The Special Interest Group is home to a diverse group of enthusiastic scholars, citizen linguists, teachers and students, working within the tradition of systemic functional semiotics. We collectively seek to understand, promote and raise awareness of the specific functions of language and other semiotic resources to express peace, compassion and empathy in everyday life and in other theatres of social engagement.

Publications and presentations | Vision Statement | Mission Statement | Glossary | SIG Meetings

PUBLICATIONS AND PRESENTATIONS

The PCE SIG wishes to acknowledge Professor Jim Martin and his foundational thinking on positive discourse analysis, first published in his 2004 article ‘Positive Discourse Analysis: Solidarity and change’, Revista Canaria de Estudios Ingleses, 49:179-200, that makes this work of the SIG possible.

SPCE SIG Reading Group and Webinars

Do you have a topic you would like to present to our group? Proposals welcome any time for the roughly quarterly webinar or reading group sessions during 2026, see contacts below.

Tentative dates for the webinars this year are 7 May, 23 July or 17 September. The webinars usually run from 4pm-5.30pm Australian Eastern Standard time. However, we are flexible with both the date and the time to accommodate speakers either in different time zones or with conflicting obligations.

Past webinars and reading groups

We are committed to sharing findings on the semiotics of peace, compassion and empathy to the wider community (see our Mission Statement) and are keen to connect with research that aims to use, critique and develop our understanding of the social semiotics of peace, compassion and empathy within the tradition of Systemic Functional Linguistics.

SPCE SIG press, papers and publications

Etaywe, Awni. 2025. Violent extremists wield words as weapons. New study reveals 6 tactics they use. The Conversation. https://theconversation.com/violent-extremists-wield-words-as-weapons-new-study-reveals-6-tactics-they-use-266053 (19 November 2025)

Etaywe, Awni. 2025. “Experts”, Mornings with Rick Hind, ABC Darwin. Radio. https://www.abc.net.au/listen/programs/darwin-mornings/mornings/105742772. (12 September, 2025).

Language abuse in Trump’s second term: why peace, compassion and empathy matter more than ever, April 2025, in John Menadue’s public policy journal Pearls and Irritations.

Special Issue: The Social Semiotics of Peace, Compassion and Empathy. Language, Context and Text, special issue 6.1

ISFC49 Conference Harmony, Compassion and Empowerment:

• Keynote Empathic listening as a resource for enriching life: A systemic functional perspective (A/Prof Elizabeth Thomson);
• Keynote Navigating compassion development in digital activism through moral affiliation enactivism (Dr Awni Etaywe)
• Colloquium ‘Linguistics as social action: SFL scholar-activism’:
  • Letters to government that are successful in bringing about change (Shooshi Dreyfus & Joshua Han);
  • Bearing witness: social semiotic perspectives on animal vigils outside slaughterhouses (Daniel Lees Fryer); and
  • Perspectives on compassion in digital activism: Ideal victim or systemic compassion (Dr Awni Etaywe & Penny Wheeler)

ASFLA 2023 Conference: Dr Awni Etaywe

ASFLA 2022 Conference: Colloquium, The semiotics of peace, compassion and empathy in our changing world; pre-conference workshop by A/Prof Elizabeth Thomson, ‘Building Resilience Using the Semiotics of Empathy‘, drawing on and extending on a foundation of Marshall Rosenberg’s work on non-violent communication. (Video overview)

OpenLearning mini-course Connecting through talk: introduction, Elizabeth A Thomson

Reference list for works investigating peace, compassion and empathy

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VISION STATEMENT

To empower and improve all lives, we examine and celebrate the semiotics of peace, compassion and empathy through collaboration and research, teaching and training.

Mission Statement

To realise our vision, we will:

• Identify, analyse and instantiate genres of peace, compassion and empathy
  – by, for example, reading, discussing and creating texts in different professional, disciplinary and community contexts
• Share our findings on the semiotics of peace, compassion and empathy
  – through research, conference sessions, special issues, community outreach and other means of dissemination
• Apply our findings to inform the development of curricula, courses, and training resources oriented towards the language and other semiotic resources of peace, compassion and empathy and mentor junior researchers and teachers in the implementation of these resources.
• Extend and help resource the work on meaning-making practices and the communication of peace, compassion and empathy
  – by, for example, mentoring junior colleagues, researchers, students, and communities in writing grant proposals; conducting linguistic/discourse/semiotic analyses; collaborating in research projects; hosting reading–writing groups
• Connect and collaborate with other disciplines, groups, organisations, and communities of practice that practise, research and promote peace, compassion and empathy 
• Provide professional commentary on matters relevant to public discourses of peace and compassion.

GLOSSARY

We are working towards a linguistic description and definition of each of these terms.

Peace – towards a linguistic description

Compassion – towards a linguistic description

Empathy – towards a linguistic description

SIG MEETINGS

The next general meeting for the SIG is:

• 18 June 2026

The next committee meeting is

• 30 April 2026

2025 SIG Committee

• SIG Convenor: Dr Elizabeth Thomson, Adjunct Professor, University of Wollongong
• Publications officer: Dr Ingrid Wijeyewardene, University of New England
• Research Communication and Social Media officer, Dr Awni Etaywe, Charles Darwin University

MEDIA INQUIRIES AND CONTACTS

For media inquiries or those seeking professional and research-based insights from the Special Interest Group, please get in touch with the SIG Convenor, Adjunct Professor Dr Elizabeth Thomson, who can be reached via email at ethomson15@gmail.com. She is available to provide expert commentary, resources, and engage in discussions on topics related to peace, compassion and empathy, and the group’s current initiatives. If needed, Dr Thomson can also direct you to other experts within the SIG.

The members of the SPCE SIG dedicate this work towards the achievement of the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goal number 16: Promote peaceful and inclusive societies for sustainable development, provide access to justice for all and build effective, accountable and inclusive institutions at all levels