Crafting Pedagogical Pathways that Disrupt and Transform Anthropocentric Mindsets of Higher Education Students

Abstract

A key challenge in education for sustainable development is in enabling learners to critically review and re-orient anthropocentric (human-centric) perspectives on sustainability. Sustainability challenges are complex and fluid, and demand non-human centric thinking in constructing viable solutions. The purpose of this study was thus to explore how disruptive pedagogical interventions could be used to challenge and transform anthropocentric mindsets of higher education students. The guiding framework for these pedagogical interventions was transformative learning, which translated into exposure to disorienting dilemmas, followed by individual reflection and subsequent engagement in rational discourse on key sustainability themes. A series of ‘visual cues’ (comprising of disruptive imagery and critical questions) were designed to provoke participants to think more critically about human centric world-views and the interconnectedness, multiplicity and heterogeneity of sustainability. Through the use of Constructivist Grounded Theory, a framework of four conceptual categories emerged, namely, ‘Emotional/cognitive disjuncture’, ‘Recognising principles, practices and themes of sustainability’, ‘Critiquing concepts and contexts of sustainability’ and ‘Reorienting dispositions/perspectives for sustainability’. This framework represents key elements within the process of becoming sustainability [re]oriented, and ultimately provided the evidence that the disruptive pedagogical framework underpinning these visual cue interventions has been effective in moving learners beyond anthropocentric views of the world, and thus, can be used to support learners in becoming sustainability [re]-oriented.