To Whom Does This Place Belong? Whiteness and Diversity in Place-Based Environmental Education

• In Event: 44.054 - (Re)Considering Place and Place-Based Education in Environmental Education

Abstract

Although the environmental movement in North America ⎯ of which environmental education is a subset ⎯ has garnered increasing attention in recent decades, its advocates seem to consist mainly of the white and middle-class segments of the population. In this paper, two environmental educators and immigrants from Taiwan explore the ways in which place-based environmental education may be imbued with white experience. The extrapolation of local geography in the theorization of place as abstract concept, may recapitulate a specific relationship to culture, history and geography. Through reflections on the process of acculturation and identify formation, the authors share their thoughts on “the environmentalist” as cultural construct, and the ways in which environmental education unwittingly installs particular values and histories.

Authors

• Yi Chien Jade Ho, Simon Fraser University

• David Chang, Simon Fraser University