[Dgkl] CfP LAUD 2025

Wed Oct 16 12:54:52 UTC 2024

Dear colleagues,

We're pleased to announce that the 40th International LAUD Symposium 
will take place in Landau/Pfalz, Germany, from 25 to 28 August 2025 and 
that the Call for Papers is now open.

https://ksw.rptu.de/abt/anglistik/forschung-projekte/current-projects/40th-international-laud-symposium

The 2025 theme is "Climate-change Discourse: Language in media 
representations, public debates, science and science communication" and 
we intend to run three parallel sessions (presentation time: 25 minutes, 
plus 10 minutes for discussion).

Theme session 1: Climate change in media discourse and public debates

Theme session 2: Climate change in scientific discourse and science 
communication

Theme session 3: Animal-rights discourse

For more information on the symposium and the theme sessions, please see 
our website or the description below.

We invite you to submit abstracts by 11 November 2024.

Please submit your abstract as a pdf file (max. 300 words, excluding 
references) to:
laud2025 at rptu.de

Please indicate your affiliation above the abstract and which of the 
theme sessions you would like to participate in.

We're delighted that the following plenary speakers have accepted our 
invitation:

Jonathan Charteris-Black | University of Bristol, UK

Kjersti Fløttum | University of Bergen, Norway

Martin Reisigl | University of Vienna, Austria

Arran Stibbe | University of Gloucestershire, UK

For more details on the venue, accommodation, etc., please consult our 
website: 
https://ksw.rptu.de/abt/anglistik/forschung-projekte/current-projects/40th-international-laud-symposium

Thanks and best wishes,

Frank Polzenhagen, Monika Reif and Neele Mundt (conference organisers)

RPTU Kaiserslautern-Landau

____

*Synopsis*

Coping with the consequences of human-induced climate change and 
preserving the basis of existence on our planet are urgent, if not the 
most urgent, challenges of our time. In recent years, they have become a 
central topic of discourse in the media and society, driven in 
particular by mass movements such as Fridays for Future and campaigns by 
climate activist groups with high public impact. Since the topic reached 
the discursive agenda on a larger scale three decades ago, environmental 
awareness and knowledge of climate change processes have undoubtedly 
increased considerably among broad sections of the population, albeit to 
different extents in various regions of the world. On the other hand, in 
many countries we are currently witnessing a decline in both political 
effort and support from broad sections of the population for measures in 
this regard. In view of numerous other crises, the problem of climate 
change has lost much of its urgency for many. The form and speed of the 
necessary transformations are being met with widespread anxieties. At 
the same time, we witness an increasing discursive presence of climate 
change sceptics and climate change deniers, with representatives in 
extremely prominent and powerful positions.

One of the most fundamental problems, however, is the drastic global 
disparity with respect to both the responsibility for the present 
condition and the availability of resources required for environmentally 
friendly transformations. The so-called “global North” has brought about 
the current collapse through its inconsiderate exploitation of nature 
since the industrial revolution. The so-called “global South”, whose 
share of the historical responsibility for the present condition is 
infinitely smaller, is the region most affected by climate change. At 
the same time, it is the region that is now expected to refrain from and 
not to repeat the practices of exploitation that made the global North 
economically prosperous and dominant, being, however, compared to the 
global North, the region seriously disadvantages in terms of financial 
resources to do so. It is a truism that the challenges of climate change 
can only be met in a joint global effort; however, such fundamental 
inequalities seriously undermine this endeavour.
These conditions and developments call for continuous reconsiderations 
of efforts, in particular context-sensitive measures, promoting 
environmentally friendly policies and lifestyles.

The topic became the subject of linguistic research on a broader scale 
through the so-called ecolinguistics of the 1990s (e.g. Fill & 
Mühlhäusler 2001; Stibbe 2021). From the outset, several strands were 
opened up in this research field, which have been pursued ever since; e.g.:
•    How is ecological knowledge inscribed in languages (e.g. Maffi 2001)?
•    How are non-ecological positions and ideologies (e.g. so-called 
speciesism) inscribed in language (e.g. Stibbe 2012)?
•    Critical analysis of political and media discourses on ecological 
issues (e.g. Fløttum 2017; Reisigl 2020)
•    Analysis of the language of climate science and climate-science 
communication (e.g. Nerlich, Koteyko & Brown 2010; Janich 2022)

In this field, cognitive-linguistic approaches play a central role, in 
particular recourse to conceptual-metaphor theory and the notion of 
framing (e.g. the work by Nerlich, Goatly, Semino, Deignan and Stibbe). 
These cognitive-linguistic concepts have also been applied in 
science-communication manuals (e.g. Corner, Shaw & Clarke 2018).

