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Paper short abstract

This paper analyzes Satoyama discourse, where humans are framed as landscape caretakers. While this identity fosters stewardship, it also reinforces anthropocentric limits. Ecolinguistic analysis suggests alternative identity framings that could be beneficial for all species of a landscape.

Paper long abstract

This paper investigates the Japanese concept of Satoyama as a site for examining ecology and identity within ecolinguistics. Through a corpus analysis of academic and policy texts, it demonstrates how humans are discursively framed as “caretakers” of the landscape. Lexical choices such as management, conservation, services, traditional wisdom, and human well-being position people as responsible stewards who sustain ecosystems, legitimized through appeals to tradition and harmony.

While this frame supports narratives of stewardship, it also reveals limitations. The discourse of management reproduces a human–nature dualism, maintaining hierarchical relations where nature is treated as an object to be controlled. Emphasis on ecosystem services and human benefit further reinforces instrumental valuation, constructing nonhuman entities primarily in terms of utility. In addition, the portrayal of Satoyama as “traditional” risks reifying specific historical practices, potentially obscuring the evolving needs of ecosystems under climate change and biodiversity shifts.

Ecolinguistic analysis highlights how such framing, despite its cultural resonance, may inadvertently constrain more transformative forms of sustainability. To address this, the paper proposes alternative discursive strategies: shifting from management to co-adaptation, from services to mutual support, and from human-centered benefits to multi-species flourishing. These shifts broaden the conceptual space for ecological futures beyond the caretaker identity, offering more inclusive frameworks. The paper concludes that ecolinguistics is essential for interrogating not only what ecological discourse promotes but also what it restricts, thus advancing more pluralistic and resilient sustainability narratives.