Speaking Engagements on Climate

Slide Deck: The Shifting Language of Climate Change

• Is it climate change or a climate crisis? Global warming or anthropogenic change? As global fossil fuel emissions continue to increase and create more volatile conditions for people and the planet to thrive, the language used in the environmental field continues to evolve. Phrases like “greenhouse gas effect” and “global warming” are used more infrequently today and replaced by phrases like “climate emergency” and “global tipping points” to better encapsulate the critical condition of our planet. This goes hand in hand with vocabulary that illustrates hope, with phrases like “climate optimism” and “rewilding” used to underscore that there is still time and opportunity to create a liveable thriving planet. The shift in the language of the environmental field will be discussed, comparing how language has changed to better suit discussion about the critical nature of climate change today. A brief history of the term “climate change” will be discussed, followed by a more in depth dive into the modern vocabulary of climate change specifically focusing on how vocabulary used today encompasses this dichotomy of doom and hope present in the climate field. The focus of the deep dive of modern climate change vocabulary will center on the terms “adaptation” and “resilience”. The end of the discussion will highlight examples of climate adaptation and resilience and the verbiage used to discuss those examples.