Author:
Ranjan Datta, University of Saskatchewan, Canada
Email: ranjan.datta@usak.ca
Published: March 2016
https://doi.org/10.22492/ije.4.1.03
Citation: Datta, R. (2016). How to Practice Posthumanism in Environmental Learning: Experiences with North American and South Asian Indigenous Communities. IAFOR Journal of Education, 4(1). https://doi.org/10.22492/ije.4.1.03
Abstract
This paper explores how to practice posthumanism in everyday life. This idea has increasingly come under scrutiny by posthumanist theorists, who are addressing fundamental ontological and epistemological questions in regard to defining an essential ‘human,' as well as the elastic boundary work between the human and nonhuman subject. Posthumanism is essential for considering today’s environmental problems and environmental science education. This paper then has three goals: developing posthumanist ontology, exploring methodology, and investigating whether environmental science education and practices can help students, teachers, and community in learning, teaching, and practicing processes. I demonstrate the complementary contributions from two Indigenous communities’ field studies that can be made when a researcher moves beyond an exclusive focus on western interests and considers participants as co-researchers. This paper concludes with a discussion of implications for this field.
Keywords
human, posthumanism, ontology, methodology, practices, Indigenous