What is Environmental Communication?

holywood

http://www.esf.edu/ecn/whatisec.htm

by Mark Meisner
When people ask me what I study and teach, I usually say "environmental communication." To which they usually respond "What's that?" with tones of either scepticism or curiosity. Being attuned to the needs of my audience (of course), I tailor my response accordingly. But in general I give them some version of the following.

Environmental Communication is communication about environmental affairs. It includes how the media cover environmental issues, the rhetoric of environmental debates and decision making, the discourse around how to solve environmental problems, etc. Environmental communication is all of the many forms of communication (interpersonal, group, public, organizational, mass, computer-mediated, etc.) that are engaged with the social debate about environmental issues and problems.
As with all types of communication, the term "environmental communication" refers to both the field of study and the activities being studied. Studying environmental communication means studying the communication processes involved in environmental affairs. Environmental communication researchers have looked at such topics as:

rhetoric in environmental debates
rhetoric in environmental texts
relations between language and experiences of nature
environmental advocacy and education campaigns
the media's role in environmental affairs
media treatments of environmental issues
public relations around environmental issues
green marketing: the advertising of environmental products
images of nature in popular culture
constructions of environmental issues in popular culture
science communication
risk communication
public participation in environmental decision making
environmental mediation and conflict resolution
Now, I would caution you that this is really a non-definitive definition. Therefore, I invite readers (that's you) to send me your thoughts on environmental communication. Be sure to let me know if you would like them posted here.

If you really want a proper introduction to the field, then Robert Cox's book Environmental Communication in the Public Sphere is the best place to start.

green!life

好好学英语！

见鬼

认不得！！！