering time to the global problems of our era; examination of Muravyov’s interpretation of the concept of culture and its extrapolation to the problems of nature preservation in the process of the ongoing technological revolution; exploration of the works of philosophical and ecological theorists within the framework of the Anthropocene concept, while identifying correlations between these works and Muravyov’s ideas. The scientific novelty of this paper consists in the dissection of Muravyov’s ideas, still largely unresearched, in considering their relevance to the current socio-ecological problems, as well as in analysing their similarities with and differences from the theories of other representatives of the ecological and philosophical thought. In addition, the paper suggests possible ways to overcome the current crisis. It is concluded that Muravyov’s concept, including the idea of a rational transformation of the world by people, which requires their uniting for a common cause, may be applied to solve the problems faced by humanity in the Anthropocene epoch.

A Multimodal Ecological Discourse Analysis of Presentation PowerPoint Slides in Business English Class

This study applies the visual grammar theory to the multimodal ecological discourse analysis of the students’ presentation PPT slides in business English class. It investigates the process of meaning construction through a quantitative analysis of 160 images and a thorough qualitative analysis of 2 specific images. The results reveal that students’ ecological values embedded in PPT design are delivered via intersemiotic play of multimodal semiotic resources. And it is found that students’ ecological values are in accordance with the ecosophy of “Diversity and Harmony, Interaction and Co-existence”, which highlights the harmonious coexistence between man, society and nature.

The Ecological Discourse Analysis of Jack London’s The Sea Wolf from a Systemic Functional Perspective

Ecolinguistics studies the interaction between language and its environment. The ecological discourse analysis in the framework of ecolinguistics refers to the analysis of any discourse that has a potential impact on the ecosystem. The systemic functional linguistics of Halliday and the approach of ecolinguistics provide rich theoretical perspectives for ecological discourse analysis. The ecological discourse analysis based on systemic functional linguistics can help to reveal the ecological concept and ideology behind the ecological discourse, so as to improve people’s awareness of ecological protection and build a harmonious relationship between man and nature. Under the analysis framework of systemic functional linguistics, this thesis will analyze the ecological discourse of Jack London’s novel The Sea Wolf to explore the ecological orientation behind this novel.

OTHERNESS OF TREES: FACTNESS AND FICTION IN RECENT NARRATIVES OF ARBOREAL SURVIVAL

The primary intention of this article is to explore some of the ways in which present-day readers, living in an age of increasing awareness of ecological change, interact with the concept of the “tree” as it appears in a variety of discourses: children’s fiction, TV documentary, scholarly writing, popularising ecological discourse, and recent mainstream Anglophone fiction, most notably that of the Turkish-British novelist Elif Shafak, whose The Island of Missing Trees (2021) features a sentient tree as a prominent narrator. The primary concern of this article is then to discuss some of the ways in which fictional texts have been augmented by popularising, fact-based discourses, most notably by the use of anthropomorphism, which supposedly permits the reader to “imagine” the existence of the arboreal Other. Inevitably, given the range of discursive sources, the findings are in part conflictual, although all can be seen to contribute in different ways to the current human-centred re-imagination of the perceived fraught relationship that exists between the natural world and the human being.

Zakorzeniona w przeszłości chińska wizja zielonej przyszłości. Koncepcja cywilizacji ekologicznej

The Chinese idea of a rooted-in-the-past, green future. The concept of ecological civilization. At the end of the 20th century, in response to catastrophic environmental pollution and the failure of recovery efforts, the Chinese authorities looked for a model that could serve as an ideological framework for effective, comprehensive actions to protect nature and maintain economic growth – one of the most important goals of the CCP’s policy since the late 1970s. A theoretical and political framework known as „ecological civilization” (shengtai wenming) was developed in response to this desire. As its name implies, this idea integrates ecological discourse with civilizational discourse, situating environmental conservation in the broader con-text of China’s long-standing heritage and civilizational mission. The idea has also been given a political component, resulting in a globally unique environmental protection program, based on technological and economic development, as well as rooted in classical culture and reliant on an effective central government. The pur-pose of this article is to highlight the most significant sources of inspiration that shaped the idea of ecological civilisation and to define the fundamental tenets that underpin it.