Fear of religious conflict silences science teachers from expressing ecological kinship
Evidence
Ever since a student had challenged my teaching of evolution, I’d learned to tread lightly on these matters. I felt all of their eyes upon me, good Christians, every one. So I hemmed and hawed about loving the woods, started to explain about indigenous environmental philosophies and kinship with the other members of Creation, but they looked at me so quizzically that I stopped and then hastened off to point out a nearby clump of sporulating ferns. At that time in my life, in that setting, I felt that I couldn’t explain the ecology of spirit, a sense that went so far from Christianity and science alike that I was sure they wouldn’t understand. And besides, we were there for Science. I should have just answered yes. — Robin Wall Kimmerer, Braiding Sweetgrass, 796
Categorization
- XREF: Echoes ch9’s assimilationist violence and ch26-27 political/ethical constitution readings of the Thanksgiving Address; kinship-with-creation is precisely the root concept students would not grasp. — connects to: The fear of unbounded individual violence drove the creation of social science