Kamala Harris’s campaign has been trying to get voters to feel the joy. Speakers at the Democratic National Convention used the word “joy” dozens of times, including when Bill Clinton hailed Ms. Harris as “the president of joy.”

But how do voters really feel? Does the data back up the vibes?

Polls have registered a jolt of newfound happiness about the election. In July, in the week after President Biden’s decision to forgo the nomination, a New York Times/Siena College survey found that anger and resignation had been subsiding among voters of both parties, while joy had jumped.

Since then, that happiness has apparently deepened, among Democrats in particular. Times/Siena swing state polls in August found that nearly 80 percent of Democrats said they were satisfied with their choice of candidates, a stark shift from May, when just 55 percent said they were.

But the post-dropout Times/Siena national poll also found that voters’ primary emotion surrounding the election was anxiety, which was reported by nearly half of Democrats.

There are many reasons anxiety might persist. Though Ms. Harris’s poll numbers are better than Mr. Biden’s, the race still sits on a knife’s edge. Whether her upswing can continue beyond the probable post-convention bump is still to be seen.

Examining the words voters most frequently used to describe their emotions about the election provides us with a window into just how much the mood has swung, and how it could continue to shift.

Words Democrats most frequently used to describe their feelings about the election

Certain corners of social media are now awash in coconut tree emojis and shaded green squares declaring this Ms. Harris’s “Brat summer.” Democrats’ joy doubled between February and July, with 20 percent of the party’s voters using words indicating happiness, hope or excitement to describe their feelings about the election after Mr. Biden had dropped out, while Democratic despair more than halved.

Ms. Harris has referred to herself and her running mate, Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota, as “joyful warriors,” and Mr. Walz, in his first speech as the vice-presidential pick, thanked her for “bringing back the joy.”

“The vibe is very high, no doubt about it,” said Nancy Rohr, 68, a retired piano teacher from Orange County, Calif., who used the word “excited” to describe her feelings about November. “I would say it’s her energy; she’s a joyful, energetic person.”

“It just feels really exciting to turn the corner,” she added.

In February, Democrats’ feelings had been dominated by fear and sadness.

Over this whirlwind summer, they have grappled with the duality of joy and fear. The July poll was taken the week after Mr. Biden dropped out of the race; though support quickly coalesced around Ms. Harris, she had not yet officially clinched the nomination. Not only did Democrats use more words indicating joy and hope about the election, they also used words indicating feelings of anxiety and apprehension.

Over the past few weeks, the Harris campaign has tried to put those fears to rest.

Still, anxiety persists. “I’m just more concerned that if one party loses, we’re not even going to have a peaceful transition of power,” said Jeff Fitzsimmons, 42, a manager of a livestock operation from Norman County, Minn., who described his election-related feelings as “nervous.”

Words Republicans most frequently used to describe their feelings about the election

Democrats hardly have a monopoly on joy, even as former President Donald J. Trump has adopted a darker tone during recent weeks, warning of “bad things” to come if Ms. Harris wins.

From February to July, feelings of anger and confusion subsided among Republicans. By summer, nearly three in 10 Republican voters used words indicating happiness, hope or excitement to describe their feelings about the election, rivaling the share who expressed fear or apprehension, which had remained virtually unchanged since February.

The Grand Old Party partied with its own set of stars this summer. “Let’s make America rock again,” Mr. Trump said in a video shown at a summer music festival headlined by Kid Rock.

“I’m excited to have a change,” said Stephanie Rhodes, 61, a Trump supporter from Silverhill, Ala., who runs a small cafe, who used the word “excited” to express her feelings about November. “I’m a small business owner, and the Biden administration has really hurt my business.”

The poll was conducted soon after the attempted Trump assassination and the Republican National Convention, accounting perhaps for some of the increased exuberance among Republicans. Trump supporters saw their candidate emerge from the attempt on his life with a raised fist, a mark of defiance reminiscent of heroes in ancient art.

Still, more than 25 percent of Republicans in July used words like “scared” or “nervous” to describe their feelings about the election.

Joel Daria, 43, an insurance agent from Dublin, Ohio, used the word “nervous,” saying he worried about the future for his daughters under a Harris administration.

“I don’t want them to think that if they get married, they’re a weak woman,” said Mr. Daria. “I don’t want them to be in a world where they can’t own guns if they want to. I don’t want them to be in a world where they have to go to the bathroom with other people that identify as women.”

In the frantic months between now and November, it’s quite likely that voters’ emotions will continue to fluctuate, particularly as the contest gears up after Labor Day.

