In her recent speech at the UN Climate Action Summit 2019 in New York City on September 23, Greta Thunberg rages against the world leaders and their inability to work for the climate. Greta Thunberg is the 16-year old Swedish girl activist, who fearlessly revolts against conservative authority and power to combat climate change. In this post, I explore the genius-ness of Greta Thunberg. I use Thunberg to illustrate what a girl genius is and how the synergy of Thunberg and mass media, through her status of media’s pet, constructs her position of girl genius as well as connecting Thunberg with my ongoing dissertation on the girl genius in new stories of “Little Red Riding Hood.” I will start by examining the media attention and girl particularity of Thunberg. After this, I demonstrate how she matches the definition of the girl genius. I conclude the discussion by linking the genius-ness of Thunberg with my ongoing study.
“People are suffering. People are dying. Entire eco systems are collapsing. We are in the beginning of a mass extinction, and all you can talk about is money and fairy tales of eternal economic growth, how dare you.”
– Greta Thunberg, UN Climate Action Summit 2019
The synergy of media spectacle and girl particularity
Through PR coverage in media, Thunberg broadcasts her originality to the world. Since her first plea for a greener world at the 2018 United Nations Climate Change Conference in December 2018, the phenomenon Greta Thunberg has quickly risen into a media spectacle. I use Douglas Kellner’s (2009) definition of media spectacle to indicate the technologically mass mediated attention of Thunberg’s case for a sustainable world, which draws on her valor and particularity of activist, environmentalist, young, female, disabled and powerless (resulting from being underage). In her emotional speeches, marches and school strikes for the climate around the world, Greta is not afraid of being unpopular and using her girl particularity to build her environmental case against the global leaders, who for the majority consist of old powerful males.
Starting from the marginalized and powerless position assumed by schoolchildren in society, Greta Thunberg first rose to the headlines in August 2018 after launching a school strike for the climate outside the Swedish Parliament in Stockholm, Sweden. One year later, she marches – and in her latest expedition, sails – around the world to raise awareness about climate change in her yellow raincoat that together with the slogan “skolstrejk för klimatet” (school strike for the climate) has become her trademark.
Greta boldly displays her girl particularity in media through her speeches and physical appearance. Her speech at the 2018 UN Climate Change COP24 Conference builds on the intersections of age, gender and powerless through the repetition of the words “small” and “children,” exemplified in the phrases “you are never too small to make a difference” and “if a few children can get headlines all over the world just by not going to school” (Thunberg 2018). In addition, she indicates her female gender through the futuristic role of mother in the phrase “if I have children… maybe they will ask about you” and questions the global leadership’s ability to love in the phrase “you say you love your children … yet you are stealing their future” and care “[w]e have not come here to beg world leaders to care. You have ignored us” (Thunberg 2018). Unafraid, she repetitively draws on her young age by using a vocabulary that alludes to children, such as “fairy tales,” “young people,” “school” and her “stolen… childhood” when addressing the audience at the UN Climate Action Summit 2019 (Thunberg 2019).
"It is the sufferings of the many which pay for the luxuries of the few." – Thunberg 2018
"And you are still not mature enough to tell it like it is. … You say you hear us and that you understand the urgency. But no matter how sad and angry I am, I do not want to believe that. Because if you really understood the situation and still kept on failing to act, then you would be evil. ... You are failing us." – Thunberg 2019
In addition, Greta turns the tables of these same differences that set her apart from the global leaders by correcting them for acting like immature, lazy, corrupt and evil schoolboys in her UN speeches exemplified in the two intended quotes shown above. Her work of activist and environmentalist is also highlighted in frequent references to the current climate crisis, which indicates Greta's concern and closeness to nature. In addition to the earlier described intersections of age, gender and power, the intersection of nature further divides her from the global leadership, which in Greta's opinion, ignores the environment. What is more, her visual appearance of schoolgirl adds to the media spectacle. Appearing in front of the audience and cameras at the UN climate summits all natural in ordinary clothes, without makeup, and neatly braided hair, which may remind the audience of a young Laura Ingalls in the television series Little House on the Prairie, further accentuates her girl particularity.
In a similar way, media showcases the differences of age, gender, power and disability between Greta and the global leadership to create spectacle. The recent headline “Trump and conservatives go after Greta Thunberg following UN climate change speech” in NBC News by Elizabeth Thomas visualizes these differences by publishing an image that shows Thunberg and POTUS Donald Trump when entering the summit. In the text, Thomas (2019) criticizes the conservative leadership of the US for discrediting Thunberg and climate change through name-calling propaganda. For instance, (in)famous for his conservative take on climate change, Trump sarcastically referred to Thunberg as “a very happy young girl” in a personal tweet from the climate conference. The same evening, Daily Wire’s Michael Knowles personally attacked Thunberg by calling her “a mentally ill Swedish child” on Fox News and by this, referring to her disability of the Asperger Syndrome in a demeaning way (Thomas 2019). What Knowles discredits as a mental disability in an attempt to degrade and disempower, Greta calls her "superpower" (Thomas 2019).
