In the most recent seminar for the Ngā Ara Whetū supported series, Teaching and Learning for a Sustainable World, attendees heard Canada-based community psychologist Professor Manuel Riemer discuss some of the innovative ways in which his teaching team is advancing sustainability. Presenting from Wilfred Laurier University in Canada, Dr. Riemer began by explaining his own engagement, catalyzed by the film An Inconvenient Truth to re-orient his research around sustainability and the advancing of social and ecological justice. He introduced community psychology, explaining that it’s a values-based paradigm where individuals are considered in context and research prioritises the combination of theory, practice and reflection referred to as praxis; working with, not on communities. Professor Reimer then outlined a number of different theoretical lenses that inform this grassroots work, from systems theory to the importance of transformative learning experiences and opportunities for students to improve their self-efficacy, combining personal action with that directed towards changing social structures.
To this end, he described a number of specific pedagogical exercises that bring this theory into classrooms, working with students across Bangladesh, Canada, Germany, India, Uganda, and the USA. Highlights included exercises re-imagining local neighbourhoods as sustainable communities; presentation from environmental justice activists designed to create ‘disorienting dilemmas’; and the bi-national exchange programme he runs where third year undergraduate students from Canada visit countries more directly impacted by climate change, linking with community partners to undertake a specific action project – for example, building efficient cookstoves in rural villages in Uganda and water bottle fill station in Bangladesh. Across all this work, Professor Riemer highlighted the importance of personal reflection and the power of collectivity when working to address our world’s complex but nonetheless changeable woes: a ‘messy’ but motivating hope.
The Teaching and Learning for a Sustainable World seminar series continues next week, with an evening presentation by Ruben Ritzén from Lund University in Sweden, discussing his work in the fantastically creative project Climaginaries and the role imagination plays in the green transition. Tune in at 6pm on August 1 to hear more: https://auckland.zoom.us/j/91052574917
Then on September 5 also at 6-7pm, we have a presentation from Dr Julia Bentz (Centre for Ecology, Evolution and Environmental Change, University of Lisbon, Portugal), with a talk entitled “What if? – Embodied art, storytelling and regenerative futures” https://auckland.zoom.us/j/99025804834
For calendar invites, or to be added to the email list for upcoming seminars, email dkel042@aucklanduni.ac.nz
Article written by Daniel Kelly, PhD candidate in the School of Psychology, University of Auckland, and TLSW research assistant.
Dr Manuel Riemer, Professor, Director Viessmann Centre for Engagement and Research in Sustainability (VERiS); Director, Community, Environment and Justice Research Group (CEJRG)
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