“There is such a heightened level of attention to this race — it really raises the stakes,” said Carroll Doherty, director of political research at Pew Research Center. “Any slip-ups or hiccups are more magnified and can lead to bigger magnitude changes in public mood.”

“Entwined: Freedom, Sovereignty and the Sea” at Mystic Seaport Museum in Connecticut explores Indigenous and African ties to the waterways of New England. The exhibition calls on visitors to think about history, water and spirituality in new ways.

“Walking through the exhibition space you get the sense that time is cyclical, not linear. And that everything cycles and has a birth, a life, a death and a rebirth, as do our histories,” said curator Akeia de Barros Gomes.

There are loaned “belongings” — or objects — from Indigenous and African communities dating back 2500 years. They show maritime navigational skills and spiritual connections to the ocean on both sides of the Atlantic.

Senior Curator of Maritime Social Histories Akeia de Barros Gomes said a first step in creating the ‘Entwined’ exhibition was to ask local tribal and Black communities how they would tell their maritime history. “What came from that conversation was the ocean as a place of creation and rebirth,” she said.

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“Yes, for the last 500 years, colonialism, slavery and dispossession have been a major factor in our histories,” de Barros Gomes said. “But if you think about African and Indigenous Dawnland, or New England, maritime histories, they go back over 12,000 years.”

“Dawnland” is the Indigenous term for New England.

Mystic Seaport Museum was founded in 1929 to preserve America’s seafaring past. Visitors can walk through a 19th-century coastal village and climb aboard a wooden whaling ship. But for decades, most Black and Indigenous maritime histories were missing. Inside the gallery space, de Barros Gomes points to an ancient ceramic cooking pot that’s partly broken in pieces.

“We are going to continue to do the work until the vessel is whole and holds water once more.”

“Drums from All Directions” is a piece created by Sherenté Mishitashin Harris of the Narragansett tribe. It sits on display as part of the “Entwined” exhibition.

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The exhibition includes a brightly painted dugout canoe, traditional masks and jewelry, and a first edition Eliot Bible translated into the Algonquin language. There are also wampum beads found just across the river at the site of the Pequot Massacre of 1637.

Mystic Seaport Museum stands on Indigenous ancestral homelands, said designer Steven Peters, a member of the Mashpee Wampanoag tribe.

Believed to be the first translation of a Christian bible into an indigenous language is on display in the “Entwined” exhibition at the Mystic Seaport Museum in Connecticut.

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“There was a lot of healing that had to take place so that the communities became comfortable sharing within those spaces.”

Before loaning any materials, local tribes wanted to be sure that along with the hard history there would be stories of strength and resilience. Peters and de Barros Gomes spent nearly two years meeting with Native and Black community members from around New England to shape the narrative.

“It had to be both African and Indigenous communities that were saying, ‘Here’s the story that we want to tell,’” he said.

Director of Research and Scholarship Elysa Engelman said she hopes that visitors can gain a new perspective from the exhibition. “I think, like with reading, like with movies, one of the powers of museums is to transport you outside of your own experience.”

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This is not the first time Mystic Seaport has worked with outside advisers, says Elysa Engelman, the museum’s Director of Research and Scholarship, “but (it’s) the first time that we’ve had an outside committee that was responsible for the content and really was the voice of the exhibit.”

Advisor Anika Lopes traces her ancestry to enslaved Africans and members of the Niantic tribe.

“It reminds me always of your foundation, foundation, foundation,” she says. “Like, who is at the table and who are you involving in the discussions from the very beginning is so important.”

Anika Lopes is an Afro-Indigenous woman who was a member of the committee that helped to shape the narrative of ”Entwined: Freedom, Sovereignty and the Sea.” To create it, the curator and designer asked Indigenous and Black communities in New England (or the “Dawnland”) how their ancestors would have wanted their history and stories to be told? The exhibition runs through spring of 2026.

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Standing outside the gallery, visitor Susie Gagne said ‘Entwined’ makes Mystic Seaport better. She appreciated the language of the exhibition.

“It was for the most part written in like, ‘we’ and ‘I’ perspectives; written by people in the groups that it’s about. And obviously there are historical atrocities associated with Mystic alongside all of the good historical connotations.”

Back inside, de Barros Gomes walked through two smaller darkened rooms. First, an attic space with ship carvings and spiritual objects of enslaved Africans. Next, an Indigenous hut called a Wetu. And finally, into a light, bright contemporary space with a large collection of art by current Native American and Black artists. There are paintings, sculpture, and traditional clothing.

 “Art that really speaks to contemporary artists reclaiming their ancestry and their ancestral stories,” said de Barros Gomes.

