By Maeve Hogel
“We won’t let you down. You’ll see.” are the bold words that 26 year old Kathy Jetnil-Kijiner uses to end her spoken word poem about climate change that she preformed at the Unite Nations Summit on climate change on September 23. Written to her son, she talks about the effects of climate change on the lives of all of those living in many different island areas around the world. She calls everyone to action to join the battle against climate to change and to start fighting. Her words and her message are incredibly powerful and her poem is a great reminder of the importance of spreading the word about climate change in different ways. The graphs, the data and the scientific statistics are incredibly important, but for many people they are difficult to understand and impossible to see their importance. The use of art, of poetry, of music, or of pictures is a way to spread the message in a entirely different way to touch an entirely different audience. It allows us to see the effects and to feel the emotion of those most affected. Kathy Jetnil-Kijiner is an impressive example of how powerful the climate change message can be.
It is so interesting to see the different ways climate change action can be expressed through artistic methods. I think these artistic expressions are able to captivate and persuade a different demographic. The use of scientific terminology and information doesn’t always engage people who are more empathetic or less educated in the field of science. But, these spoken words from a mother to her son is a very relatable topic where you can feel the emotion. Some people don’t believe things until they can identify with their senses, these powerful expressions can hit some of the ‘naysayers’ on an emotional level. It almost reminds me of an advertising scheme, we must be able to cater towards all different groups of people in order to promote climate change action.