Between fragility and resilience

Ambivalent images of nature in popular documentaries with David Attenborough

Dados Bibliográficos

ID4189090
AutoresEvi Zemanek (0000-0002-8707-3880, University of Freiburg, autor correspondente)
Ano2022
Volume9
Fascículo2
Páginas139-160
Data de publicação2022-08-01
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessSim
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoThe Anthropocene Review (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 2053-0196 • E-ISSN: 2053-020X
EditoraSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1177/20530196221093477
OpenAlexW4280500384
IdiomaEN
Citações recebidas1
Referências citadas36

Nature documentaries often present contradictory images of, on the one hand, a fragile nature that is threatened or already destroyed by humans and, on the other hand, a resilient nature that indifferently survives the human species. Similar ambivalences characterize the public discourse on "nature" in the Anthropocene. From the perspective of cultural and media studies, this essay attempts to disentangle the incoherencies in popular imaginaries of nature by exploring the challenges of narrating and picturing the two opposite qualities of vulnerability and resilience. Tracing the conceptual evolution of documentaries presented by David Attenborough between 1979 and 2020 and their gradual increase in environmentalist rhetoric, I show how different visual motifs undergo a recoding (resilient/fragile) and relate it to paradigm shifts in ecology, earth system science, and environmental protection principles. With an interest in the historical development of multimedia discourses on resilience and vulnerability, I focus on the relationship between visual and verbal representation as well as on the interplay of semantic and aesthetic aspects, while reflecting on whether the observed ambivalences are intentional and how they might influence the perception of the documentaries. This essay is a contribution to Transmedia Ecocriticism and thus situates itself in the Environmental Humanities

Aesthetics · Ambivalence · Anthropocene · Art · Ecocriticism · Environmental ethics · Linguistics · Rhetoric · Sociology · Visual arts · Climate Change Communication and Perception · Ecocriticism and Environmental Literature · History · Philosophy · Psychology · Social Psychology · Sustainability and Climate Change Governance