How online audiences experience and perceive environmental movies or podcasts?
Stream: Text mining
ECs: 14 or 23 EC
Description
Visual and audio storytelling, movies and educational podcasts (Drew, 2017; Lowe et al., 2021) in particular, have been proposed as an effective means for conveying environmental messages to large audiences. Linking insights from the narrative persuasion field with those of conservation psychology, McCormack et al., (2021) identified three promising pathways through which environmental films might influence their audiences: (a) reduced resistance to environmental messages, (b) interactions with audience identity and (c) meaningful media experiences. In this project, you will focus on understanding the role environmental films or podcasts can play in connecting people with nature, raising ecological awareness, foster environmental action and empathy for the planet (Talgorn & Ullerup, 2023). You can identify and select your own theoretical framework for developing your research question. Of specific interest are non-conventional, other-than-cognitive approaches to reaching audiences through engaging empathy and affective responses through storytelling and the arts.
Using text mining tools, you will explore audience responses on Reddit or another online platform, to an environmental movie or podcast series of your own choice. For example the We Are the Great Turning podcast https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RA0SPcdowuA or the Arts and Ecology podcast https://open.spotify.com/show/0EK522dPp4YIfOukdwalI3 You can also consider movies in the Solar-punk genre (e.g. Disney’s Strange World).
Recommended literature
McCormack, C. M., K. Martin, J., & Williams, K. J. H. (2021). The full story: Understanding how films affect environmental change through the lens of narrative persuasion. People and Nature, 3(6), 1193–1204. https://doi.org/10.1002/pan3.10259
Drew, C. (2017). Educational podcasts: A genre analysis. E-Learning and Digital Media, 14(4), 201–211. https://doi.org/10.1177/2042753017736177
Lowe, R. J., Turner, M. W., Schaefer, M. Y., Lowe, R. J., Turner, M. W., Dialogic, M. Y. S., … Turner, M. W. (2021). Dialogic research engagement through podcasting as a step towards action research : A collaborative autoethnography of teachers exploring their knowledge and practice teachers exploring their knowledge and practice. Educational Action Research, 29(3), 429–446. https://doi.org/10.1080/09650792.2021.1908905
Talgorn, E., & Ullerup, H. (2023). Invoking ‘ Empathy for the Planet ’ through Participatory Ecological Storytelling: From Human-Centered to Planet-Centered Design. Sustainability, 15(7794).