Abstract
This fascinating new work from media studies scholar Julie Doyle addresses a central question which has long vexed science communicators – how to make climate change meaningful; relevant to people’s everyday lives and social practices. This is not, however, a guidebook for the communication of a complex technoscientific issue. Rather, Doyle presents us with a nuanced, thoughtful argument about the difficulties in mediating between scientific assertions and our capacities for imagination, narrative and creative engagement.
Doyle frames her understanding of the challenges to climate change mediation through a conceptual critique of the notion of environment. She posits that our concepts of “nature,” “vision” and “time” generate an understanding of the environment as something that is distinct from culture, knowable only through the material praxis of science, and in conflict with our metrologically stabilised understandings of time. “Space” might have been added to this list of troublesome concepts, as Doyle reflects often on the role of place and distance in our constructions of environmental challenges. Critiques follow of scientific and artistic visualisations, non-governmental organisation campaign literature and media coverage of the Copenhagen climate conference. The triptych of nature/vision/time provides constant theoretical companionship on the journey through the complex landscape of climate meaning-making, thus forming a uniquely coherent account of the competing discourses and definitional struggles over climate change.
This book is significant in its invitation to move beyond the linear idea of “communication” towards a dialogic notion of “mediation.” However, this argument is somewhat impaired by the occasional presentation of publics as subjected to the processes of mediation, rather than as active participants. The potential to explore the relations between competing discursive framings of climate change and perceptions of scientific authority is not wholly realised, and it is not until the final chapter that the “public” is acknowledged as consisting of a wide range of potential actors and audiences. However, Doyle’s work is sure to inspire much discussion about the complex ways in which meaning is negotiated between diverse social actors in diverse places, rather than being simply “handed-down” by authoritative cultural entities. Processes of mediation intrinsically involve relational and indexical co-productions of meaning, and we are thus left to ponder the relationship between meaning-making and social action, in addition to the many ways in which “mediation” is a welcome addition to discussions of science communication and public understandings.