NATURE PRESENTATION

Kavya Noble

Environmental Communication & Public Awareness

• Definition
• In public sphere
• Ecological consciousness
• Environment in media
• Disasters/ecological crisis
• Environmental journalism-Digitisation/transformation of environmental news
• Environmental campaigns and movements

• Public participation in environmental decisions
• Areas of study and practice

Index

"The environment we experience is largely the product of how we come to talk about the world." - James Cantrill & Christene Oravec Communication about environment matters in the choices we make in response to environmental problems and possibilities.

• Issues of environmental communication.

• The surroundings or conditions in which a person, animal, or plant lives or operates.
• The complex of physical, chemical and biotic factors that act upon an organism or an ecological community and ultimately determine its form and survival.
• "The environment we experience and affect is largely a product of how we come to talk about the world".

What is Environment and why do we Need to speak of it ?

• The pragmatic and constitutive modes of expressing our ecological relationships.

• The dissemination of information and the implementation of communication practices related to the environment.

• Human interactions with the environment.

• "The application of communication approaches, principles, strategies, and techniques to environmental management and protection."- Alexander Flor.

Environmental Communication

• Citizen and civil society
• Nongovernmental organizations
• Politicians and public officials
• Businesses
• Scientists and scholars
• Journalists

Diverse Environmental Voices in the Public Sphere

1) Citizens & Civil Society

Love canal, a neighborhood in Niagara Falls, New York, became the site of an enormous environmental disaster in the 1970s. Decades of dumping toxic chemicals harmed the health of hundreds of residents, the area was cleaned up over the course of 21 years in a Superfund operation. People sought media coverage, marched and raised their issue before the state. As a result, Hooker company was prosecuted, imposing large fines.

• Environmental NGOs- The most visible sources of environmental communication in public spheres.
• Exist to advocate for a wide range of environmental concerns and hopes.
• Eg- Navdanya- Women centred movement for protecting native seeds & biological diversity.
• African Conservation Foundation- continent-wide effort to protect Africa's wildlife & habitats.
• Greenpeace,Avaaz-Fight against climate change & for environmental sustainability.

2) Non-Governmental Organizations

• Represents corporations/private sector.
• The voices of corporations span the spectrum of environmental communication.
• Some are building solar panels and imagining how to improve public health.
• It is the responsibility of business enterprises to check the consequences of their actions & to protect environmental resources

4) Businesses

• Charged with making decisions about public goods, as well as making decisions about private interests.
• Environment is a major topic in most elections, the voices running for office or working in Government, therefore, reflect the whole spectrum of political opinions.

3) Politicians & Public Officials

Climate scientists have provided vital research and testimony that has shaped public understanding of anthropogenic climate change, prompting public debate over actions by Government.Eg.- Scientists helps to identify keystone species and make connections between plankton in the ocean and our ability to breathe.

5) Scientists & Scholars

• Collect, verify, produce, distribute and exhibit information regarding current events, trends and issues associated with the world.
• Follow environmental policy decisions & environmental organizations.
• Have a general understanding of current environmental concerns and the ability to communicate information to the public in a way that's easily understood.
• Its roots can be traced to nature writing.

6) Journalists

Credited for voicing the first nationally recognized public challenge to business practices that affect the environment, including public health or the prevention of disease and to prolong human life.

Rachel Carson & the Public Health Movement

Public health & Ecological Movements

On 22 April, 1970, students, public health workers, activist groups and urban workers joined a movement to champion environmental controls on industrial pollution. New NGOs arose to address the relationship between human health and environment. Among the earliest NGOs were the Environmental Defense Fund (1967), Environmental Action(1970), and the Natural Resources Defense Council(1970).

Earth Day & Legislative Landmarks

The fair treatment and meaningful involvement of all people regardless of race, colour, national origin or income, with respect to the development, implementation and enforcement of environmntal laws,regulations and policies. By 1970s,new activists had begun to gain ground in challenging the dominant perceptions of nature as a wild place apart from people's everyday lives,disclosing another antagonism- Environmental Justice.

