Language, Context and Text - Volume 6, Issue 1, 2024

Abstract

In our interconnected world, exposure to hate, fear, violence and adversarial communication is commonplace. Yet, this exposure underscores the urgent need for a more just, peaceful, and inclusive society. While research stresses the importance of nurturing peace, compassion and empathy for enhanced well-being and social justice, these three terms are rarely discussed at length in linguistics and communication studies. Little systematic work explores how language and semiotic resources actualise these ideals across contexts. This special issue, grounded in systemic functional linguistics, addresses this gap. It aims to contribute to a more just world, promote non-violent efforts for social justice, and lay the foundation for future research on the semiotics of peace, compassion and empathy. This paper outlines key definitions and contributions.

Abstract

This study adopts the concept of “positive peace” and draws on critical discourse studies to investigate the texts of two Thai activists responding to the 2006 coup d’état and subsequent events in Thailand. The study analyses the texts from a systemic functional linguistic (SFL) perspective to show how the first text challenges the legitimacy of the coup, and how the second text reflects a widening of the cracks then appearing in Thai royalist hegemony. In particular, the study compares the construal of one social actor in the first text published in 2007 with that in the speech of the second activist three years later, highlighting how the meaning of a key word evolved from one of oppression to one of pride.

Abstract

This paper illustrates what can be revealed by a linguistic analysis of the discourse strategies deployed in a bilingual text acknowledging the dispossession of Indigenous peoples in Mindanao (Philippines). The analysis draws on systemic functional linguistics (SFL) descriptions of English, which model language as a resource for making meaning. It explores the choices involved from the perspective of critical discourse analysis (CDA), exposing language in the service of power, and positive discourse analysis (PDA), appreciating language as an instrument of social change. In doing so we exemplify the role of SFL-informed CDA/PDA in processes of reconciliation, including personal and public acknowledgements and apologies, alongside considerations of “making peace” with dispossessed Indigenous people through existing, renovated or emerging genres.

Abstract

This article addresses the underexplored topic of compassion in digital activism through linguistic research. Utilising corpus linguistics and the SFL appraisal framework, the study initially analyses the lemma “compassion” and its appraisal nature within The Coronavirus Corpus. It then models compassion development as a social discursive process, taking Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS-Australia) campaigns as a case study, drawing on “communion” and “tendering” strategies, and positioning theory-based morality by linking structure to agency. The analysis provides evidence that the concept of “compassion” extends beyond triggered emotions, expressing institutionalised feelings. Compassion also develops through a moral affiliation process: aligning identities, positioning others within shared moral and sociocultural frameworks, and exhorting people towards purposeful social actions as commodities. This research underscores compassion’s normative (i.e. moral orders) core and performative essence.

Abstract

This article considers the multi- and intersemiotic expression of empathy and compassion in a campaign organised by the Vegan Society. It draws upon insights from ecofeminism and the ethics of care as well as systemic functional semiotics as a way of exploring how instances of attitude (affect, judgment and appreciation) in the campaign’s various texts might be negotiated and shared, creating potentials for empathetic and compassionate responses. The study finds that parts of the campaign represent empathy and compassion as exemplars for readers to follow, while other parts of the campaign, especially social media, provide readers with an opportunity to enact empathy and compassion. The study also identifies gendered and generational dimensions, and suggests that syndromes or clusters of positive and negative attitude can form the basis for empathetic and compassionate responses.

Abstract

This article investigates empathic listening as practised in the tradition of Nonviolent Communication (NVC), noting that this tradition is understood as a designed register of interpersonal connection, “concerned with progress toward a better world” (Hughes 2018). In the tradition, empathy is considered “a respectful understanding of what others are experiencing, … we give to others the time and space they need to express themselves fully and to be understood” (Rosenberg 2015: 91–92). The analysis in this article applies the tools of systemic functional linguistics to demonstrate that this empathic understanding is achieved by the empathiser supporting the speaker’s exploration of their emotions via a linguistic pattern of co-created, continuous thematic progression of resonated new information. The article provides insights into the linguistic machinery powering NVC empathy practice.

Abstract

This paper examines how an adult’s letter to the New South Wales Minister for Disability regarding problems identified within the disability service sector resulted in successful outcomes: that is, the changes asked for were delivered. A range of discourse semantic tools of analysis including appraisal (Martin and White 2005) and connexion (Martin 1992; Rose and Martin 2012) were employed in analysing this letter, which can be seen as an example of empathy activism. The analysis identifies how the complex layering of stages and phases that organise the arguments in this letter powerfully drives the point home, which is to convince the Minister to increase the staff ratio at a government-run respite house for children with intellectual disabilities.

Abstract

This article describes the semiotic resources deployed during the creation, in 2021, of the Alphabet Workers Union (AWU): the trade union that represents the workforce of the tech giant Alphabet Inc. The focus is on how the union shapes and develops its identity as one of “empathetic workers who believe in social justice” (Alphabet Workers Union 2021). The analysis of the homepage of AWU’s website through the prism of the textual metafunction in the visual mode (Kress and van Leeuwen 2001, 2006, 2020) together with the analysis of the interpersonal metafunction in the verbal mode according to the “appraisal” paradigm (Martin and White 2005), shows how the union assigns a central position to positive feelings of togetherness.

This article reviews The new peace linguistics and the role of language in conflict