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Season 3, Episode 6: A Climate Vocabulary with Herb SimmensThis episode found Thomas and Panu in dialogue with Herb Simmens, a long time advocate for addressing climate issues in local government, and author of the compendium of climate-related terms, A Climate Vocabulary of the Future. What kind of new words could be useful to make sense of living in the midst of climate change?LinksHerb SimmensA Climate Vocabulary of the Future, 2nd EditionBureau of Linguistic Reality Glenn Albrecht on Negative and Positive Earth EmotionsFinnish art project Utopedia. Inventing new words related to environmental futures (in Finnish)TranscriptTranscript edited for clarity and brevity. Thomas Doherty: Well, hello, I'm Thomas Doherty.Panu Pihkala: And I am Panu Pihkala. Doherty: And welcome to Climate Change and Happiness, our podcast, the show for people around the world who are thinking and feeling deeply about global climate change and all the other environmental issues that we can be aware of, and that affect us in our personal lives, in our daily lives. And like we say, we're all emotions all the time. So we really try to make a place for all our different feelings and our thoughts, and maybe our actions as well. And we have a guest today with us:Herb Simmens: I am Herb Simmens, from Washington, DC, and the author of A Climate Vocabulary of the Future.Doherty: Yeah, so we're really … We've been chatting with Herb and we love words here at this podcast, feelings words, concepts, and Herb has a whole book of an incredible lexicon of climate words. And we know this is one broad approach that people do to make sense of this big issue is trying to get the vocabulary of it. And I personally, as a lover of words, appreciate exploring an area through its vocabulary. So we're going to talk about that today. And you listeners can think about how this is landing for you. And you might also check out Herb’s book as well as kind of a guide, as an accessible guide to a lot of different really interesting concepts about climate change. Panu, do you want to get us started?Pihkala: Warmly welcome, Herb, very glad to have you here. And we share a love also, for crafting words. I've done that mostly in the Finnish language, which functions so that we often put words together and of course, then you may also mix them a bit. And I see some similar things happening with English also in your book. And, but let us start with sort of roots and history. So could you share a bit about your own journey? What brought you to do this kind of creative, multifaceted work around climate issues?Simmens: Well, thanks and I really appreciate the opportunity to be here today. I've really enjoyed the podcasts that I've listened to. I sort of grew up in the era and at least in the United States, when public policy and when government was looked at positively. Some of your listeners at a younger age may feel that … may be surprised to even hear that such an era existed. But, in the 1960s with then President John F. Kennedy [who said] “Ask not what your country can do for you,” you know, “what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country?” And as a result, I got involved in … I studied public policy, and worked in state and local government for many years. And I was actually the, the manager of a town in New Jersey, back in 1988, when Jim Hansen, the now famous climate scientist, appeared before Congress and said, “Global warming is real, and we have to pay attention to it.” And I remember, even back then discussing it with people in my town, what do we need to prepare for? And over the years, I continued to be involved in various ways, running a small nonprofit that was a consortium of New Jersey's colleges and universities focused on climate. I had the opportunity to help get the county that I live in right outside of Washington create or adopt the first climate emergency in the United States and the second in the world in 2017, and a whole bunch of other things that I won't take the time on now. But you know, in the last … a few years ago, it struck me that, what's maybe sort of obvious to me and to some people, but it wasn't to everybody back then, was the climate affects everything. I mean, you could sort of do it like a parlor game and just pick a topic or a word and say, “How does climate connect to this?” you know, and sooner or later, you'd be able to figure out a connection. And so I thought, well, since climate affects everything and sadly not that we wanted to, climate being climate change, that it's important for us to label what's happening, both to educate people and to stimulate people to have their emotions activated, if you will, because it's so important to identify what's going on. And plus, I just always have loved playing with words. So I basically wrote the first edition of the book, and in 2017, it had about 400 terms, half of which are original. And then I sort of put it aside, I didn't want to deal with words for years. I was like … and I dealt with other aspects. And then two years ago, I thought, it's time for an update. And to my amazement, I thought