[Commlist] 2020 Special edition "Exploring Eco-pedagogy and Digital Nature Connections" / open access Digital Culture and Education

Call for papers: 2020 Special edition of the open access /Digital 
Culture and Education 
<https://digitalcultureandeducation.squarespace.com>/ journal exploring 
Eco-pedagogy and Digital Nature Connections.

Full paper submission due Nov. 30, 2019.

This 2020 special issue of the Digital Culture and Education open 
access, online journal explores contemporary issues in digital 
eco-pedagogy, particularly in relation to the education of children.

The worldwide youth climate strike on March 15 reflects young people’s 
growing frustrations with the lack of political response to the 
escalating ecological crisis. It also reflects the impact of efforts 
already underway to highlight environmental concerns. The ecological 
turn has been gaining ground in social and theoretical discourse since 
at least the 1970s. During that time environmental education has been a 
concept in progress. Early debates concerning the notion of 
eco-citizenship and even the definition of nature itself express the 
growing realisation that environmental stewardship in the age of the 
Anthropocene (when humans dominate the earth) is a multi-dimensional 
cultural project incorporating everything from emotional re-learning of 
nature connectivity, through to eco-media literacy training, scientific 
witnessing, philosophical/economic reassessment and citizen action.

Alongside this, the growing ubiquity of digital culture has fuelled 
concern. In Last Child in the Woods (2008) Richard Louv blames the rise 
of digital screen culture for what he calls children’s ‘nature-deficit 
disorder’. Indeed, a 2013 study revealed that only 1 in 5 UK children 
felt sufficiently connected with nature (rspb.org.uk/connectionmeasure 
<http://rspb.org.uk/connectionmeasure>), raising the question of 
potential consequences for those 40% of the world's species already at 
risk of extinction and reliant upon human passion and dedication to save 
them.

Nevertheless, the role that digital culture plays in this crisis is 
still unclear and also in flux. Büscher’s (2016) concept of Nature 2.0 
to describe the emerging digital representations of nature and networked 
engagements with the natural world points to the growing research 
interest in eco-digital cultures. Indeed, as Dobrin (2014: 205) 
observes, digital environments are “themselves natures … environments in 
and with which humans and non-humans forge relationships”. The ways that 
digital culture and nature are becoming increasingly enmeshed invites 
more discussion, particularly in relation to the role that 
eco-pedagogies play within thesesocial and material assemblages. Recent 
provocations include Fletcher’s (2017) discussion of the “environmental 
values behaviour” gap between the mediated appreciation for nature, 
versus the lack of societal commitment to conservation action. Whilst 
nature-relatedness research (Richardson 2015, 2018) indicates that in 
order to build a joyous connection with nature, children in particular 
will often need to do so by focusing on the positives, free from the 
impending fear of environmental collapse. More evidence is required to 
help better understand the role that digital eco-pedagogy plays 
regarding these sorts of tensions.

This special issue invites researchers to explore these contemporary 
issues in digital eco-pedagogy.

Empirical studies are particularly welcome. Topics might include, but 
are not limited to:

- Engaging pedagogy with mediated experiences of nature relatedness

- Interplays of real/virtual, action/simulation, inside/outside, the 
physical world and digital space in environmental education

- Eco-media literacy, including awareness of the creative, economic and 
material modes of digital production

- Progressive and social constructions of ecological citizenship

- Navigating the limits, as well as the potential benefits of digital 
nature connections

- The intercultural, multi-dimensional, interdisciplinary and/or 
inter-generational dimensions to eco-citizenship

- Digital eco-pedagogy and cultural theory

- The digital mediation of inter-species relationships

- Digital representations of climate change e.g. abstraction, versus 
digital photo-realism

- Links between mediated play, expectations of nature and off-line 
behaviours

- Digital green-washing

- Testing the educational and social impact of digital nature 
connections across genres and platforms

- The use of portable, personalised, automated and/or ubiquitous 
technologies in digital eco-pedagogy

- Digital eco-feminist interventions

- Digital citizen science initiatives

- Collaborative Design of digital nature

There is no charge to submit, or publish papers in the /Digital Culture 
and Education /journal, which is a non-commercial, open access academic 
journal that is  distributed freely, at no charge.

5000 – 7000 word paper submission is due Nov 30, 2019. For author 
guidelines please see 
https://www.digitalcultureandeducation.com/submit-your-paper-1

Please direct your questions to Bronwin Patrickson at 
(floatingblueseen /at/ gmail.com) <mailto:(floatingblueseen /at/ gmail.com)> in the 
first instance, or alternately Alexander Schmoelz at 
(alexander.schmoeltz /at/ univie.ac.at) <mailto:(alexander.schmoeltz /at/ univie.ac.at)>



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