Utopia in environmental and sustainability education: imagination, transformation, and transgression

Abstract

This article explores the cognitive aspects of utopia in environmental and sustainability education. Utopia here is understood as the imaginary transformation of society, entailing a critique of society and its imaginary reconstruction aligned with the ideal of just and flourishing communities. To gain insight into the processes at play, I develop a pragmatist semiotic framework and highlight five characteristics of utopia in the context of environmental and sustainability education: dystopia, modifications, existing beliefs, transfer of concepts, and missing alternative concepts. At the core of these features are two other phenomena—dissonance and vagueness—that can serve as a springboard for extended exploration and a deeper understanding of society, as well as of held beliefs and ideals. When working with utopia, I conclude that students themselves may become minimal utopian spaces. This process may be accompanied by adverse feelings, such as confusion, frustration, or anxiety, which implies that working with utopia as a means to empower learners may also make them vulnerable.

Keywords:

• sustainability education
• imagination
• utopia
• semiotics
• transformative learning
• transgression

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1 This account is partly inspired by Salthe (1985).

2 These characteristics are nonexhaustive.

3 I employ this term inspired by Bojesen and Suissa’s (2019) idea of minimal utopianism—the (limited) potential for utopian thinking and practice in formal (higher) education.