What’s in a word?: The rhetoric surrounding the Deepwater Horizon disaster

By Cutler Cleveland, originally published by Energy Bulletin

June 5, 2010

NOTE: Images in this archived article have been removed.

A word cloud or (tag cloud) is a visual representation of the relative frequency of words used in a document, speech, article, etc. The cloud gives greater prominence to words that appear more frequently in the source text. Word clouds can provide insight into the explicit and implicit messages that underlie proclamations.

Below are four word clouds:

  1. The entire text of all press releases by BP, April 21- June 2, 2010 on the Deepwater Horizon incident, as published at http://www.bp.com
    Image Removed

  2. The entire text of all official statements by the White House on the Deepwater Horizon incident, April 21- June 1, 2010, as published at http://www.whitehouse.gov/ Image Removed
  3. The entire text of all official statements made by Jack Gerard, president of the American Petroleum Institute, on the Deepwater Horizon incident, April 21- June 1, 2010, as published at http://blog.energytomorrow.org/
  4. The entire text of all press releases by Greenpeace USA on the Deepwater Horizon incident, April 21- June 1, 2010, as published at http://www.greenpeace.org/usa/press-center/releases2

The word “disaster” figures prominently in the White House and Greenpeace text, but is virtually absent from the API and BP statements. “Accident” and “incident” show up instead in the API and BP statements.

The BP press releases emphasize terms such as “response,” “efforts,” and “containment,” reflecting their desire to demonstrate the strength of their response. The Greenpeace text emphasizes “drilling” and “Arctic,” reflecting their attempt to use the Deepwater Horizon accident in the organization’s campaign to limit oil and gas exploration in Alaska.

API uses terms such as “security,” “workers,” “economic,” and “affordable,” reflecting the industry’s emphasis on the role of oil in the economy and national security.

The White House uses terms such as “assistance,” “responsible,” “affected,” “response,” and “liability,” reflecting its desire to appear to be on top of the situation, and its stated intent to hold BP responsible.

Read more about the Deepwater Horizon tragedy
in the Encyclopedia of Earth:
http://www.eoearth.org/article/Deepwater_Horizon_oil_spill

Cutler Cleveland

Tags: Deepwater Oil, Fossil Fuels, Oil

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