Getting “really close”: relational processes between youth, educators, and more-than-human beings as a unit of analysis

Abstract

In this paper, we explore relational processes between and among three key learning ecosystem actors – youth, educators, and more-than-human beings – as a unit of analysis for understanding a specific type of environmental identity development: a 21st century naturalist. Our conceptualization of these relational processes aims to knit together sociocultural theories of identity formation with Indigenous, new-materialist and posthumanist philosophies. We draw on data collected while conducting a case study of a teen youth program held in an urban park collected as part of an ongoing research-practice partnership. We ask how we, as educators and educational researchers, attend to more-than-human actors as essential agents for youth naturalist identity formation. As two settlers living on colonized lands, we aim to dismantle Eurocentric scientific logic of human hierarchical exceptionalism and denial of the personhood and agency of more-than-human beings in both our educational and research practice. We close with reflections on how we both transform and are transformed by the learning places in which we work.

Keywords:

• Environmental education
• naturalist
• identity
• relational processes
• more-than-humans

Acknowledgements

We would like to thank the educators and youth that participated in this project for their generous participation and contributions to this work. We also thank the flora, fauna, lands and waters of the Park for sharing space with us.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1 All names are pseudonyms that were approved by participants.

2 We include Latin names to provide clarity on the species, genus, or family we refer to.

Additional information

Funding

This project was funded by a University of Pittsburgh School of Education Student/Faculty Research Grant.