This article explores the recently emerging area of ecolinguistics as a form of critical discourse study. While ecolinguistics tends to use the same forms of linguistic analysis as traditional critical discourse studies, the normative framework it operates in considers relationships of humans not just with other humans but also with the larger ecological systems that all life depends on. Ecolinguistics analyses discourses from consumerism to nature poetry, critiquing those which encourage ecologically destructive behaviour and seeking out those which encourage relationships (...) of respect and care for the natural world. The expanded context of ecolinguistics complicates power relations between oppressor and oppressed since it considers impacts on non-human subjects and future generations not yet born, necessitating both theoretical development of CDS and an application of an ecologically based normative framework for judging discourses against. (shrink)

This paper investigates offensive animal metaphors in blog comments about the management of donations of money and medical relief during the coronavirus pandemic in China. Rather than understanding the metaphorical usage of language as a cognitive process, we consider its situational usage as a social action and invoke insights from Conversation Analysis. Based on data retrieved from Sina Weibo, we show how discussants use animal metaphors to accomplish varying actions and construct intelligibility between themselves and others about the relationship between (...) actions, moral accountability, and description of social events. We therefore argue that CA with its focus on topicality, action and societal membership can complement the cognitive understanding of the proximity between the source and the target domains. (shrink)