Intra-Active ‘World-Making’: Hope, Education, Utopias and Potential Eco-Socially Just Futures

The paper is an edited extract from an MA Education Dissertation that researched the discernment of hope with young people through the Philosophy for/with Children (P4wC) process. Through the paper the role of hope in the utopian project of education is considered in rapport with the ethico-onto-epistem-ology of Agential Realism (Barad, 2007) and how education is in relationship to how we imagine and create futures as collaborative ‘world-making’ communities. The paper begins by conceptualising hope through historical and contemporary theory and debate, whilst suggesting hope is a Living Narrative of ‘openings’ and future potentials. Through exploring critical education theory (Freire, 1994; Giroux, 2011), feminist perspectives (Haraway, 1997; Held, 2006), Agential Realism (Barad, 2007) and pedagogies of Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) (UNESCO, 2019) the paper dialogues with the entanglement of hope, utopias and the imaginary of education. Throughout the paper the role of teacher, the classroom as a pluriversal (s)place, and pedagogy are regarded as part of an educators response-ability (Haraway, 1997) to contribute to imagined, tangible and possible eco-socially just futures that are vitally prescient as humankind faces some of its most unprecedented global challenges. Lastly, the paper aims to contribute to wider discourse on the phenomenon of hope, pedagogies of hope and the entanglements of education with hope and utopian potentialities

Learning for Sustainability:young people and practitioner perspectives

This report is based on research conducted by a team at the University of Dundee into the understanding and implementation of Learning for Sustainability amongst young people aged 14+ in school and community learning and development settings and the practitioners responsible for their education

Sustainable citizen decision-making:Impact of the cost-of-living crisis on the energy and circular economy transitions in urban Scotland

The present report is the outcome of a research project commissioned by Zero Waste Scotland and carried out by the Just Transition Hub (JTH), University of Dundee, with the objective of understanding the ways in which the cost-of-living crisis has affected the attitudes and behaviours of individuals and communities towards a transition to a low-carbon economy in Scotland. We define the transition as encompassing both energy transition and the transition to a circular economy, so in this report the word “transition(s)” means both the referred transitions. We define the scope of “justice” to cover three dimensions – distributive, recognition and procedural. Briefly, distributive justice concerns the ideal of a fair share of the benefits and costs of the transition among different communities and stakeholders. Recognition justice respects the proper acknowledgement of marginalised individuals and communities who may be living in deprived urban areas. Procedural justice respects inclusion and effective participation of all, including marginalised actors, in public debate and decision-making. The study involved a literature review in narrative form (chapter 2) and a smallscale exploratory study (chapters 3 and 4), using a multi-strategy approach that included seven individual semi-structured expert interviews, four semi-structured citizen/consumer focus groups and one semi-structured expert focus group. Both the literature review and the empirical research adopted a thematic analysis approach, with clear research objectives identified in a standardised analysis framework. The present research is part of a broader series of investigations commissioned by Zero Waste Scotland to understand circular economy perspectives and sustainable decision-making in times of crises to help inform Zero Waste Scotland’s communication, engagement and further research for a just transition. The present study is complemented by parallel research being conducted by the University of Highlands and Islands with a focus on rural communities

Becoming Places: Experimenting with emergent walking arts-based practice as method for philosophical journeying:The poster is a Deleuzian rhizomatic journeying and encountering with, between and across knowledges, concepts, methodologies, and methods as entanglements of my thesis inquiry and (re)generative process to consider what does a thesis do, what does philosophy do and what does a teacher do

The poster presentation draws on research and philosophy into contemporary process-orientated arts-based practice and outdoor learning with a focus on how these approaches are (s)places of emergent pedagogy that contribute to the increasing interest in walking-based education research methods and outdoor philosophical inquiry. The Art Earth Walk method has emerged through my background in Earth Education's 'Earth Walks' (Van Matre, 1990) as a sensory and immersive inquiry with ecosystems and habitats, alongside an experience of Shinrin-yoku (Li, 2018), with slow sensory creative inquiries nurturing wellbeing and nature-connection. The philosophical journeying (Styres, 2009) emerges from learning with Indigenous Knowledges and is entangled with a Deleuzian method driven approaches, as well as New Materialist perspectives in education, foregrounding that ’to think-with is to stay with the naturalcultural multispecies trouble on earth’ (Harway 2016, p.40) and that place-conscious land/art methods do embody eco-social justice practices for teachers. Pages from my own Art Earth Walk journaling will be shared, exemplified as ‘agential cuts’ (Barad,2007) and symbol conceptualisations (Yunkaporta, 2019) to explore ‘thinking’ and ‘storying’ of subjective experiential nature encounters through walking and arting. Sketch book pages included in the poster will also offer provocations into themes around becoming-places for futural surviva