I would, you know, add 100 words. But I added another four or five hundred words and terms. And here we are today. And I guess the fact that I added so many terms, sadly, is an indication of how much more pressing and huge climate is as a problem.Doherty: Yeah, so are you from New Jersey originally?Simmens: From Philly [Philadelphia] across the river from Jersey.Doherty: Yeah. So that one's one strand to talk about a little bit. It's just this background, because, you know, Philadelphia, broadly, New Jersey, you know … here I'm in Portland, Oregon, which is known as an environmental consciousness kind of town, but for whatever reason, New Jersey or Philadelphia might not necessarily be seen as environmental hotbeds. But, that's not really true, right? You've been aware. The point I'm trying to make is that there are people aware of climate change, and have been aware of climate change for many, many years, and in all parts of the country and all parts of the world. So you've seen climate change, as an issue in local city government, state government for decades and decades?Simmens: Well, you know, I would like to be able to say that I agree with your statement, but I'm not sure I can say that, because it's mostly been a non-issue when it should have been an issue. And that's what I've seen is the level of indifference, minimization, denial, you know, name your word, speaking of words. And I'll just very briefly give you an example here in Montgomery County, Maryland, where our community literally declared an emergency and set the toughest greenhouse gas emission reduction target in the country, maybe the world of an 80% reduction countywide by 2027. And it has been an important issue in the county, but nowhere near an emergency. The distinction between another important issue, like taxes are important and good schools are important, you know, at that level, as opposed to, we've got to put this first because our future is in line. It hasn't happened here. And I haven't seen it happen pretty much anywhere in the country.Doherty: Yeah, so it's both-and. I talk to young people a lot, and they think this issue is new, but like yourself, you've been living with this issue for years. It was almost 30 years between Hansen and when you all did the climate emergency. So I just want to just make sure that we shout out to listeners who have been working on this for years and just honor that. That's the piece I want to honor here.Simmens: Absolutely. There's so many people that put their hearts and souls into this issue for, as you say, for years, if not decades. And you know, it's been lonely. It's been, you know, you could have a whole vocabulary and you maybe you have had shows about this, you know, the emotional price that one pays, when one is sort of looked at as a kind of Cassandra, or one is looked at as this Doomsayer. When you know … and then you never want to be in a position 5 or 10 or 15 years later saying, “You know, I was right. You know, things are … we did need to act 10 years ago, or 20 years ago, or 5 years ago, whatever.” So it's very emotionally draining to have been in that position. To honor, I mean, it's critically important to honor those folks as you suggest, and to recognize the price that many of us have paid.Pihkala: Yeah, I think that's a very important point. And I've been working mostly in Finland publicly in this, ecological emotions, and especially ecoanxiety in the Finnish form, which is more like “environment-anxiety” (ympäristöahdistus). And that has led to some interesting discussions with people who have been aware of ecological issues and sometimes climate issues for decades. And now finding some validation because there are public discourses about psychological toll. Of course, there is also, you know, feelings of honor to be had when, you know, that you are trying to work for the right things. So there's always a complex mix of emotions and one of the new words in my Finnish book is “suojelijakiitollisuus,” which is quite technical, it literally means “gratitude about those who have participated in nature protection.” It's more of a pedagogical word, you know, drawing attention that it is a source of gratitude for me, and I know for many others, those people who had to work sometimes in much more difficult circumstances than now, psychosocially speaking. Of course, it's not easy still. And we have, in some places growing identity polarization around climate issues, for example, But anyway, just resonating with some of these things. And does this remind you of some of the concepts in your book?Simmens: Well, I mean, there are many concepts in my book that span the whole range of, you know, sort of climate, climate emotions, if you will. I mean …maybe I can mention just a couple of the terms that I'm not sure, you know, I'm not sure how much on target they are with what you're saying, but they're sort of in the ballpark. One of the things is, because of the nature that those of us who are involved, essentially have a pretty good sense of what's going to come and maybe how bad it's going to be, but not necessarily when and how and where is the level of