Conference Agenda

Climate change is becoming one of the most pressing issues in the social sciences, because the certainty that the future is open and moldable is challenged deeply. Thus, social institutions especially in education are called upon to find new answers to these uncertainties.

In natural sciences, this insecurities were processed through developing the term “Anthropocene”(Crutzen 2002), the “geological age of humans” (Yusoff & Gabrys 2011). This conceptual vehicle is being used to describe how specific natural events (like floodings or forest fires), global warming and its aftermath (like the loss of biodiversity) are intertwined with human activity on earth (Wallenhorst 2023). It has served for conveying the concerns of scientific communities about the fragility of the Earth's habitability, e.g. by identifying tipping points (Rockström et al., 2023). In social sciences, scholars have highlighted the importance of the cultural, social, discursive and political implications of climate change. In this context, we expect the focus on shifting notions of time and space as particularly insightful, as the following arguments have received little educational attention to date:

For the Anthropocene, it was found that an "end-of-the-world" narrative is common in scientific discourse (Dürbeck 2018). This narrative conveys the impression that "our" world will soon come to an end and must be saved. Rooted in a dominant Western understanding of Modern Science, this perspective was firstly criticized in terms of its underlying anthropocentric understanding, which re-actualizes the category “man” and his fantasies of omnipotence over nature. The idea of an educated human subject who rewins control over nature through positive knowledge that brings adequate technical solutions was heartedly taken up also in the field of education, e.g. in theories of sustainable development. Hence, as suggested by feminist and post-human theories (Haraway 2015; McKagen 2018; Taylor & Hughes 2016), there is a need for spatial concepts that de-centralize the human and the notion of a “man” who finds solutions for global problems, putting forward the entanglement of human and non-human beings with nature instead.

Secondly, postcolonial, Black and indigenous interrogations of the Anthropocene (Chakrabarty 2022; Mitchell & Chaudhury 2020; Yusoff 2018) have shown that the perceptibility of climate change has long been part of the present for certain groups of people around the world, who already have been dealing with natural events for some time. In fact, not everyone is equally affected by the consequences of climate change. Rather, social inequalities are perpetuated and consolidated here, particularly affecting people living in the so-called global south and especially children, women and people of color. This notion challenges the end-of-the-world-narrative mentioned above, which suggests that climate change is “suddenly” happening or in the near future yet to come. Hence, dealing with climate change is not urgent because it is increasingly noticeable for people who live in Europe, but because it has been shaping lives all over the world for many years.

As a consequence, there is a need for analytical tools of future-making in education in order to develop notions of hope and creativity instead of apathy. In the symposium, we therefore ask: How can we conceptualize educational spaces in a way that integrates humans, non-humans and nature instead of hierarchizing man over nature? How can climate change be understood as a present and everyday phenomenon that shapes very distinct narratives, educational pathways, spaces and futures?

Objectives: With reference to the concept of the Anthropocene, this paper inquires into the methodological foundations of investigating a decentered understanding of the subject. The attempt to overcome the binary logic of culture/society and nature inevitably leads to a paradox. On the one hand, human beings are part of nature, and on the other, science is a prototypical expression of the mastery of nature and - as is very evident in educational science - of the centering of the subject. In other words: Although the findings of the Enlightenment can be relativised, e.g. post-colonially, they are also achieved with Eurocentric methods (Spivak; Chakrabarty 2022). Theoretical framework: Two theoretical concepts can be used to address the paradox of a critique of the Enlightenment and the simultaneous use of 'enlightened' and enlightening methods to discuss educational processes. The first concept is relational spatial theory (Löw 2001; Hummrich & Engel 2023), which, by focusing on the interrelationship of positioning and contexts, makes it possible to approach knowledge structures about educational processes that lie beyond universalistic understandings. The second concept refers to the importance of relational heuristics, in which structures and positions are considered as a multi-level system (Hummrich 2024). In both, the spatio-temporal positioning of research objects becomes clear. Methodology: On the basis of selected reconstructive methods, the paper develops an understanding of epistemic violence and the capacity for reflection that is prototypically inscribed in qualitative research. This is because qualitative research has a long tradition of reflecting on the positioning of science, which can also provide meaningful impulses for research on educational processes in the Anthropocene. Data sources: The data sources come from two research projects in which structures of the production of postcolonial order were reconstructed (e.g. interviews, group discussions, observations). They provide exemplary insights into the production of positioning in educational processes and into the traces of epistemic violence. Results: The results of this discussion should contribute to a qualitative understanding of relational spatial orders in the production of science and scientificity. In doing so, the role of postcolonial critique is juxtaposed with a critical understanding of the dialectic of enlightenment, which on the one hand enables insights into the here and now of the production of subjectivity and sociality, and on the other hand discusses the necessity of systematic reflection on insights and their context of origin.

