Thunbergian
Language: English
Part of speech: adj
Forms: form: more Thunbergian
form: most Thunbergian
Etymology: From Thunberg + -ian.
Senses: glosses: Of or relating to Carl Peter Thunberg (1743–1828), Swedish naturalist who collected and described many plants and animals new to European science.
examples: text: When asked if she’ll meet with President Donald Trump, she gave a predictably Thunbergian response: “Why should I waste time talking to him when he, of course, is not going to listen to me?”
ref: 2019 August 16, Michael Fraiman, “Greta Thunberg: A message in a racing yacht”, in Maclean’s, archived from the original on 16 Aug 2019:
text: At present, with China allowed to self-identify as a “developing” nation it can continue merrily to grow its emissions, while tapping into the UN Climate fund to which Australia has contributed almost $200 million. That’s an outrage actually worthy of Thunbergian meltdown.
ref: 2019 September 27, Miranda Devine, “Miranda Devine: Charges should be laid over the abuse of Greta Thunberg”, in The Daily Telegraph, archived from the original on 11 Jan 2023:
text: Not only is Scott a voice crying out in the wilderness, heralding the virtues of the Thunbergian project, but he is an outright evangelist for the faith: “We’re hoping to have other building owners who like this idea and support our objectives and want to have something similar on their buildings.” […] The Thunbergian clergy might claim that the public is functionally illiterate on issues of climate change, but the mural seems to suggest that they are more interested in selling indulgences than in informing the masses of the putative virtues of climate conversion. It might be that the great majority of people are “illiterate” on, for instance, the literature of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
ref: 2019 November 14, John Hirschauer, “An Icon for Saint Greta Thunberg”, in National Review, archived from the original on 12 Nov 2020:
text: Thunbergian activism, along with many other advocates, such as Autumn Peltier (who heartbreakingly asked the Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau for clean water), are figures we should align ourselves with in this fight for our planet.
ref: 2020 January–February, “Moving Forward with Ecofeminism: Find Your Community”, in Amsterdam Alternative, number 28, page 15:
text: So how is the past decade going to be remembered? As the Trumpy 2010s? And what will this new one be like? The Thunbergian 2020s, perhaps?
ref: 2020 January 18, Niall Ferguson, “The people’s decade: how will history come to define the 2010s?”, in The Spectator, archived from the original on 11 Jan 2023:
text: And if we were to heed the Thunbergian call for “immediate” action by halting the extraction of coal, oil, gas, and so forth, the consequences wold^([sic]) be so economically disastrous that all work on new, alternative technologies would cease.
ref: 2020 February 27, “Editorial: Nuclear fears cost planet Earth dearly: ‘Green’ energy spurned”, in Press Enterprise, page 10:
text: “Climanipulation ?” (F1): reason over the “Thunbergian dogma” (F7) / Climate denialists are thought to be dissidents from the climate orthodoxy (C6). The climate emergency is perceived to be “an apocalyptic faith” (C1), a new “eco-religion” unnecessarily catastrophist, namely “ecologism” (A4; B4; C4; D1,2; F7,10,11; G3,4; H1). The IPCC is the “ultimate cult body” (C13) proselytising its “doctrine” (L22). Greta Thunberg is denounced as the “great priestess” (D2; F10; M2), a new “goddess” (L4), a “climatic guru” or an “ecolo-catastrophist shaman” (F7) prophesising as an “oracle” (L4).
ref: 2020 spring, Lise Benoist, “Green is the new brown – Ecology in the metapolitics of the French far right today”, master’s thesis:
text: It inspires me about as much as Thunbergian climate-squeaking and, while not being happy about paying R26 for a small Coke in a local club when two litres is available from Pick n Pay at R11, I do not support price hiking followed by trumped-up […]
ref: 2021 December 1, “Consumers deceived with bargains”, in The Citizen:
text: So long as environmentalism tends to begin with a Thoreauvian (or for that matter, Thunbergian)²⁹ regard for the wild rather than the environmental perspectives of the former, environmentalist movements are fatally locked into an underestimation of their problem. […] 29. I am thinking here about the controversy surrounding the publication of an “all-white” photograph of prominent young climate activists, including Greta Thunberg, which deliberately cropped out the Ugandan climate activist Vanessa Nakate.
ref: 2022 June 27, Jonathan Howard, “Swim your ground: Towards a black and blue humanities”, in Atlantic Studies, →DOI:
text: You may be inclined to dye your hair green, wear a nose ring and subscribe wholeheartedly to those plentiful Thunbergian prophets of impending climatic doom; as the truculent Swedish teen frightens the living daylights out of the big WOKE world. […] Thunbergian ideologists seem to hanker for some kind of pre-industrial, retrograde existence where human achievements are all but unwound, dragging us all back to a Flintstones-like state of cave-dwelling.
ref: 2023 January 7, Douglas Hughes, “Left-Right, Left-Right. It's all a bit dull”, in The Portugal News, archived from the original on 07 Jan 2023:
synonyms: Greta Thunbergian
glosses: Of or relating to Greta Thunberg (born 2003), Swedish environmental activist who is known for challenging world leaders to take immediate action for climate change mitigation.