Environmental Justice

Environment in/of Popular Culture

Polar bears struggling for survival have emerged as a poweful symbol of global warming. As early as 2005, polar bears have been drowning in the Arctic Sea due to the melting of ice floes, and as the floes drift farther apart. The long distance swimming also affect them as they are adapted for swimming close to the shore.

Polar Bears as Condensation Symbols

Ecological Crisis

The addition of any substance (solid, liquid, or gas) or any form of energy (such as heat, sound, or radioactivity) to the environment at a rate faster than it can be dispersed, diluted, decomposed, recycled, or stored in some harmless form.Pollution of all kinds can have negative effects on the environment and wildlife and often impacts human health and well-being.

Pollution

• Popularly known as Green Journalism.

• Objectives include creating synergies among members of the public, communicators, institutions, NGOs & any agents involved in environmental issues, promoting the approval and improvement of environmental policies.
• Tracing india's environmental journalism through a photograph.

Environmental Journalism

• While the content of environmental journalism changed, one trend sustains: it is still challenging to get environmental stories approved by editors.
• Interesting developments in the space of English-language environmental journalism.
• A conscious effort to increase the coverage in local languages is also visible.

Onwards and Upwards

Environmental Journalism

1) Save Dehing-Patkai

• The National Board for Wildlife (NBWL), in April 2020, via a video conferance by prakash javedkar , chairman of NBWL, announced the approval of a coal-mining project in the Saleki reserve forest which is a part of the Dehing Patkai Elephant Reserve.
• This move sparked protests by environmentalists which slowly gained momentum, as Guwahati University students started an online campaign to save the only rainforest in Assam, the ‘Amazon of the East’ - Dehing Patkai.

Environmental Campaigns & Movements

• For over three years now,environmentalists from various organisations, along with activists, students and citizens have been putting up a tough fight to protest Aarey forest of Mumbai and safeguard our future.
• However, now these green crusades have been barred from entering the location where the work for the metro car shed has already begun.
• Over a 100 trees have already been chopped.

Environmnetal Campaigns & Movements

2) Save Aarey

3) Save the Sunderbans

• In the delta of Ganga & Brahmaputra
• Home to Bengal Tigers, saltwater Crocodiles etc.
• World's largest mangrove forests
• Amphan left a trail of misery in the Sunderbans
• #SavetheSundarbans

Environment Campaigns & Movements

• A nascent but rapidly growing movement in India of young people.
• School and college students concerned about climate change are now confronted with having to deal with the chilling effects of police charges on some of their fellow-activists.

4) Climate Action Strike

Environmental Campaigns & Movements

• The nation's capital throttled into an environmental crisis as the Air Quality Index [AQI] plummeted to 494.
• Toxic smog choked the city with mere breathing in Delhi being considered a hazard to one's health.
• The protest, organized as a result of various movements on social media ,saw over 1500 people gather at Amar Jawan Jyoti, India gate on November 5.

Environmnetal Campaigns & Movements

5) Right to Breathe Protest

Definition

The continuous, two way communication process which involves promoting full public understanding of the processes & mechanisms through which environmental problems & needs are investigated and solved by responsible agencies;keeping the public fully informed about the progress of studies or implications of the project

Public Participation in Environmental Decisions

• Social consensus mitigates conflicts.
• Process of decision-making & final decisions become more transparent & legitimate.
• Helps prevent adverse environmental consequences of the decisions.
• Generates more solutions and opinions to solving problems.
• Government and business costs of possible wrong decision could be reduced significantly.

Benefits of Public Participation

• Environmental rhetoric and discourse
• Media and Environmental Journalism
• Public Participation in Environmental decision making
• Social marketing and Advocacy campaigns
• Environmental collaboration and conflict resolution
• Risk communication
• Representations of nature in popular culture and green marketing

Areas of Study & Practice

• Must watch- 'Green practices in Stephen's'
• Apps we enjoy
• Affordable eco-friendly brands we have tried
• Youtube channels/playlists to know more about eco- friendly practices we can adapt.

The Way Forward- Our Green List

Thanks!