Downwind: Articulation and Appropriation of Social Movement Discourse

Abstract

This essay examines the transformation of ideographs as they are passed from one social movement organization to another. The processes of articulation and appropriation are presented as a means of understanding which circumstances allow for a successful conveyance of discourse. A case study of “downwinder” discourse is offered as a means of analyzing this process and its effect on the construction of identity and place.

Notes

Local toxins are a concern for an increasing number of people in the United States. In his 1996 nomination acceptance speech, President Clinton announced, “Today 10 million children live within just four miles of a toxic waste dump” (“The Democrats,” 1996, p. A20). A decade later, one in four Americans lived within four miles of a designated toxic-waste site (Clayton, 2006), with the number of children (0–14 years old) totaling a little over 15 million (http://factfinder.census.gov/home/saff/main.html?_lang=en).

Kinsella and Mullen, in their excellent discussion of Hanford Downwinders, chart the creation of the downwinder community identity in five stages: “initial awareness, early self-organization, identification with a broader discursive and political community, engagement with the secretive and technocratic frames of public nuclear discourse, and the development of a public voice and policy influence” (2007, p. 76). Though they do not use the term, these stages can also be understood as the normalization of the articulation of “Hanford identity/place” to “downwind.” This analysis adds a sixth stage in the articulation-normalization evolution in which the now normalized rhetoric is appropriated by organizations with similar goals.

Social movement organizations are individual groups within a movement. They share characteristics of a movement in that they are often loosely organized, do not evolve in any particular fashion, do not have one leader or timeline, and do not attempt to obtain a well-defined goal with one particular strategy as is seen in campaigns (Stewart, Smith, & Denton, 2001, 6).

Other oppositional strategies include the use of image events (DeLuca, 1999b) and melodrama (Schwarze, 2006). Trumbo (2000) argues for the importance of interpersonal factors such as social comparison and persuasive arguments as a means of amplifying and attenuating risk.

The decision to examine an environmental conflict that took place in the 1980s and early 1990s is important for understanding community-level pollution disputes. The period saw the explosion of the Union Carbide plant in Bhopal, India, the Chernobyl disaster, Love Canal and the discovery of a growing hole in the ozone over Antarctica. The nation-wide coverage of the poisoning of the residents of Love Canal, New York, convinced many Americans that what they did not know about the industries surrounding them could be deadly. In conjunction with the growing alarm, the 1980s were also a time of great growth for community environmental groups. In response to a belief that the big 10 environmental organizations were losing touch with local needs, Sale (1993) notes that twenty-five million Americans were involved in environmental issues at the local level by 1988.

This type of transitory activism is common in antitoxin disputes. “Local toxics organizations tend to be short-lived; they are likely to come together around a particular issue, and once that fight is over, disband” (Epstein, 1995, p. 4).

Arguments made through the articulation of Spokane to downwind were perhaps the most easily addressed by the city and county governors and facility managers. In technocratic models of risk communication, industry is seen as having the scientific and technological “facts” of the situation, which they present to an “uneducated public” (see Grabill & Simmons, 1998; Clark & Freudenburg, 1993; Rowan, 1991 for discussions of risk communication). Even when taking bias into account, industry has the benefit of being able to claim expertise as to how its own technologies work.

The Associated Press provides an extended example of the emphasis on identity and victimization in the normalized articulation of downwinder:

• During a hearing earlier this month, the downwinders testified in front of representatives of the National Academy of Sciences … Under current procedures Idaho downwinders have to wait for Congress to decide whether they should be included in the compensation program ….

• The letter suggests the government should compensate downwinders not only for medical bills, but also for pain and suffering. The same act that compensates downwinders $50,000 pays miners—who knowingly assume some risk with the job—$150,000.

• The letter suggests a higher level of compensation for downwinders. (“Downwinders,” 2004, para. 8–18).

For example, organizations using the term “downwind” in their title reference the people involved in their groups as “members of Downwinders” or as a person who “sits on the board of Downwinders at Risk” (Aaron, 2003, p. B9) not as “downwinders” themselves.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Jennifer Ann Peeples

Jennifer Ann Peeples, Department of Languages, Philosophy and Speech, Utah State University.