Chakrabarty, D. (2022). Das Klima der Geschichte im planetarischen Zeitalter. Berlin: Suhrkamp. Haraway, D.J. (2015). Anthropocene, Capitalocene, Plantationocene, Chthulucene: Making Kin. Environmental Humanities, 6(1), 159-165. Hummrich, M. (2024). Critique of Universalism in Critical Theory and Postcolonial Theory. Paragrana Journal 1/2024 Hummrich, M. & Engel, J. (2023). Space. In. C. Wulf & N. Wallenhorst (ed.). Handbook of the Antropocene. Springer Nature, 985-992. Löw, M. (2001). Raumsoziologie. Suhrkamp McKagen, E. L. (2018). The Stories We Tell: Toward a Feminist Narrative in the Anthropocene. SPECTRA, 6(2).

Objectives: This research is based on the observation that scientific knowledge about the bioclimatic context is insufficiently central to the public debate, which is saturated by different types of political narrative that regularly have nothing to do with the facts. We have produced a typology of political narratives in the Anthropocene epoch. The purpose of this typology is to help people make political judgements and to distinguish between facts (accessed through the mediation of scientific knowledge) and narratives (most of which are ineffective in containing the bioclimatic runaway of the Earth system). This is a major challenge for education. Theoretical framework: The underlying theoretical framework is the new geological epoch we are entering, the Anthropocene, characterised by a lasting change in the conditions of habitability of the Earth for all living organisms and for human life in society. We are mobilising both biogeophysical and socio-political knowledge of the Anthropocene to produce an effective interpretative framework for reality. Methodology: To assess these new narratives in terms of what they contribute to the human adventure or what they plan to do with it, we will use two analytical criteria. The first is scientific, based on current environmental knowledge. Our guide will be the scientific state of play on the planet, i.e. the research that has led to an international scientific consensus. The second criterion is political: we will focus on what deepens democracy rather than what weakens it. We will examine the political threat posed by the current environmental context. Data sources: 300 documentary sources were categorised and analysed in an attempt to identify the six major political narratives of the Anthropocene. Results: A deciphering of the six political narratives of the present day, which provide a possible breeding ground for de-democratic failure and/or ecological failure: the false narrative, according to which we are not sure that climate change is man-made; the Chinese narrative, according to which the end justifies the means; the Californian narrative, which holds out the prospect of techno-scientific salvation; the carefree-but-not-so-carefree narrative, which bases global change on each citizen's conversion to ecology; the perverse narrative, which wants to make everything fit at once; the alternative narrative, which postulates that only a democratic radicalism will enable us to live together on Earth.

Dalby, S. (2016). Framing the Anthropocene: the good, the bad and the ugly. The Anthropocene Review, 3(1), pp. 33-51. McCarthy, F. M. G. et al. (2023). The varved succession of Crawford Lake, Milton, Ontario, Canada as a candidate Global boundary Stratotype Section and Point for the Anthropocene series. The Anthropocene Review, 10(1) 146-176. Mychajliw, A. M., Kemp, M. E., & Hadly, E. A. (2015). Using the Anthropocene as a teaching, communication and community engagement opportunity. The Anthropocene Review, 2(3), 267-278. Rockström, J. et al. (2023). Safe and just Earth system boundaries. Nature, 619, 102-111. Steffen, W. et al. (2018). Trajectories of the earth system in the Anthropocene, PNAS, 115 (33) 8252-8259. Wallenhorst, N. (2022). Qui sauvera la planète ? Les technocrates, les autocrates ou les démocrates… Actes Sud. Wallenhorst, N. (2023). A Critical Theory for the Anthropocene. Springer-Nature. Wallenhorst, N., Wulf, C. (2023). Handbook of the Anthropocene. Springer-Nature. Zalasiewicz, J. et al. (2014). When did the Anthropocene begin? A mid-twentieth century boundary level is stratigraphically optimal. Quaternary international, n°30, pp. 1-8. Zalasiewicz, J., Williams, M., Haywood, A., Elis, M. (2011). The Anthropocene: A new epoch of geological time? Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society, n°369, pp. 835-841.

