Document Type

Presentation

Version Deposited

Not Published

Publication Date

6-7-2024

Abstract

Climate change is a prime example of a “wicked problem”: it is characterized by complexity and unboundedness and has no complete or simple solutions, though communities can develop constructive interventions that address particular aspects of the problem (for example, in cities increasing green spaces that have a cooling effect). Because the problem of climate change is so expansive and the answers to it remain limited in scope and impact, engaging with the topic inevitably evokes difficult emotions like uncertainty, overwhelm, despair, and grief. So it is understandable that a common response to the realities of climate change has been denial and disengagement. But an increasing number of people are looking honestly at the difficult realities of climate change and (re)imagining ways to build futures centered on community and care, including in the realm of education.

Of particular relevance to librarians, wicked problems like climate change make evident the incredible complexity of information behaviors and the need to explore new approaches to information literacy in the face of messy challenges. As librarian Alex Hewitt convincingly argues, climate change and the related experience of ecological grief reflect the importance of attending more fully to the affective dimensions of information behaviors and information literacy (see their 2022 article “What role can affect and emotion play in academic and research information literacy practices?”). Beyond librarianship, many teachers and scholars engaged with climate change education also stress the importance of recognizing and normalizing the affective dimensions of learning about it and developing responses to it. Many of these individuals explore constructive ways within learning environments to build community and to allow space for complex and sometimes conflicting emotions like grief and hope. Much of this pedagogical work draws on areas of inquiry such as: 1) transformative learning, according to which learners who face “disorienting dilemmas” undergo a process of perspective transformation; 2) “radical futurity,” which explores how different imaginings of the future can affect the present (see Barrineau et al., 2022. "Emergentist education and the opportunities of radical futurity"); and 3) an ethics of care that centers community and interrelatedness.

This presentation will introduce scholarship on the intersections of wicked problems, climate change education, and affect, and will explore potential implications of such work for information literacy education. The presenter will give particular attention to different forms and experiences of grief and hope and their relationship to (dis)engagement with information about wicked problems like climate change.

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