Gep-Ed Mailing List

ESS member Michael Maniates maintains an active email listserve devoted to environmental studies research and teaching. Individuals interested in joining the list should send an email to Michael Maniates at michael.maniates AT yale-nus.edu.sg that includes a very brief statement of current work and interest in the list.

The new list archive is at: http://groups.google.com/group/gep-ed/topics

Here is some more information on the Gep-Ed list (shamelessly lifted from the list’s welcome message):

This list provides a forum for discussing substantive and pedagogical issues related to the teaching of global environmental politics (GEP) at the undergraduate and graduate level. The list was initially organized to provide a place for college and university teachers of GEP to compare notes and explore alternative curricular and pedagogical approaches.

Over the years, the list has taken on another purpose too, that being a place where scholars, government analysts, activists, and graduate students can raise questions and broach issues about the state of the field and relevant events and scholarly resources.

Much of the list’s discussion revolves around how or what to teach, and about why and how we teach what we do. Narrow requests for help and insight are welcome on this list (e.g. what recent good books exist out there for my undergraduate course in international relations, how do I teach international political economy to a varied classroom audience, what’s the latest word on international property rights and biodiversity, and how are people framing these issues in their courses?) So too are broader discussions about contemporary and alternative approaches to teaching GEP, and questions or concerns grounded in the struggle to enlighten and inspire students with whom we now, or may someday, work.

The only sort of discussions to be avoid are the solely descriptive and the highly theoretical. Those interested primarily in international relations theory or the nuances of global political economy might best be served by the IPE email discussion list. For more information on this list, email. And those looking for a place to simply outline what they do in the classroom, without engaging in broader discussion about form, method, and consequence, will probably be more comfortable contributing to some of the environmental education listservs that populate cyberspace.

Most who come to this list share two assumptions: education, rather than existing solely as a mechanism of socialization, can foster critical thinking and informed action among our students. Education, in other words, can make a difference, and hence it’s worthwhile pondering what and how we teach. A second assumption is that the links between education and sustainability are unclear, ambiguous, and contentious. Consequently, several distinct models of teaching about GEP can coexist, each with its own set of critical facts to know, normative slants of the world, and prescriptions for change.

Most who come to this list – educators, activists, and analysts with an interest in international environmental problems and the politics they spawn – do so seeking to compare their model to others and, through dialogue and debate, refine their thinking and teaching.