Ecopedagogy Work for Planetary Sustainability: Ecopedagogical Teaching and Research in Diverse Local-to-Global Contexts

• In Event: Teachers, Practice, and Systems in Climate Education

Proposal

This article explores eleven teaching projects using Freirean-based ecopedagogy and associated ecopedagogical literacies from eleven diverse contexts toward students' praxis rooted in the ecopedagogical goal. The pedagogical and research works provide empirical evidence on a variety of ecopedagogical teaching-learning methods to deepen and widen students’ reflexivity for socio-environmental, world-Earth (re)connections to (re) construct their actions (i.e., (ecopedagogical) praxis). The work occurs in specific contexts globally; however, through (post)critical comparative education methodologies, it is possible and needed, to contextually lend and borrow their ecopedagogical findings worldwide. This diversity of approaches underscores that Freirean-based ecopedagogy thrives when rooted in local realities through diverse epistemologies, and deepening reflexivity for meaningful widening reflexivity for ecopedagogical praxis.

 
When education focuses on benefiting some humans on the backs of many others and is anthropocentric – centering only humans and ignoring the rest of Nature/Earth (ecopedagogical term of world-Earth distancing), authentic learning for socio-environmental justice and planetary sustainability becomes impossible (Misiaszek, 2020a). Such teaching is opposite to ecopedagogy, which has the goal of "globally all-inclusive socio-environmental justice and planetary sustainability (Misiaszek, 2018). This article explores eleven teaching projects using Freirean-based ecopedagogy and associated ecopedagogical literacies from diverse contexts toward students' praxis rooted in the ecopedagogical goal.
To understand the deep interconnected relationship between the world of humans and the rest of Earth, with the world as part of Earth (i.e., teaching for world-Earth de-distancing) praxis includes both deepening and widening reflexivity. Teaching for such reflexivity within praxis needs teaching through multiple, diverse epistemological realities, especially countering sustainable Development (uppercased to denote groundings of oppressive dominance, neoliberal-based, and planetary unsustainability) is opposite to sustainability guided by lower-cased development. Teaching for environmental justice is grounded on Paulo Freire’s unfinished Ecopedagogical vision (Gadotti, 2008b; Gadotti & Torres, 2009; Misiaszek, 2023c; Misiaszek & Torres, 2019) which is linked with critical literacies emphasizing the inseparability of the world and Earth, and recognizing the inseparability of that social justice and environmental violence.
Ecopedagogical literacy
Ecopedagogy inherently has (post)critical approaches to teaching to disrupt banking environmental pedagogies, creating spaces that include dialectical, democratic participation and utopia rooted in justice and sustainability (Gadotti, 2008a, 2008b; Misiaszek, 2020a, 2023c). Misiaszek defined ecopedagogy as:
essentially literacy education for reading and rereading human acts of environmental violence with its roots in popular education, as they are reinventions of the pedagogies of the Brazilian pedagogue and philosopher Paulo Freire. Ecopedagogies are grounded in critical thinking and transformability, with the ultimate goal being to construct learning with increased social and environmental justice. Rooted in critical theories and originating from popular education models of Latin America, ecopedagogy is centered on better understanding the connections between human acts of environmental violence and social violence that cause injustices/oppressions, domination over the rest of Nature, and planetary unsustainability. (Misiaszek, 2020a, pp. 16–17)
Beyond the quote, there are the questions on the different dimensions, reinventions, and possible limitations of Freirean reinventions of ecopedagogical literacy, as well as ecopedagogy overall. One key aspect for Freirean and ecopedagogical reinventing is teaching beyond the disruption of unlinking human oppressions from environmental violence. This is an approach crucial for reinventing post-humanist perspectives that critically explores anti-anthropocentrism beyond-humans (Misiaszek, 2025). Second, (post)critical ecopedagogical lenses are essential for teaching toward praxis that can help untangle the messiness of environmental (super) wicked problems – and ultimately work toward ending them (Misiaszek, 2025; Rittel & Webber, 1973). Last but not the least, the need for ecopedagogically teaching to (post)critically unpack how media and technologies are entangled in instilling (anti-)environmentalism – often (super) wickedly with environmentalism.
The discussed ecopedagogical projects that are located throughout the world exemplify how theoretical framings (re)create practices for praxis reaching towards achieving ecopedagogy’s overall goal - "globally all-inclusive socio-environmental justice and planetary sustainability" (Misiaszek, 2023b). The study presents three following emergent threads, with the write-ups of various ecopedagogues, a rich gallery of ecopedagogical practices and research to illustrate how the Freirean reinventions have transformed teaching, methodologies, educational policy-making, and societies in different ways towards achieving this goal.
World-Earth De-Distancing as Multifaceted Systems
A unifying insight emerges throughout the works: each project reflects our human journey to rediscover relationships with ourselves, mirrored by Nature as both of us are multifaceted, interconnected systems. In numerous ways, this is the embodiment of world-Earth de-distancing. Whether exploring embodied environmental ethics through dance, cultivating biophilia in gardens, or creating immersive outdoor curricula, these works demonstrate that healing our disconnection from Nature is inseparable from healing the fractures within ourselves in an increasingly globalized world.
Ecopedagogical Praxis through Diverse Theories, Epistemologies, And Transdisciplinarity
The experimental and emergent nature of ecopedagogical curricula throughout the works illustrates that ecopedagogical praxis is not a one-size-fits-all prescription and underscores local realities through diverse epistemologies, affirming Misiaszek’s (2018) call for deepening reflexivity for meaningful widening reflexivity for ecopedagogical praxis. Conflictive dialectics through globally diverse epistemologies, as discussed by Southern Theorists (Connell, 2007; Santos, 2018; Takayama, 2022), are needed to disrupt Northern epistemologies for ecopedagogical (e.g., justice and planetary sustainable-based) (re)inventions of cosmopolitanism. Lastly, the works highlight the transdisciplinarity essence of ecopedagogy to meaningfully connect to multiple disciplines with local-to-planetary contexts, such as business education and language education, to create spaces for problematizing human-centered (environmental) education (i.e., anthropocentric teaching) to local-to-planetary inclusive teaching.
Praxis Widened Beyond the Private Sphere through Systems Approaches
The ecopedagogical works illustrate how ecopedagogical literacy and public engagement from its praxis provide real opportunities to tackle non-local socio-environmental problems, impacting one's private sphere but also well beyond it. Its utopic teaching that counters fatalism of a singular oppressed, unsustainable future (Misiaszek, 2023c), is a bedrock for Freire’s (Freire, 1992, 2000) work. Projects like community-driven photovoice in Lesotho, collective cooking curricula in California, and cross-cultural environmental programs show that relational learning (re)builds shared agency and strengthens community resilience. By centering dialectics, possibilities for shared meaning-making, and resulting collective action towards ecopedagogy’s overall goal, these works move beyond isolated interventions toward systemic change. Collectively, this affirms that justice-centered ecopedagogy with non-anthropocentric planetary sustainability is most powerful when it is communal, dialogic, and grounded in relationships.

Authors

• Greg William Misiaszek, Tohoku University

• Jannatul Mawa, 1.Beijing Normal University

• Michaela Ensweiler, UCLA

• Allan Muganga, Beijing Normal University