Earth Beat: Three-minute Green

摘要

Are The Oprah Winfrey Show, The Today Show, and Robert Red-ford's cable TV effort, The Green, a sorry lineup of fluff-ball venues for dabbling in feel-good environmentalism, or brave new birthplaces of an eco-literate America? Journalist Simran Sethi, who got her start as an anchor for MTV News and has wowed day-time television audiences (and now hosts the Sundance Channel's The Green), makes the case that green issues are for everyone. (Before you even think of pigeonholing her, note that the MBA-toting Sethi teaches environmental communications at the University of Kansas's School of Journalism and Mass Communications and is penning a tome on environmental justice for HarperCollins.) Sierra spoke with Sethi about what it takes to "expand the conversation" about the environment from dorm lounges in college towns to living rooms across America. We have about two or three minutes to tell the story, and the information is new to many people in the audience. The language of broadcast journalists calls for asserting things in short sound bites without hesitation or uncertainty. But we have to grapple with the language of scientists, who don't speak with that same level of certainty.