Abstract
In 2005, the UN General Assembly adopted a resolution defining sustainability in accordance with three “interdependent and mutually reinforcing pillars:” 1. social development, 2. economic development, 3. environmental protection (“3Ps”). Although interdependence of the 3Ps aimed to distribute the burden of sustainability evenly, a year after the resolution, Keith Nurse proposed a fourth pillar—culture. “Culture,” …shapes what we mean by development and determines how people act in the world…[This is] because peoples’ identities, signifying systems, cosmologies and epistemic frameworks shape how the environment is viewed and lived in. In 2014, Katriina Soini and Inger Birkeland concluded that “culture” was “broader than…anticipated.” Although the concept was often used, “it was rarely defined or discussed.” The diverse use of the concept as well as the lack of discussion of its meanings could indicate that there is a taken-for-granted or assumed consensus related to meanings of culture. We found representations of culture in the story lines ranging from both narrow to broad. What Nurse, Soini, and Birkeland observed was something Ludwig Wittgenstein noticed decades earlier: the variety and diversity of a term’s usage not only provides us with a fuller understanding, in some cases, it can become so fundamental, it is accepted without thought. When a term is “assumed” as part of a community’s background, it functions less in reflective words than in unreflective actions. Wittgenstein’s work provides those involved in climate issues with essential tools that serve to strengthen their position against climate change deniers.
Details
Presentation Type
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session
Theme
Education, Assessment and Policy
KEYWORDS
WITTGENSTEIN, CULTURE, SUSTAINABILITY
