An Ecological Discourse Analysis of Fan Chengda’s Summer of Rural Life from the Perspective of Systemic Functional Linguistics

Fan Chengda’s Four Seasons of Rural Life stands as the culmination of classical Chinese pastoral poetry, embodying profound traditional Chinese ecological wisdom that remains highly relevant today. However, this wisdom has not been fully explored. Based on the theoretical framework of Systemic Functional Linguistics, this paper adopts an ecological discourse analysis approach combining quantitative and qualitative methods to conduct a multi-dimensional interpretation of Summer of Rural Life, the third part of Four Seasons of Rural Life. Focusing on the three metafunctions of language, this study explores how the poetic language realizes the ideational function of “the beauty of rural ecology”, the interpersonal function of “ecological concern and concern for farmers’ well-being”, and the textual function of “harmonious coexistence between humans and nature”. This research seeks to enrich the ecological discourse study of classical Chinese pastoral poetry, thereby illuminating its profound ecological wisdom, elevating public ecological awareness, and ultimately fostering a positive and sustainable ecosophy.