“There are no passengers on Spaceship Earth. We are all crew.” ~Marshall McLuhan, 1964

Lauren Sanger, Marketing Manager at Robertson Languages International, takes a look at the history, culture, and awareness of this celebrated day.

On April 22, 1970, 20 million people across America marked the first Earth Day, celebrating the planet and peacefully demonstrating their frustration with widespread pollution and environmental degradation. Today over 500 million people in 175 countries participate in Earth Day events each year. The aim is to raise awareness of the threat to Earth’s natural beauty as increasing amounts of greenhouse gasses are pumped into the Earth’s atmosphere.

In addition, Earth Day aims to extend the definition of ‘environment’ to include issues surrounding health, community activities, reforestation and combating air and water pollution. Some of the core projects that the Earth Day campaign promotes currently include the Green Schools Campaign and Women and The Green Economy (WAGE). The core project of 2011 is called A Billion Acts of Green®. This calls for all people, individuals or corporations of all sizes to measurably reduce their carbon emissions.

Earth Day is celebrated in a variety of ways across the globe. For instance, in Thailand it is a deeply religious event, where 100,000 Buddhist monks from 30,000 temples gather for mass meditation to promote world peace by achieving inner peace. In Canada, celebrations are focussed on collective environmentalism – the whole community comes together to address local environmental issues.

What can we do?

The Earth Day Network consists of 22,000 partners, 192 countries and 1 billion supporters worldwide. Within this staggering network, learning a multitude of languages can only benefit the objectives of the Earth Day Network and break down barriers of communication which may inhibit the progress of the message they promote. At Robertson Languages International we do our bit to support the efforts that the Earth Day celebrations promote. Online learning programs for language training reduce carbon emissions by reducing unnecessary travel; digital learning tools reduce the amount of paper consumed.

For solutions that are accurate, professional and delivered on time. Robertson Languages International has been providing language and cultural awareness training since 1989. You can be assured you will only work with trainers and translators who are experienced, qualified and dedicated to successfully meeting your needs and delivering projects on time every time.