Empowered by mass media, the world watches Greta. Her initiative has influenced millions of children and adults globally. While a few of the spectators consider her insane, many wishes that someday, too, they would master the courage to stand up and act. However, for the majority, someday turns into never because since their childhood, society has discouraged them from seeking out and expressing their particularity – the differences which make them unique in the world. Instead, you must be normal, said society: You must numb and hide your differences in favor of dominating societal values, laws and authority. The take home message from philosopher, therapist, author (and feminist) Julia Kristeva is that today everyone is capable of developing their particularity. However, are you willing to do the work? Are you brave enough to be different?
Greta defines the girl genius
Through her valor of displaying her uniqueness to the world, Greta Thunberg is the quintessence of the girl genius. The girl genius is my adaptation of Julia Kristeva’s the female genius, which Kristeva outlined in her essay “Is There A Feminine Genius” (2004). With the girl genius, I mean a girl’s particularity, the ecceitas of a girl which makes her fundamentally unique and different and makes her into her, which raises her above normality and the ordinariness of the world and through which she surpasses herself in her field to become the most fruitful, appealing and complex version of herself in a particular socio-historical context and time. Corollary, Greta’s genius-ness builds on her girl particularity that I have discussed in this post: activist, environmentalist, young, (school)girl, disabled and power(less) together with valor, creativity and hard work.
In addition to fitting the definition of girl genius, Greta’s advocacy for climate change in her two UN speeches exhibits the three nominators of Kristeva’s female genius: object relation, the intoxication with life and the experience of time as rebirth. First, Greta’s fight for the climate points to the human-nature relationship which reveals an increased object relation through her dependence on and closeness to the Other, which in Greta’s case is nature. Second, Greta’s passionate willingness to think, question, criticize and revolt indicate a heightened intoxication with life because these qualities renew the link between life and meaning and give meaning to life (see Kristeva 2004; see also Hansen 2014: 160 –161). By displaying these qualities, by marrying thought with life, Greta tells her story of climate change and suffering to the world. Third, the combination of nature and a futuristic motherhood reveals Greta’s understanding of time as rebirth – what dies, renews. This means that nothing ever leaves. Everything transforms and comes around in a new form. This idea is also at the foundation of sustainability.
Conclusion: How Greta’s genius-ness links with the girl geniuses in my research
In this post, I have discussed the genius-ness of Greta Thunberg in combination with mass media attention through her girl particularity of young, power(less), (school)girl together with activist, environmentalist and disabled. I have used Greta as an example to define the girl genius and demonstrated what a girl genius may be in 2019. With the help of media, personal valor, creativity and hard work, Greta has developed her girl particularity and by this, raised her agency, power and subjectivity in order to influence others to stop climate change. As a further indication of her genius-ness, Greta recently won the Alternative Nobel Prize 2019 for her climate change advocacy awarded by the Right Lively Hood Foundation. As importantly, through her girl particularity, valor and work for the climate, Greta the genius connects to my ongoing research on 10 fictive girl geniuses in equally many new stories of “Little Red Riding Hood.” In the same vein as Greta, the girl geniuses in my study start out small and powerless in the role of schoolgirls but instead of shrinking, standing down or giving up, they work through their particular trials, challenges and obstacles to correct wrongdoing. Instead of hiding, each one an activist in their own context displays their girl particularity and genius-ness to create a better, more inclusive and greener world.
You can read more about me and my research on my website, in my article “Woman in Red and the Abject in Unni Lindell’s Crime Thriller Rødhette” (2016). Also, remember to check out my visual research results and give me feedback.
References
Kellner, Douglas (2009). Media Spectacle and Media Events: Some Critical Reflections. [Online]. UCLA. [Cited 1.10.19] Available at: https://pages.gseis.ucla.edu/faculty/
Hansen, Sarah K (2010). Zoe, bios and the language of biopower. [Online] Vanderbilt University. [Cited 2.10.2019] Available at: https://etd.library.vanderbilt.edu/available/etd-07232010-134550/unrestricted/Hansen_DissertationFinal.pdf
Kristeva, Julia (2004). Is There a Feminine Genius? [Online] JStor. [Cited 1.10.2019] Available at: https://jstor.org./stable/10.1086/421159
The Right Livelihood Foundation (2019). 2019 Right Livelihood Award Laureates Announced. [Online] The Right Livelihood Award. [Cited 2.10.2019] Available at: https://www.rightlivelihoodaward.org/media/2019-right-livelihood-award-laureates-announced/
Thomas, Elizabeth (2019). “Trump and conservatives go after Greta Thunberg following UN climate change speech.” [Online] ABC News. [Cited 2.10.2019] Available at: https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/trump-conservatives-greta-thunberg-climate-change-speech/story?id=65821012
Thunberg, Greta (2018). Greta Thunberg full speech at the UN Climate Change COP24 Conference. [Video] Climate Change. [Cited 2.10.2019] Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VFkQSGyeCWg
Thunberg, Greta (2019). Transcript: Greta Thunberg's Speech at The U.N. Climate Action Summit, [Video] npr. [Cited 1.10.2019] Available at: https://www.npr.org/2019/09/23/
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