Abstract
In the wake of the “ecological turn” in linguistics (Stibbe, 2021), Ecological Discourse Analysis (EDA) has emerged as an interdisciplinary field to investigate how ecological orientations are embedded in discourse patterns. EDA encompasses a wide range of analytical orientations. Western approaches largely draw on Deep Ecology and Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) to expose how dominant anthropocentric discourses contribute to ecological degradation. In China, by contrast, Harmonious Discourse Analysis (HDA) is the more prominent approach. As a culturally grounded strand of EDA, HDA is particularly valuable in addressing the limitations of one-size-fits-all applications of Western ecosophies 1 which risk overlooking cultural specificities and misreading context-sensitive narratives.
Zhao Ruihua and Huang Guowen’s Harmonious Discourse Analysis: Ecolinguistics through Chinese Culture and Philosophy represents a major stepping stone towards advancing HDA. The volume provides EDA scholars engaging with Chinese sources a robust theoretical framework alongside practical examples, suited to small-scale, in-depth discourse analysis. It also advances an analytical framework grounded in Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL) but rooted in culturally salient Confucian and Taoist philosophies along with ethnic minorities’ ecological wisdom. Through their innovative approach, Zhao and Huang respond to the call for “cultural diversity” in EDA and stimulate East-West dialogue by reconciling Western demand for robust analytical approaches with a theoretically sound articulation of a culturally salient Chinese perspective.
The volume is organised in two sections: Theory and Application. The former outlines the conceptual and philosophical foundations of HDA; the latter demonstrates its application through case studies, ranging from text-analysis of Chinese media discourse and educational sources to contextual analysis of ecological wisdom embedded in cultural practices of ethnic minorities in China. In Chapter 1, Zhao and Huang establish the normative orientation of HDA, clarifying the ethical commitments informing their approach. They present HDA as an interdisciplinary framework, integrating linguistics, philosophy and ecology to address environmental challenges. They articulate their unique ecosophy through the principle of ecologicalisation, which highlights human responsibility in safeguarding well-being of all life forms. By emphasising human agency, Zhao and Huang redefine the role of humanity in ecological restoration, challenging Western portraits depicting it purely as a threat to nature.
Chapters 2 and 3 foreground the practical orientation of HDA analytical methods. In Chapter 2, the authors characterise SFL, the primary linguistic framework underpinning HDA, as a Marxist approach conceptualising language as a form of social intervention. The authors highlight how evaluative lexis, transitivity configurations and participants’ roles contribute to accountability allocation, potentially shaping responsibility perception and patterns of action. In this sense, Zhao and Huang reposition language as a constitutive force in socio-ecological dynamics, highlighting the relevance of in-depth discourse analysis for climate strategy design.
A similar emphasis on practical utility informs the conceptualisation of harmony in Chapter 3. While HDA has been accused of being a “primarily conceptual exercise” (Brombal et al., 2024: 4), the authors address this concern by operationalising SFL within a Confucianism-based tripartite model of harmony, structured across semiotic, social and physical systems. Distinguishing personal, interpersonal and interspecies harmony, the model clarifies how harmony acts across the three interconnected systems, making it analytically observable.
The most salient contribution of the volume lies in Chapter 4, where the authors distinguish anthropocentrism from human-orientedness, defining the distinct position of HDA. While some Western scholars (Brombal et al., 2024: 4) characterised HDA as anthropocentric due to its emphasis on human beings, Zhao and Huang argue that HDA should instead be understood as human-oriented. While anthropocentrism presupposes the human right to exploit nature, human-orientedness draws on Confucianism and Chinese Humanism to vest humans with the responsibility of realising the intrinsic value of nature. Building on this point, the authors interpret environmental degradation as resulting from the oppression of capitalism that alienates humans from the principle of oneness of nature and living beings. Through this key distinction, they propose an ontology grounded in conscience, proximity and regulation, where conscience concerns human attitude towards living and non-living beings, proximity refers to perceived ecological distance, and regulation involves mechanisms constraining individuals’ behaviour towards nature.
To facilitate application, Zhao and Huang translate HDA’s theoretical foundations into a ready-to-use two-fold analytical framework (p. 79). Through this innovative and culturally situated framework, the authors enable both experienced EDA scholars and first-time practitioners to conduct complete and coherent analyses. Through this approach, at the micro level, researchers investigate linguistic patterns as elements of a semiotic system, while at the macro level, they extend discourse analysis to encompass social practices shaping human behaviour. Moving between text and context, the framework treats language as meaningful primarily in relation to social, cultural and ecological situations, allowing linguistic practitioners to address three fundamental questions: what ecological problems exist, who is involved in them and how humans are implicated in their emergence and resolution.
The Application section illustrates how the framework operates across different contexts. Chapters 6 and 7 focus on the micro level, exploring ancient and modern natural poetry and official and media discourse reporting environmental news. Despite source heterogeneity, Zhao and Huang consistently focus on lexicogrammatical structures shaping human-nature relationships, with particular attention to transitivity patterns. They show how SFL-derived process types and participant configurations distribute agency, frequently positioning humans as the implicit benchmark, with other entities evaluated in terms of their contribution to human well-being.
Chapters 8 and 9 shift the focus to the macro level. In Chapter 8, Zhao and Huang turn to primary school ecological education textbooks, identifying discursive strategies, as metaphors, anthropomorphism and topic structures, through which ecological civilisation and pro-environmental attitudes are conveyed to children. Chapter 9, on the other hand, explores the ecological wisdom embedded in Chinese minorities’ land-planning, myth-making, costume culture and ritual practices, expanding the scope of discourse studies to the investigation of the broader context.
One of the main strengths of Zhao and Huang’s book lies in the versatility of the HDA framework. This versatility, however, also reveals a key structural limitation. When applied to longer texts or large datasets, the HDA framework’s analytical robustness appears to diminish, suggesting sensitivity to document or corpus size. This is particularly evident in the analysis of Chinese social media discourse, where the framework, relying mostly on traditional SFL-driven corpus analysis, appears less theoretically integrated with HDA’s core principles. The tension between analytical depth and empirical scalability raises questions about how the HDA framework can operate in big data environments in conjunction with SFL without sacrificing theoretical coherence.
Despite this limitation, the book advances a valuable context-sensitive and holistic approach to EDA, offering scholars a framework for examining ecological discourse as embedded within complex environmental and societal dynamics. Moreover, by adopting a harmonious perspective, the authors challenge the tendency to frame EDA primarily through CDA, moving beyond the mere critique of problematic narratives and instead highlighting how existing discourses may foster balanced human-nature relationships. Overall, Zhao and Huang provide a theoretically substantial and culturally grounded contribution to ongoing debates within EDA, offering both a strong analytical framework and an alternative perspective for linguistic investigation. At the same time, further methodological refinement may be necessary to accommodate the demands of large-scale corpus research. This work, therefore, represents both a significant achievement and an invitation for continued development.
