GoTriple - Patterns of Protestant Ethics and Modern Culture in Greta Thunberg’s Public Appearances

authors

Contributors

University of Lodz,

Jaroslaw Pluciennik (born 1966) He is a full professor of the humanities, a student of cognitive analysis, doctor of cultural and literary criticism and theory, the editor-in-chief of an academic journal. He used to be a Pro-Vice-Chancellor (Pol. prorektor) in charge of curricula and quality assurance and enhancement at one of the largest universities in Poland, University of Łódź (2012-2016). Then, he functioned as Rectors' Poxy for Open Educational Resources (2016-August 2020). He has graduated from the University of Lodz. He has also studied at the University of Lund, Sweden. He researched at the University of Cambridge, UK and in many higher education institutions in Europe. He was the local coordinator of an Erasmus Multilateral Project called The iProfessional (iPro), and an Erasmus+ Project entitled Boys Reading, and an Erasmus+ Project DIGI.COM/YOUTH. Currently, a Polish co-ordinator of the Erasmus + project called Language Learning on Mobile devices He worked as university CEO on curricula, quality of education, e-learning and recruitment. He is recently doing research focused on the act of reading, from the comparative and cognitive perspective and educational technology (especially iphonology and MOOCs) as well as the idea of the university. He did study and research in cognitive semantics and literary culture as well as reformation. He is now teaching cultural studies at MA seminars in Journalism and Communication Studies at the University of Łódź and PhD Studies in Language, Literature and Culture.,

jaroslaw.pluciennik@uni.lodz.pl

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Publisher

Universitatea Babes-Bolyai, Catedra de Filosofie Sistematica

Abstract

The 16 year old Swedish girl from Stockholm in the year 2019 was created by media as a suitable candidate for the Nobel Peace Prize and recognized as one of the most influential people of the year 2019. Her ecological message focusing on global climate changes is one of the most exciting phenomena in socio-political life in the European context of the second decade of the 21st century. She grew up in influential, artistic but also a typical Swedish family, deeply rooted in the Swedish tradition. Greta becomes a symbol of the climatological movement; she arranges a climate protest called School strike for climate, Fridays for Climate or Fridays for Future (FFF). The article describes the Lutheran patterns and the roots of Greta Thunberg’s ecological activity. We analyze the imagery tied to her public appearances and interpret the analysis with a protestant ideology in the background. First, we try to understand why Greta Thunberg is sometimes called a prophetess: even the prime archbishop of Sweden Antje Jeckelen called her attitude prophetic. We will argue that there are some traces of apocalyptic imagery and rhetoric behind her statements. We compare them with some public appearances of her parents Malena Ernman and Svante Thunberg as well as Naomi Klein. Then we trace the family background of Greta which is rooted in Swedish patterns of the Protestant ”vita activa”. The last part is a review of the criticism of modernity present in the Greta’s speeches and writings as well as her parents’ writings. We will indicate some precedents in music and film framing this analysis with the musical family roots of 17-years old Greta.