IN DEFENSE OF NON-ANTHROPOCENTRISM—A RELATIONAL ACCOUNT OF VALUE AND HOW IT CAN BE INTEGRATED

Climate change has been show to be caused by humans. Human-centric behaviors have affected the world to the extent that many believe we have entered a new geologic epoch. This epoch— the Anthropocene—has prompted exploration into the ethical relationship between humans and the rest of the world. We know that a purely anthropocentric ethical system of values has lead ecological imbalance and environmental destruction, and that a non-anthropocentric (or humancentric) ethical system of value would be better suited for maintaining and regaining a habitable environment. However, past conceptions of non anthropocentrism have relied on abstract conceptions of value that fail to create a useful and practical ethical system. A look into the views of indigenous cultures provides another conception of non-anthropocentrism grounded in the concept of relational values. Relational values emerge out of indigenous systems of knowledge, which are grounded in and supported by indigenous origin stories and cosmologies. These systems of knowledge are the product of thousands of years of observing the functioning of the natural world, and the efficacy and practically of the derived values are proven through generations of lived experience that embodied those values to great success. In order to integrate such values into the mainstream, we must overcome the institutionalized historical biases designed to oppress and diminish indigenous cultures and values. This can be done by integrating a land-based educational approach to learning, where the entire history of relations within a place or community is critically analyzed and discussed. If this can be done, then the foundation will be set for modern society to develop the necessary relational principles needed for avoiding perpetuating the same issues that resulted in the Anthropocene

Conceptualising global indigenous and indigenist models of inclusive and equitable education

© 2022 James Nicholas Publishers. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial No Derivatives (CC BY-NC-ND) 4.0 License.The role of colonial education systems in the cultural genocide of Indigenous children in many countries is an urgent matter to be meticulously scrutinised in order to address structural inequities. It is time to envision and construct context-based authentically inclusive education. In this article, we critically examine and address structural inequities in education with examples from our own research in Sámi and First Nations contexts, and discuss possible implications for the inclusive education of all Indigenous children, with emphasis on the early years of education. Dominant models of special education are displayed followed by conceptualising Indigenous and Indigenist models as ways to reimagine, restructure and inspire the positive change towards inclusive equitable education from early years education and onward for diverse Indigenous children, and enhance the development of teacher education programmes.publishedVersio

Sharing a place-based indigenous methodology and learnings

Building on a methodology of Cooperative Inquiry, the outcomes of five interconnected place-based learning projects from Australia are synthesised and elaborated in this paper. The methodology can facilitate the everyday living and sharing of an Earth-based consciousness: one that enriches Transformative Sustainability Education (TSE) through recognising meanings and stories in landscape, and celebrates Indigenous ways of knowing, being and doing. Indigenous-led environmental education is shown to link with one of the longest continuous environmental education systems in the world and it is contended that because of its ongoing history, environmental education carries a cultural obligation. In Australia, every landscape is Indigenous and storied, and all Australians have an inherent right to learn that joy in place, along with the responsibility to care for it. Teaching and learning a relationship with place as family, is one way that environmental education can lead that campaign. This place-based methodology is a lifetime commitment involving everyday actions for change, a whole-of-education dedication

The Post-Anthropocene Diet: Navigating Future Diets for Sustainable Food Systems

This article examines how future diets could reduce the environmental impacts of food systems, and thus, enable movement into the post-Anthropocene. Such non-anthropocentric diets are proposed to address global food systems challenges inherent in the current geological epoch known as the Anthropocene—a period when human activity is the dominant cause of environmental change. Using non-anthropocentric indigenous worldviews and object-oriented ecosophy, the article discusses changes in ontologies around diets to consider choices made in the present for sustainable future food systems. This article conceptually addresses, how can pre-Anthropocene ontologies guide an exit of current approaches to diets? Considering temporality, what post-Anthropocene ontologies are possible in future diets for sustainable food systems? Through the ontological positions defining three distinct temporalities, considerations for guiding future diets in(to) the post-Anthropocene are proposed. Indigenous ontologies are presented as pre-Anthropocene examples that depict humans and non-humans in relational diets. Underlying Anthropocene ontologies define current unsustainable diets. These ontologies are described to present the context for the food systems challenges this article aims to address. A post-Anthropocene illustration then employs object-oriented ecosophy along with indigenous ontologies as theoretical foundations for shifting from the dominant neoliberal paradigm in current ontologies. Ontologically-based dietary guidelines for the post-Anthropocene diet present the ontological turns, consideration of temporality, and outline technological orientations proposed for sustainable future food systems. This is a novel attempt to integrate non-anthropocentric theories to suggest possible futures for human diets in order to exit the Anthropocene epoch. These non-anthropocentric ontologies demonstrate how temporal considerations and relational worldviews can be guidelines for transforming diets to address public health concerns, the environmental crisis, and socioeconomic challenges