For too long, others told America’s maritime history, she said. ‘Entwined: Freedom, Sovereignty and the Sea’ shifts the tide.

Kamala Harris accepted the Democratic party’s nomination for president in front of a cheering crowd of delegates in Chicago on Thursday night with a speech pitched directly at the moderate and undecided voters who will decide November’s election.

While Donald Trump has tried to depict the vice-president as a radical leftist, Harris cast herself as a candidate who is “realistic, practical and has common sense” and could chart a “new way forward” for the US.

Here are the highlights from her primetime address.

Defining herself: ‘Never do anything half-assed’

Although Harris has been vice-president for nearly four years, it was critical for her to reintroduce herself to Americans unfamiliar with her life story.

She started with tales of her upbringing in California as the daughter of immigrants and recalled how her mother, a researcher from India, taught her to “never complain about injustice, but do something about it” and to “never do anything half-assed”.

Harris, who served as a prosecutor in California for the bulk of her career before she became a senator and then Joe Biden’s second-in-command, cast herself as a defender of ordinary Americans. “My entire career, I’ve only had one client: the people,” she said.

Attacking Trump: ‘An unserious man’

Since Harris launched her campaign last month, she has shifted her party’s message against Trump, casting him as a weak, selfish and small-minded candidate rather than a powerful, menacing strongman. On Thursday night, Harris stuck to that tone, describing the former president as an “unserious man”.

But she also warned that a Trump victory would be devastating. “The consequences of putting Donald Trump back in the White House are extremely serious,” she said. “Just imagine Donald Trump with no guardrails, how he would use the immense powers of the presidency of the United States not to improve your life, not to strengthen our national security, but to serve the only client he has ever had: himself.”

Harris warned that Trump’s policies would seek to “pull our country back into the past”, setting up one of her campaign’s top slogans: “America, we are not going back.”

Protecting abortion rights: ‘They are out of their minds’

Access to abortion care and reproductive rights have been central messages of the Harris campaign, galvanising the Democratic party base and young and women voters. On Thursday night, Harris once again put the issue front and centre.

“Friends, I believe America cannot truly be prosperous unless Americans are fully able to make their own decisions about their own lives. Especially on matters of heart and home,” she said. “But tonight, too many women in America are not able to make those decisions.”

Harris placed the blame for a rollback of abortion rights across the country squarely on Trump, who nominated three Supreme Court justices who voted to overturn the 50-year precedent of Roe vs Wade. She warned that further rights could be stripped away under a second Trump presidency.

“He plans to create a national anti-abortion co-ordinator and force states to report on women’s miscarriages and abortions,” Harris said. “Simply put: they are out of their minds.”

Her economic agenda: ‘The middle class is where I come from’

Harris spent a chunk of her speech talking about the US economy, saying strengthening the middle class would be a “defining goal” for her presidency as part of building what she called an “opportunity economy”.

“This is personal for me. The middle class is where I come from,” Harris said.

She fleshed out that vision during her speech, saying she would seek to cut taxes for middle-class households, end a housing shortage and protect pensions and healthcare for the elderly.

“As president, I will bring together labour and workers, small business owners and entrepreneurs, and American companies to create jobs, grow our economy and lower the cost of everyday needs like healthcare, housing and groceries,” she said.

She also took a jab at Trump, arguing: “He doesn’t actually fight for the middle class. Instead, he fights for himself and his billionaire friends. And he will give them another round of tax breaks that will add up to $5tn to the national debt.”

Foreign policy: ‘I know where the United States belongs’

Harris made some of the most detailed comments on foreign policy of her campaign to date, outlining a muscular projection of US power on the global stage. “As commander-in-chief, I will ensure America always has the strongest, most lethal fighting force in the world,” she said.

Harris vowed to stand with Ukraine and Nato allies and said she would ensure that “America, not China, wins the competition for the 21st century”.

She also tore into Trump for “cosying up to tyrants and dictators like [North Korean leader] Kim Jong Un”, whom Harris said were “rooting” for the former president to win in November.

“They know Trump won’t hold autocrats accountable because he wants to be an autocrat,” Harris said. “In the enduring struggle between democracy and tyranny, I know where I stand and I know where the United States belongs.”

Harris also did not shy away from addressing the war in Gaza, the thorniest international issue facing the White House, which has split the Democratic party and triggered protests against her inside and outside the convention hall in Chicago this week.

“Now is the time to get a hostage deal and ceasefire done,” she said, declaring a commitment to both Israel’s defences and to ending the suffering in Gaza.

When she closed out her discussion of the Middle East with a call for the Palestinian people’s right to “dignity, security, freedom and self-determination”, the delegates offered resounding applause.