The 40th LAUD Symposium aims to address this topic from a linguistic 
perspective, especially in light of the declining public resonance of 
the climate change issue mentioned above. The wider context of the 
conference is critical (esp. cognitive) discourse analysis (e.g. Hart 
2017, 2019; Charteris-Black 2018) and science communication. The aim is 
not just to take stock, but rather to explore possible approaches to 
counteract the widespread public fatigue, anxiety and scepticism 
surrounding this existential matter, and to encourage societies to 
rethink and change entrenched behavioural patterns.

Taking up the strands of ecolinguistic research outlined above, the 
symposium will be organised into the following three *theme sessions*.

(1) Climate change in media discourse and public debates

Contributions to this theme session should explore patterns in the 
public discourse and media coverage of environmental issues; e.g.:
•    (Cognitive) critical-discourse studies on metaphors, scenarios and 
frames in media representations and public debates
•    Studies on the multimodal representations of climate change
•    (Cognitive) critical-discourse studies on changes and continuities 
in media representations and public debates over time and in various 
parts of the world
•    Studies on the language of climate activists
•    (Cognitive) critical-discourse studies on the language of 
climate-change sceptics and deniers
•    Studies on the public perception and the impact of media discourse 
on lifestyles

(2) Climate change in scientific discourse and science communication

Contributions to this theme session should explore ways of how 
scientific knowledge on climate change can be presented and disseminated 
in public discourse; e.g.:
•    Studies on heuristic metaphors in climate science
•    Studies on strategies and models in science communication
•    Studies on the impact of science communication
•    Studies on the representation of climate change in educational 
material and public-awareness campaigns
•    Studies on the public perception and the impact of science 
communication on lifestyles
•    Studies on the interrelatedness of climate change and other crisis 
phenomena

(3) Animal-rights discourse

This theme session will explore how the protection of animal rights can 
contribute to an environmentally-friendly agenda; e.g.:
•    Studies on the interrelatedness of climate change and animal welfare
•    Studies on sociological and ethical aspects of animal consumption 
in consumer societies
•    Studies on the representation of animal rights in the media and in 
public discourse
•    Studies on the multimodal representation of animal rights
•    Studies on the language of animal-rights activists

References:
Charteris-Black, Jonathan (2018). Analysing political speeches: 
Rhetoric, discourse and metaphor. 2nd. ed. Basingstoke & New York: 
Palgrave-MacMillan
Corner, Adam, Chris Shaw & Jamie Clarke. (2018). Principles for 
effective communication and public engagement on climate change: A 
handbook for IPCC authors. Oxford: Climate Outreach
Deignan, Alice, Elena Semino & Shirley-Ann Paul (2019). Metaphors of 
climate science in three genres: Research articles, educational texts, 
and secondary school student talk. Applied Linguistics 40(2): 379-403
Fill, Alwin & Peter Mühlhäusler (eds.) (2001). The Ecolinguistics 
reader: Language, ecology, and environment. London and New York: Continuum
Fløttum, Kjersti (ed.) (2017). The role of language in the climate 
change debate. London: Routledge
Hart, Christopher (2017). Cognitive linguistic critical discourse 
studies. In: John Flowerdew & John Richardson (eds.), The Routledge 
handbook of critical discourse studies. London: Routledge
Hart, Christopher (2019). Cognitive linguistic approaches to text and 
discourse: From poetics to politics. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press
Janich, Nina (2022). Warum braucht die Welt Wissenschaft? 
Wissenschaftskommunikation im Klimawandeldiskurs zwischen Diagnose und 
Prognose. Deutsche Sprache. Zeitschrift für Theorie, Praxis, 
Dokumentation 50(3.22), 214-233. [Special issue “Diskursive Dynamiken“, 
ed. by Janja Polajnar]
Maffi, Luisa (ed.) (2001). On biocultural diversity: Linking language, 
knowledge, and the environment. Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian 
Institution Press
Nerlich, Brigitte, Nelya Koteyko & Brian Brown (2010). Theory and 
language of climate change communication. WIREs Climate Change 1(1): 
97-110. [Update 2015 in Volume 6(6): 613-626]
Reisigl, Martin (ed.) (2020). Klima in der Krise. Kontroversen, 
Widersprüche und Herausforderungen in Diskursen über Klimawandel. 
Duisburg: uvrr
Stibbe, Arran (2012). Animals erased. Discourse, ecology, and 
reconnection with the natural world. Middleton, Conn.: Wesleyan 
University Press
Stibbe, Arran (2021 [2015]). Ecolinguistics: Language, ecology and the 
stories we live by. London: Routledge

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