Original scientific paper
https://doi.org/10.1080/1331677X.2020.1836993
Analysing the environmental websites of the world’s greatest polluters: a multimodal ecolinguistic approach
José-Santiago Fernández-Vázquez
Abstract
This paper develops a visual analysis of the environmental webpages of 20 global companies, considered to be the world’s
greatest polluters in terms of their carbon emissions into the
atmosphere. Our aim is to determine how these companies build
a public reputation as environmentally concerned agents in relation to climate change. The analysis is based on the theoretical
and methodological propositions put forward by Critical
Discourse Analysis, ecolinguistics and multimodal analysis. More
specifically, we take into account Kress and van Leeuwen’s grammar of visual design, which enables us to describe and classify
the images on webpages and to determine how these images are
used to enforce certain narratives and ideologies. The paper also
develops a comparative study of promotional strategies and the
level of development and communicative efficiency of the sustainability webpages of Western and non-Western companies, on
the one hand, and of global companies and environmental NGOs
on the other.
Keywords
Climate change; corporate discourse; promotional discourse; multimodal analysis; critical discourse analysis; ecolinguistics
Hrčak ID:
301455
URI
Publication date:
31.12.2021.
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