Green Film Production for All

Abstract

As an emerging field of study, Environmental Media Studies explores the connections between the environment, culture, and media, examining the ways in which media representations shape our understanding of and attitudes towards the environment and the natural world (Starosielski and Walker 2016, Shriver-Rice and Vaughan 2019). However, there are currently two significant omissions from Environmental Media Studies. The first pertains to language accessibility, as information needs to be translated and disseminated across various languages and cultures. The second is the availability of media content to all audiences, including those who have difficulties accessing the visual or audio channels. Here, Media Accessibility, as a research discipline, can provide insights that can expand the scope of Environmental Media Studies to include issues of accessibility.This article aims to establish connections between the fields of Media Accessibility and Environmental Media Studies by examining how these two fields complement each other in terms of theoretical and practical insights. A case where both fields can jointly address issues related to accessibility and sustainability is by using subtitles as a metric to gauge a film’s level of engagement with climate change. In this article, we propose the use of subtitles as an additional indicator in the Carbon Calculator used by the film industry. Furthermore, we suggest developing the subfield of Green Media Accessibility to investigate resource use, social equity, and environmental communication in the wider media sphere.