The politics of making and un-making (sustainable) futures

Knappe, Henrike; Holfelder, Anne-Katrin; Beer, David Löw; Nanz, Patrizia

doi:10.1007/s11625-018-0541-x

Cited by 4 publications

(2 citation statements)

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“…The Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS), which shape P-12 science education and teacher education in the U.S., position the environment as entirely separate from living organisms, humans in particular [26]. Further, sustainability challenges are often framed as having physical properties and primarily technological solutions, which overlooks their complex human elements (e.g., cultural, social, and political) [26][27][28][29]. In the U.S. classroom, for example, the siloed, discipline-based approach to teaching climate change as science tends to ignore the social dimensions of climate change, and the political dimension is likely to be omitted [30].…”

Section: Science Education For a Sustainable Futurementioning

confidence: 99%

Science Education for Sustainability: Strengthening Children’s Science Engagement through Climate Change Learning and Action

Trott

Weinberg

2020

Sustainability

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Scientists and sustainability scholars continue to make urgent calls for rapid societal transformation to sustainability. Science education is a key venue for this transformation. In this manuscript, we argue that by positioning children as critical actors for sustainability in science education contexts, they may begin to reimagine what science means to them and to society. This multi-site, mixed-methods study examined how children’s climate change learning and action influenced their science engagement along cognitive, affective, and behavioral dimensions. For fifteen weeks, ten- to twelve-year-olds participated in an after-school program that combined on-site interactive educational activities (e.g., greenhouse gas tag) with off-site digital photography (i.e., photovoice process), and culminated in youth-led climate action in family and community settings. Participants were 55 children (M = 11.1 years), the majority from groups underrepresented in science (52.7% girls; 43.6% youth of color; 61.8% low-income). Combined survey and focus group analyses showed that, after the program, science became more relevant to children’s lives, and their attitudes towards science (i.e., in school, careers, and in society) improved significantly. Children explained that understanding the scientific and social dimensions of climate change expanded their views of science: Who does it, how, and why—that it is more than scientists inside laboratories. Perhaps most notably, the urgency of climate change solutions made science more interesting and important to children, and many reported greater confidence, participation, and achievement in school science. The vast majority of the children (88.5%) reported that the program helped them to like science more, and following the program, more than half (52.7%) aspired to a STEM career. Lastly, more than a third (37%) reported improved grades in school science, which many attributed to their program participation. Towards strengthening children’s science engagement, the importance of climate change learning and action—particularly place-based, participatory, and action-focused pedagogies—are discussed.

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Section: Science Education For a Sustainable Futurementioning

confidence: 99%

Science Education for Sustainability: Strengthening Children’s Science Engagement through Climate Change Learning and Action

Trott

Weinberg

2020

Sustainability

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“…This approach can be characterized as neither making 'futures for the present' (coherent plans or visions to guide future action) nor making ''presents for the future' (producing knowledge and action that we are confident can influence developmental trajectories in responsible ways) (Knappe et al 2018) but as 'gesturing' towards both activities in the present absence of adequate conditions of possibility for either. The GTDF collective uses the term 'gesture' to distinguish its practices from approaches to education for global ecological justice that are based on 'demands, manifestos or prescriptions' for the future.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Gesturing towards radical futurity in education for alternative futures

Amsler

2019

Sustain Sci

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This comment paper reflects on the challenges and possibilities of interdisciplinary, translocal efforts to create pedagogies that invite people to grapple with the foundations of global social and ecological injustice, and the difficulties of transforming them. It begins from a proposition that there is a 'blind spot' in analyses that uphold the sustainability of globalized capitalism and its interlocking systems of racialized and gendered oppression as a viable form of life. It considers how an 'alternative thinking of alternatives' is being practiced in learning spaces where future-making practices are being developed that recognize the harmful effects of this blind spot. It emphasizes the importance of learning from both the successes and failures of these efforts. In particular, it identifies common circularities that emerge in alternative spaces that seek to transcend complicity in harm and gloss over the difficulties of transformative change. It describes how one collectively approaches these difficulties by starting from acknowledging the irreducible complexity and complicity of efforts to 'gesture' towards future-making practice for viable ecological futures.

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Thinking about future/democracy: towards a political theory of futurity

Kelz

2019

Sustain Sci

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Today, representative politics are often perceived as being primarily concerned with short-term goals. Moreover, the future appears to be pre-determined by economic or technological necessities. This 'closing' of the future, however, becomes increasingly problematic in the face of global existential crises, such as environmental depletion and climate change. These catastrophic developments could only be mitigated by immediate, decisive political interventions, which would amount to systemic changes that redirect technological research and economic activities. This article seeks to outline how political theory and philosophy can contribute to "(re-)Politicizing the Future". I argue that political thought should take temporality, and in particular futurity, as a central conceptual and methodological concern. Drawing on the works of prominent twentieth century thinkers such as Hannah Arendt, Stanley Cavell, and Jacques Derrida, I want to develop a deepened analytical understanding of the possibility for a 'future directed' political thought which highlights intrinsic connections between sustainability and democracy.

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The politics of making and un-making (sustainable) futures

Cited by 4 publications

References 5 publications

Science Education for Sustainability: Strengthening Children’s Science Engagement through Climate Change Learning and Action

Science Education for Sustainability: Strengthening Children’s Science Engagement through Climate Change Learning and Action

Gesturing towards radical futurity in education for alternative futures

Thinking about future/democracy: towards a political theory of futurity

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