Objectives: While climate change research often prioritizes the present, recent efforts within Educational Sciences have highlighted the crucial link between different temporalities, social positionings and future visions (Kumpulainen et al., 2023; Spyrou et al., 2021). We argue that the prevalent discursive framings of climate futures lack spatio-temporal and ecological diversity insofar as they silence voices not included in the hegemonic frame of white, western representation (Whyte 2018). This challenges educational science to open up to such marginalized narratives, positionings as well as concepts of time (Facer 2023). Hence, our objective is to investigate alternative imaginations of climate futures (Yusoff & Gabrys 2011) by observing visual data created by marginalized young people. Theoretical Framework: Our considerations are rooted in feminist, postcolonial and decolonial approaches to the Anthropocene and climate change (Haraway 2015; Whyte 2018) and hegemonic time concepts (Facer 2023). Importantly, this perspective moves beyond existing narratives of skepticism and denial and instead advocates for a shift towards fostering creative agency and imagination for a transformative and sustainable future through education (Mitchell & Chaudhury 2020). Methodology & Data Sources: In our qualitative analysis, we use the methodological concepts of imagination and temporalities (Facer 2023; Yusoff & Gabrys 2011) to unveil alternative ideas about the future. This methodology also emphasizes the importance of embracing the emic knowledges and imaginations. The pictures and texts we analyze stem from the public media discourse on climate change. In our analysis of discourse in visual data (Traue 2013), we focus particularly on the construction of temporalities, generations and human-nature-relationships in climate future visions (Facer 2023; Leccardi, 2021). Results: Overall, the paper contributes to the theoretical and methodological debate on integrating non-hegemonical, alternative future perspectives and imaginations into our educational frameworks. The paper unveils how hope and critique disrupt dominant end-of the-world-narratives and offers insights into shifting concepts of time and their potential for educational research.

Facer, K. (2023). Possibility and the temporal imagination. Possibility Studies & Society, 1(1-2), 60-66. Haraway, D.J. (2015). Anthropocene, Capitalocene, Plantationocene, Chthulucene: Making Kin. Environmental Humanities, 6(1), 159-165. Kumpulainen, K., Wong, C.-C., Byman, J., Renlund, J., & Vadeboncoeur, J. A. (2023). Fostering children’s ecological imagination with augmented storying. The Journal of Environmental Education, 54(1), 33–45. Mitchell, A., & Chaudhury, A. (2020). Worlding beyond ‘the’ ‘end’ of ‘the world’: White apocalyptic visions and BIPOC futurisms. International Relations, 34(3), 309-332. Spyrou, S., Theodorou, E., & Christou, G. (2021). Crafting futures with hope: Young climate activists’ imaginaries in an age of crisis and uncertainty. Children & Society, 36(5), 731–746. Traue B. (2013). Visuelle Diskursanalyse. Ein programmatischer Vorschlag zur Untersuchung von Sicht- und Sagbarkeiten im Medienwandel [Visual discourse analysis. A programmatic suggestion for the study of visibilities and sayabilities]. Zeitschrift Für Diskursforschung 1, 117-136. Whyte, K. P. (2018). Indigenous science (fiction) for the Anthropocene: Ancestral dystopias and fantasies of climate change crises. Environment and Planning: Nature and Space, 1(1–2), 224–242. Yusoff, K., & Gabrys, J. (2011). Climate change and the imagination. WIREs Climate Change, 2(4), 516–534.

Objective: In recent years, the ‘Anthropocene’ has become a gathering term to address constitutive concerns regarding Earth system epochal change across a complex and entangled web of material, philosophical, scientific, ethical, and political significances. At the same time, children of the Anthropocene remain relative marginalized from ongoing discussions. Importantly, there is little recognition of children’s perspectives or capacity to be agents of change and future-making, apart from activist youth. This study responds to this research gap by investigating educational approaches that position children into the roles of investigators, authors, and change agents rather than mere receivers of adult information and advice about the Anthropocene. It does so by focusing on time-space narratives of children’s ecological imagination through a novel mobile augmented story-crafting method (Kumpulainen et al., 2023). Theoretical framework: Our inquiry is grounded on posthuman scholarship informed by ‘common worlds’ (Haraway, 2008, 2016), new materialism (Barad, 2003, 2007), and nomadic philosophies (Deleuze & Guatarri, 1987). Posthuman theorizing helps us generate knowledge on how children of the Anthropocene narrate their relations with the human and more-than-human world across time and space and the performative power of these narratives. Methodology: Our methodological choices draw on post-qualitative approaches that allow us to attend to the time-space contexts of children’s ecological imagination through the mutual becoming of materialities, bodies, and atmospheres. Post-qualitative methodologies offer us creative means to study complex relational entanglements of human and nonhuman encounters shedding light on the contextual processes, events, and relationships (Byman, et al., 2023; Kumpulainen, et al., 2023; Renlund, et al., 2023). Data sources: Our inquiry draws on empirical research material generated together with children (aged 7 to 9 years old) and their teachers in a Finnish elementary school by means of videos, observational field notes, children’s narrations of their stories, interviews, and children’s story artefacts. Discussion: Our research results evidence the children’s narratives attuning into complex relational entanglements of affective, embodied, sensual, symbolic, and moral intensities of the Anthropocene that also question human exceptionalism. The narratives were entangled with the children’s past experiences and cultural knowledge, ongoing involvement and yet-to-accomplished goals, as well as hopes, worries and concerns. The children imagined possible futures that called for change and action, demonstrating relational agency and care. In all, our research provides insights into the importance of recognizing children of the Anthropocene as important stakeholders whose perspectives can enrich our relational imagining and acting for the future of the planet.

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