This cross-disciplinary project combines journalism studies and environmental humanities to address the research question: how and when does an awareness of shifts in the timings of nature relatable to climate change emerge in seasonal journalism in the period 1996-2021?  Much journalism is closely aligned with political, cultural and natural seasonal rhythms within which recurring events are covered: the opening and closing of parliament, holidays and, not least, events and activities related to specific times of the year: heavy rain, droughts, foraging, planting vegetables etc. Writings linked to such natural events and rhythms reveal a vernacular sense of phenology; and given that “phenological events” are “among the most sensitive biological responses to climate change”, seasonal journalism constitutes a valuable set of phenological data that simultaneously reveals social responses to ecosystems. A key aim is to understand how such a vernacular phenology gradually came to intertwine natural, cultural and political aspects.

By analyzing journalism on either leisure activities or weather phenomena tied to seasonal changes, the project investigates and compares national and local online newspapers in two industrialized nations Denmark and Australia in the period from 1996 to 2021. Australia differs from Denmark by being a settler-nation placed in an ecologically vulnerable part of the Southern Hemisphere, by being heavily invested in the export of coal and, consequently, with much more polarized media landscape.