Poetic Environmental Activism and Education

Amanda Fulford has worked in senior research leadership positions in UK universities as Professor of Philosophy of Education. She now writes independently.Victoria Jamieson is Senior Lecturer in Education, Faculty of Education, Edge Hill University, UK.

"A beautifully written and compelling account of the lives and environmental literature of Henry Thoreau and Anna Shepherd. It explores the intricate relationship between dwelling sensitively in communion with their New England and Scottish landscapes, care-fully observing nature, and documenting environmental change as a form of “poetic environmental action”: not as a substitute, but as groundwork and companion for other forms of environmental action. In this well-composed album of portraits, Thoreau and Shepherd stand out as emissaries speaking to our troubled times in the Climate Crisis: as vital exemplars within the long literary and educational traditions that position the more-than-human realm as both inspiration and first teacher."Jeffrey Stickney, Senior Lecturer, Curriculum, Teaching, and Learning Department, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, University of Toronto, Canada."This powerfully curated text serves as a reminder to its readers that environmental education, climate activism and ecological consciousness will get humanity nowhere without a flourishing poetic core. This significant work introduces the powerful voices of Henry David Thoreau and Nan Shepherd to find a much needed philosophical and poetic infusion to sustain environmental education and action. Fulford and Jamieson not only dwell sensitively with their literary companions, they attend to, document and reinvigorate environmental education with power and elegance. This is the first major work bringing Shepherd and Thoreau together, where Fulford and Jamieson remind us that through careful reinterpretation, accounting and dwelling, we can return to discussions of greater purposes than are typically discussed in education: to get leave to live and to do so deliberately."Lewis Stockwell is Principal Lecturer in Outdoor Learning and Philosophy of Education, University of Hertfordshire."In our world of a shared but diverse environmental crisis, Fulford and Jamieson offer a compelling invitation to dwell in a unique educational experience, a space of eco-poetics, of activism. Their elegant text, of engaged writing and relationship, personal and literary, and threading across millennia, cultures, and genders, is led by revenants, Thoreau and Shepard. The message, from the natural world of specters, is an evocative model for today that all can adopt and adapt no matter their home or political form of response."Lynda Stone, Holton Distinguished Professor Emerita, The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, USA.

• PART 1: Education and Environmental Crises in Context: Tracing Themes of Connection and DisconnectednessChapter 1: Thoreau and Shepherd: BeginningsChapter 2: Environmental Emergencies in Literature: CrisesChapter 3: Environmental Activism and Environmental Apathy: DisconnectednessChapter 4: Education and the Natural World: ReconnectingPART 2: Thoreau and Shepherd as Poetic Environmental Activists: Tracing Ideas of Dwelling and AttentionChapter 5: Being with, and in, Nature through Thoreau and Shepherd: DwellingChapter 6: A Care-ful Attention to the Natural Environment: DocumentingChapter 7: Thoreau and Shepherd: Towards Poetic Environmental Activism PART 3: Finding Hope: Possibilities for Poetic Environmental Activism in Contemporary EducationChapter 8: Poetic Environmental Activism in Contemporary Education