Ontological Turns: Youth “Lessons” to Turn it Around

• In Event: Highlighted Session: Stacking the Deck for Sustainability: Youth “Lessons” to Turn it Around

Proposal

This presentation shifts our attention toward the theoretical perspectives that informed our thinking about the role of education in relation to the climate crisis. In the ‘Turn it Around!’ project, youth submissions highlighted the urgency of redefining the concepts of time, space and matter in order to turn around the existing education systems and structures. The submissions by youth indicated that knowledge is neither isolated nor neutral, but rather intertwined within who we are, where we come from and what we are becoming. Furthermore, learning occurs across time, learning is relational, and learning occurs not only between humans but between humans and their environment. Through their art and written responses, youth are attempting to re-build the ontological foundations, encouraging us to un/learn in order to turn toward eco-ontologies.

Drawing on the interdisciplinary field of biosemiotics, we understand life as creating meaning, every element in nature representing the world, and humans being not only outside of that world, but also a part of it. Eduardo Kohn expresses similar perspectives in How Forests Think (2013) where he advances the possibility of understanding nature beyond the human, beyond language. He encourages us to “see” in emergents such as the relational knowledges in the way water, trees, and plants coexist in particular patterns. The youth participating in this project were deeply aligned with these ontologies, suggesting that education too must be redefined in ways beyond human, opening possibilities for new ways of thinking and being that rely on and nurture the interdependence between nature and humans.

The presentation will discuss how we can incorporate these new ways of representing the world into education policy and curricula, focusing attention on cultivating the relationships with other species, natural environments, and ancestors, as well as cultivating relational knowledges (such as empathy, belonging, love, curiosity, minimalism) that are currently missing in formal school curriculum. For example, Berryman’s (2008) concept of “whakapapa” links ancestor’s identities with their living relatives. In whakapapa, ancestors represent the past, the family represents the present and the children represent the future. However, in whakapapa these identities are not personal identities, instead they are global identities. This allows for a common genealogy through which connections to the personal and collective are established. Many of the youth’s messages align with the concept of whakapapa, illustrating different ways in which children and youth already learn with and from ancestors and how such practices could be incorporated in formal education systems. Drawing on the vision and wisdom of global youth, we argue that these knowledges are critical not only for achieving equity and climate justice, but also for our overall survival. Our educational systems must make space for new ontologies that promote ontologies of living with the Earth.

Authors

• Dilraba Anayatova, Arizona State University

• Keti Tsotniashvili, Arizona State University

• Setrag Hovsepian, Arizona State University