Thinking differently: An education for the Anthropocene from Uttarakhand, India

Theoretical and philosophical underpinnings of education and activism in the Anthropocene might well benefit from an embrace of non-hegemonic thinking. Laxmi Ashram, a small girls school in the Himalayan mountains of Uttarakhand, India, provides an object lesson in thinking differently: education/research/activism towards socio-ecological community.

This paper acknowledges the critique of Western philosophy, political economy and education that is implicit in any call to listen to voices from the Global South. It also acknowledges, more specifically, a continuing lack of attention in the literature to local, cultural and place-based diversity in transformative learning towards sustainable socio-ecological community. However the central story in this paper is not one of critique, but rather of creating the pedagogical conditions for transformation in thinking and behaviour, towards connected natureculture community.

Diverse ethnographic methodologies and methods have been used to explore the long term impact of a Laxmi Ashram education on students and to inhabit the experience of the school’s pedagogy. A seamless flow of socio-material practice between pedagogy, research and activism, both in research and in the school’s educational approach itself, speak to a philosophy-in-action that is worth considering for global educational praxis in the Anthropocene.