Voedsel, plastic, energie: De Nederlandse ecocinema onder de loep
Summary
In comparison to other European countries, the Netherlands is failing in their policy towards sustainable energy and the production of environmental friendly food and other consumer products. However, the debate regarding Dutch environmental policy is in full swing. Critical environmental documentaries, known as ecocinema, and their creators play a large role within this public debate, as they influence discourses regarding environmental policy, environmental issues and sustainability. This influence has proven to have an actual effect on environmental policy. Therefore, the way creators of documentaries exact their influence should be examined carefully. However, critical inquiries into Dutch ecocinema remain non-existent.
In this bachelor thesis, three Dutch environmental documentaries are examined utilizing a critical discourse analysis. From this analysis, a typology of discourses circulating within Dutch ecocinema is theorized. It exists of three discourse types: optimistic individualistic, optimistic technocratic, and pessimistic Anthropocene-sceptic. This typology is a first step in examining discourses in the field of Dutch ecocinema and, in accordance with the ecological humanities and its communicative branch of environmental communication, in researching the communicative effectiveness of these different discourses.
This bachelor thesis was written in the context of the bachelor Communication and Information Studies as part of the Humanities Honours Programme at Utrecht University, Utrecht.