Teaching Critical Sustainability Studies: Towards a Relational Pedagogy

Abstract

How do we teach disciplinary content, like American environmental history, that have exclusionary, extractive roots to underrepresented students who face their own marginalization in society and at the university? What pedagogical practices best empower students to make meaningful and substantive change within these fields? To begin addressing these questions, I explore the intersection between relational pedagogies, a humanistic pedagogy that places primacy on caring relationships to enhance learning, and critical perspectives within environmentalism. Used in conjunction, they create productive synthesis between pedagogy and content that enables students to work towards greater inclusivity in environmental knowledge and praxis outside the classroom. In particular, the concept of a “relational ontology”—a worldview in which “beingness” or one’s sense of self is composed from relations with others—that undergirds relational pedagogies strengthens ideas of sustainability that go beyond techno-scientific or managerial approaches. At the same time, critical environmentalism pushes relational pedagogical practices to engage more deeply with questions of power, social justice and human-environment relations. I reflect upon my own motivations and experiences in using relational teaching strategies and offer suggestions around designing and implementing a relational pedagogical approach when teaching environmental courses from critical lenses.