ABSTRACT

Scholars have observed the need to better understand the role of emotion in the issue of climate change, as well as to better convey the relationship between climate and other global crises. This article takes up these two positions, investigating the way social media facilitates affective connections between climate and other global risks. Using Twitter data from three global events – Covid, the 2020 U.S. presidential race, and the Russia–Ukraine war – the study examines how users connect climate change to each event. Placing these discussions in the context of online issue publics and ecocriticism, the paper examines the way users employ affect to connect these events to climate change. The paper uses a quantitatively driven qualitative approach, combining computational methods with a thematic analysis of affective expressions. Interestingly, sentiment was not universally negative, and the qualitative findings further suggest that users combine emotions in contradictory ways, expressed through the themes Weary Zealotry, The Hope–Disgust Dialectic, Climate as Proto-Disaster, Idiots and Enemies, and Global Solidarity. It is argued that a modified version of Beck’s ‘imagined communities of global risk’ provides a framework for the role of affect in people’s relationship to climate change.

摘要

学者们发现，需要更好地理解情绪在气候变化问题中的作用，以及更好地传达气候与其他全球危机之间的关系。本文承担了这两个立场，调查社交媒体如何促进气候与其他全球风险之间的情感联系。该研究利用来自三个全球事件（新冠肺炎、2020 年美国总统竞选和俄罗斯-乌克兰战争）的 Twitter 数据，研究了用户如何将气候变化与每个事件联系起来。本文将这些讨论置于在线问题公众和生态批评的背景下，研究了用户如何利用情感将这些事件与气候变化联系起来。本文采用定量驱动的定性方法，将计算方法与情感表达的主题分析相结合。有趣的是，情绪并非普遍消极，定性研究结果进一步表明，用户以矛盾的方式结合情绪，通过主题“疲倦的狂热”、“希望与厌恶的辩证法”、“气候作为原始灾难”、“白痴和敌人”以及“全球团结”来表达。有人认为，贝克的“想象的全球风险社区”的修改版本为影响在人们与气候变化的关系中的作用提供了一个框架。