The Beginning
Environmental Studies may seem like a class that clicks easily to those interested in our planet and issues surrounding it (like myself!), as well as just learning about concepts like global warming, pollution, energy, etc. However, it is not all that simple, and in fact you will realize this once you take ENVS 160. This course introduces to us that even the word “environment” is a very diverse and massive concept, and people need to first know how an action can affect different people and regions before implementing it. Throughout my time in Introduction to Environmental Studies, I have felt overwhelmed at times. I was not used to taking a reading quiz every single class, and I struggled with them because I did not complete the reading guides given to us by our professor, Jim Proctor. After frequently struggling with quizzes, I realized that something needed to change. I finally started using the reading guide and paying special attention to the pages Professor Proctor highlighted on the reading guide. Thankfully, I started doing better on the quizzes, but I wish I did this from the beginning. You have to give it your best the first couple of weeks into the course, and if you have any problems, see your professor right away! However, by having faith in myself to do well and putting in the effort, I have been doing better throughout my time in this class. If you slack off, miss more than three classes, and don’t pay attention in class, BELIEVE ME (Trump references, anyone?) you will realize the mistake you have made.
In this post, I will be discussing what I learned in ENVS 160 and the four rich sections that the course covers.
Why We Disagree About Climate Change
The first book we read and discussed in ENVS 160 was the book, Why We Disagree About Climate Change, by Mike Hulme. In this book, Hulme talks about, well, the title! He talks about the vast reasons why people disagree on climate change and how to address it. Hulme states that to every person, climate change can mean something different, regardless if they believe it is problem or not (Hulme 2009). Someone living near the Arctic will have a different perspective on climate change compared to someone living in Abu Dhabi. Hulme puts his attention on how climate change came to be with the connection between social rules and concrete action. In every single chapter in this book, he discusses the different types of disagreements people have about climate change; whether it is a social difference, how one was raised, etc. (Hulme 2009). Because people have different opinions about climate change, our first group project was to survey people in Portland on what they thought of climate change and how important they felt it was. We would go up to people and ask if they would like to be surveyed, and if they did, we asked them the question, “What do you first think of when you hear the phrase ‘climate change’? What pops into mind?” as well as other small questions, which we then put into a Google Form and submitted. Even though Portland is a very progressive city, our group used Hulme’s idea that people disagree on climate change in order to analyze the data we found. Thanks to this assignment, we were able to get out of the Lewis and Clark bubble and see what people in the real world think about climate change.
Making the Modern World
The next book we read and discussed in ENVS 160 was the book, Making the Modern World: Materials and Dematerialization, by Vaclav Smil. This book is very complex and at times can seem very overwhelming. However, thanks to Professor Proctor knowing about this, he only assigned us to read certain parts of the book. This book is full of quantitative data, and in class we talked about the factual statistics Smil uses. This is definitely the hardest part in this course, but as long as you do not give up, you will understand it! Something that really stuck out to me when I read this book was how he talks about consumption: Smil says that people in well-off and technologically advanced countries, like the United States and Germany, are “addicted” to consuming materials. He also presented a piece of data that shows that people living in these countries rank lower on the “global Happy Index” compared to countries like Colombia, the Philippines, and Rwanda (Smil 2014, 174)! For our second group project, our group analyzed silicon and how silicon plays into the scope of things. Our group analyzed four different mining and production sites in different parts of the world. By working on this project, we were able to see how vital a “place” is.
Classic and Contemporary Environmental Thought
This section differs from the former two sections because there was more than one text the class had to read and discuss surrounding classic and contemporary environmental thought. In our ENVS 160 class, we went over the ideas surrounding classic and contemporary environmental thought, and how they differ. In layman’s terms, classic is the older view and contemporary is the better and modern view on how to solve issues surrounding our planet. One major classic environmental thought text that we read was The Tragedy of the Commons (Hardin 1968). Hardin states that humans are selfish and only do things to help themselves rather than others. He also was not optimistic about our planet’s future. However, we then moved on to the book Austerity Ecology and the Collapse-Porn Addicts, by Leigh Phillips, who is more positive about what society can do about climate change (Phillips 2015). Our third and final group project was about “isms”, when our group talked about conservatism. Although this was one of the more challenging group assignments, our group managed to talk about the context of this term in environmentalism and environmental scholarship.
Who Rules the Earth?
The last book we read and discussed in ENVS 160 was the book, Who Rules the Earth? How Social Rules Shape Our Planet and Our Lives, by Paul F. Steinberg. By going over this book, our class learned about social norms, rules, and institutions. Steinberg’s main argument in this book is that in order to get solutions for wide-scale environmental issues such as climate change, it should be able to come from institutional change and not individual change. This is because he believes that thinking institutionally will be able to solve environmental issues more effectively than thinking individually (Steinberg 2015). This book was able to take in all of the ideas we have gone over throughout the semester, such as classic and contemporary thought, into a great last book we had to read. Instead of doing another group project, Professor Proctor decided to have us do four short posts reflecting on material in class and our personal lives, as well as connecting concepts that have been brought up throughout the semester. These posts have been the perfect way to bring up students’ grades to the grades we want, and so far it has been working! Our first post was about how ENVS 160 has changed us so far. Our second post was about the connections between the texts; we were able to choose which texts to incorporate into our post. Our third post was specifically focused on Who Rules the Earth? How Social Rules Shape Our Planet and Our Lives, and how it applies to our scholarly and personal lives. Our fourth post was built on the three previous posts in order to state what we have learned in ENVS 160 and how we will practice the information we have learned in our scholarly and personal lives. Although the posts were time consuming, they were helpful to bring together everything we have learned.
Final Thoughts
As you are taking ENVS 160, you will feel confused and overwhelmed at times. It is normal; do not worry! Just make sure you focus in class and be as engaged in the course as you can. If you have any issues, do not be afraid to ask for professor for help, because all of the professors here at Lewis and Clark want you to succeed in their courses. This class was not what I expected to be, and you might feel the same, but the knowledge you will gain from this class is definitely worth all of the small bumps along the way.
References
Hardin, Garrett. 1968. The Tragedy of the Commons. Science.
Hulme, Mike. 2009. Why We Disagree About Climate Change: Understanding Controversy, Inaction and Opportunity. Cambridge, United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press.
Phillips, Leigh. 2015. Austerity Ecology & The Collapse-Porn Addicts: A Defense of Growth, Progress, Industry and Stuff. Winchester, UK ; Washington, USA: Zero Books.
Smil, Vaclav. 2014. Making the Modern World: Materials and Dematerialization. Chichester, West Sussex, United Kingdom: Wiley.
Steinberg, Paul F. 2015. Who Rules the Earth? How Social Rules Shape Our Planet and Our Lives. New York, United States: Oxford University Press.