Ecological Discourse Analysis Of The Commentary In Our Planet

The ecological documentary Our Planet shows the relationship among human beings,non-human organisms and entities which reflects the ecological thoughts and values of the program.The message of a documentary is conveyed through multi-modal channels with the visual and audio forms as the primary modes.Yet commentary as the secondary mode in the documentary plays a role which other modes cannot replace.It can fully demonstrate the advantage of language: to convey abstract meanings and values behind the picture and sound in a more coherent and logical way.In other words,if we want to get a better understanding of a documentary,it is better to have a close examination of the language mode—the commentary of the documentary.This study focuses on the commentary of the ecological documentary Our Planet from the perspective of ecological discourse analysis(EDA),aiming to point out the underneath message in this program.Under the framework of EDA,which includes Naess’ s ecosophy(Deep Ecology)as the guideline and the specific way of analyzing eco-transitivity process and eco-attitude resource,this thesis selects three commentaries from the documentary series as research material.Both quantitative and qualitative methods are used to uncover the ecological thoughts embodied in the selected data.Two questions are explored in this research:(1)From the perspective of EDA,what is the distribution of transitivity process and attitude resource in the commentary of Our Planet ?(2)What are the ecological thoughts embodied in the commentary of Our Planet ?Through analyzing transitivity process and attitude resource,this study obtains the following findings :(1)The distribution of the frequency of transitivity process from the highest to the lowest is as follows: material process,relational process,existential process,mental process,and behavioral process.This order indicates that material process matters most in the construction of ecological thoughts.Eco-beneficial processes far overweigh eco-ambivalent and eco-destructive processes in all six eco-transitivity process types,which shows eco-transitivity processes play a dominant role in the selected commentary.Therefore,the commentary of Our Planet is judged as eco-beneficial discourse under the framework of eco-transitivity process;(2)for the analysis of attitude resources,the commentary involves three kinds of attitude resources-affect,judgement and appreciation resources.Among them,appreciation resources are used most frequently,followed by judgement resources.Affect resources takes up the least.Appreciation resources depict the beauty and value of beings in nature,which mostly are positive evaluation.Eco-beneficial attitude resources exceed eco-ambivalent and eco-destructive resources by far,so the commentary of Our Planet is classified as eco-beneficial discourse under the framework of eco-attitude system;(3)Based on the above findings,this study explores the deep ecological thoughts embodied in the commentary of Our Planet: Self-realization and ecocentrism equality,the core principles of Naess’ s ecosophy.The thought of Self-realization is reflected by respecting ecological diversity and admitting the intrinsic value of non-human organisms and entities through transitivity processes and attitude resources;the thought of ecocentrism equality is constructed through personifying and using non-human participants as actors in transitivity process.This study may throw light on the following functions and enlightenment.First,it proves that EDA possesses strong applicability on analyzing commentary discourse.Second,it highlights the role of language in revealing the theme of documentaries so as to deepen people’s comprehension on the video.Third,it helps to awaken people’s ecological consciousness and responsibility,and provides some useful reference for the creation of commentary in the ecological documentary.