David Attenborough's speech to world leaders at the COP26 UN Climate Summit:
(Link to text:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o7EpiXViSIQ&ab_channel=UnitedNations).
David Attenborough, famous for narrating television shows about animals and insects, presented a speech to world leaders at the COP26 UN Climate Summit on Monday, November 1, 2021 in Glasgow, Scotland.
The speech was given during the opening ceremony of the summit.
COP26, or the 26th United Nations Climate Change Conference, was a global summit.
The summit brought together countries that signed the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) to accelerate action on climate change.
The speech was formally presented.
The vocabulary use of simple, easy to understand wording with such lines as, Is this how our story is due to end? A tale of the smartest species doomed by that all-too-human characteristic of failing to see the bigger picture, in pursuit of short-term goals? really got the point across and didnt leave any confusion to the audience.
It is sad that humanity can not work together to solve this issue. Although, personally I believe in the bible's take on the matter which is found in the bible at Revelations 11:18 in the form of a prophecy. But the nations became wrathful, and your own wrath came, and the appointed time came for the dead to be judged and to reward your slaves the prophets and the holy ones and those fearing your name, the small and the great, and to bring to ruin those ruining the earth." Another scripture in the bible states that the world will continue on forever, it will never be destroyed, I will discuss the speech and the different text aspects and context involved with the speech. Nine million other Jehovah's witnesses also have this take on climate change.
The social issue that is addressed in this speech is the issue of "Climate change".
The earth's atmosphere is made up of seven different gases and one of these gases is carbon dioxide.
Humans and animals breath out carbon dioxide which is all around us and trees take in that carbon dioxide as well as sunshine to grow and produce more oxygen for us to breath in.
However with carbon dioxide being accumulated at a high measurement. It is producing what is known as the "Greenhouse effect" which means that there is too much heat in the atmosphere. The measurement of cabon dioxide directly effects the global temperature.
With the greenhouse effect, comes more risk of catastrophic weather and droughts causing decline in food resources. The intense weather events include events, such as heat waves, droughts, and storms, which in turn cause more floods and wildfires. There are melting glaciers in the arctic and rising sea levels. If it proceeds to get worst in future, the lives of all mankind may then be threatened.
According to scientists, activists and other spokespeole this could be detrimental to live on earth for both humans and animals.
The use of an active voice by way of command is used in the sentence "We must fix our sights on keeping one and a half degrees within reach". It helps to bring the listener to the purpose of the speech. The purpose of persuading the audience to lower carbon dioxide and any other harmful gases in the atmosphere. The purpose of the speech is to persuade the listeners to make a wise decision about how they will act in regards to climate change as well as inform the listeners of the facts involved and surrounding climate change.
The use of parallel structure with the sentence, "Our burning of fossil fuels our destruction of nature, our approach to industry construction and learning, our releasing carbon into the atmosphere at an unprecedented pace and scale" creates an easy to understand text that really drives the point home, that us humans need to come to a beneficial solution on the issue.
It builds on the introduction of simple, explanatory and informative words such as "Your excellencies, delegates, ladies and gentlemen. As you spend the next two weeks, debating, negotiating, persuading and compromising. As you surely must. It's easy to forget that ultimately, the emergency climate comes down to a single number" by being easy to understand and straight to the point.
The use of rhetorical questions at the end of the speech really demands thinking on the part of the audience. Which brings about a good chain of thoughts to consider and come to a personal conclusion on the issue. The rhetorical questions used are such as, "Did that number stop rising and start to drop, as a result of commitments made here?" and "If working apart, we are a force powerful enough to destabilize our planet, surely, working together, we are powerful enough to save it?"
The issue of climate change is a hotly discussed topic in modern-day times. The World Health Organization has called it the "single biggest health threat facing humanity."
