Transmission

OK, so I’m a little behind the times. I just watched An Inconvenient Truth last night and whoa. It seems the effects of Global Warming will soon be of apocalyptic proportions. I beseech ya’ll to take an active step to reduce carbon emissions, or at least netflick the movie and experience the revelation for yourself. One place to start is climatecrisis.net. New Yorkers, Con Ed offers 100% wind power for your home.

As springtime blooms again, it’s time for us to start thinking about how we can renew the earth, as she renews us.

PS, while I have your attention, check out the Abstract of a paper my friend, Jackie, did at the Society of Biblical Literature annual meeting in 2006.

Averting the Apocalypse: The Horrors of Global Warming and the Rhetorical Power of the End
Program Unit: John’s Apocalypse and Cultural Contexts Ancient and Modern
Jacqueline Hidalgo, Claremont Graduate University

In the Fall of 2005, Al Gore lectured in Los Angeles about global warming as part of the production of the new documentary, An Inconvenient Truth. Gore compared some of the horrible plagues imagined in John’s Apocalypse to the horrific repercussions of global warming around the world, repercussions which Gore demonstrated in a complex narrative of photographs, tables, and film clips. Through a focus on Gore’s rhetoric of averting the global warming apocalypse, this paper explores the enduring prominence and power of the Apocalypse as it may be encountered throughout the US political imaginary. It is often recognized that Conservative Christians in the U.S.A. have used the horrific imagery of the Apocalypse in combination with the promise of an imminent End in order to shape politics, identities, and cultures. Many occupying different parts of the political Left have likewise turned to narratives of impending environmental doom and/or political totalitarianism. Given that such a variety of groups deploy these counterpoised apocalypticisms, what does this suggest about the social power of apocalyptic narratives over the social realities of different people? Successful deployment of the Apocalypse, and specifically of its horrors and end-time imagination, has been a significant source of social power for those who pursue it, and those who perceive themselves to be in situations of social distress often invoke apocalyptic rhetoric. Gore serves as an interesting example against this backdrop. Although he is part of the political mainstream, his speech comes at a time when many on the political Left feel disenfranchised. Is apocalyptic rhetoric most popular with groups who perceive themselves as disempowered or is it just such a central part of the US cultural imagination that it is hard to conceive of a historical trajectory outside of the Apocalypse?

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