uncertainty. So I came up with the concept of an “antemortem,” where you're basically…mortem being death, essentially, you're in anticipation, you're sort of anticipating or analyzing what may happen, and sort of grieving in advance. You know, because today if you are where I am, it's a beautiful day. It's 80 degrees Fahrenheit, and you know, the world is wonderful. It's .. there's a kind of hidden, you know… Here's another one … the “false climate summit.” For those who are mountain climbers know that often in certain large mountains, you get up there, and you think you're at the summit, but you're not, there's another one behind it. So, I coined the term “false climate summit” that we know we've made a certain degree of progress, or we've gotten through this, [and we say] “Oh, my God, there's another one,” you know, “where am I then going to get the … candy bars and the energy bars and the emotional support to get to the next summit? You know, that kind of thing. And another one is what I call “bifocal behavior,” the idea that climate almost requires the same way with people with certain kinds of glasses, to be able to look at the distance, and to look at what's now at the same time. We can't take our eyes off of the, you know, the sort of the future 30 years from now, or else we won't achieve it. But if that's all we look at, and we don't deal with the opportunities and the pain and the suffering and the grief and the confusion, then we will have failed or at least not succeeded. So anyway, those are a few terms I'll just throw out. You're going to have to stop me because I got 1000 In the book, and you only have a few minutes! But what you know is that, you know, those are a few that cover various dimensions of climate and, you know, sort of the emotional landscape.Doherty: Yeah, … it's great. I have to make a note about this idea of [false summit]. As someone who's been a mountain climber, the idea of a false summit, I know what that is. We… we've been climbing for hours, like Mount Adams, near where I live is a big mountain we all can see. And it has a very notorious false summit when you're the first time climbing up there. But they tell you there is but you don't believe it until you see it. And when you get up to this … precipice, you think that must be the top, and then you get to this and then you see a whole other set of the mountain, and little tiny ants up on the side of the mountain, which are the other people that are far ahead of you. Yes, we love to do wordplay here. But you know, “False Climate Summit” is also a play on words about some of these meetings that we have, like the upcoming COP. I think a lot of people would think that's a “false summit,” in the sense of it's already sort of infiltrated by fossil fuel interests and things like that. Simmens: Oh, I don't know how you can say that, Thomas! [laughs] The fact that it's being led by the head of the oil company, the head of a Middle Eastern oil power, you know, oh, you're much too cynical!Doherty: Yeah. So humor is our friend, if we can if we can find humor. But you know, so I'm curious of where you find your words. I imagine you're always on the hunt. There's some of your words that are very pop cultural, which I like. Like there's an entry called “So Holocene,” which is a great, great kind of pop culture term. So the idea that the Holocene is this traditional geological age that we've become accustomed to as humans, and now that's changing because of climate change to a different geological regime, you know, in the planet. That's the Holocene era that we're mourning the loss of. But to say something’s “So Holocene” that means it's kind of like “so yesterday.” It's “so 90s.” …It's so quaint that you're, you know, so when we make our summer plans, and we think we're going to do a certain thing. “Oh that it is ‘So Holocene’ that you think you're just going to make some plans, and there's not going to be wildfire smoke or a flood or something like that.” Do you know where you got that term “So Holocene” from?Simmens: I think that one I found online somewhere, maybe Twitter, I don't know. You know, I distinguish in the book, I have a sort of a special dot or mark for those terms that, as far as I know, are original with me. At least when I do a Google search … they didn't show up as a climate term. And those that I basically …you know, taking out of the reading I do and whatever. But generally, I mean, most of what I've done is simply to, as I'm reading, if I'll read a paragraph in a book, and it may not even be about climate, and I think, you know, the author is taking a whole paragraph or a whole page to explain this concept. There should be a word or a term for this. And so that's what I'll do is sort of scribble on the side of the book and say, you know, maybe a couple of different terms. And that's how I, and also, when I'm walking here, I'm not a mountain climber, but walking and hiking. You know, I basically, I guess, my experience is enriched by looking at the relationships between the plants and the animals and the birds and the sounds. And then, who knows where…
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