Tomorrow Today

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] 100

short stories, for example, one focuses on the represen-

tation of the physical environment in relation to the

socio-cultural and economic environment. Limbo Island

relates the story of a man caught up in the American

dream of ‘making it’ (a reverse Willy Loman figure as

in Arthur Miller’s

The Death of a Salesman

) who then

discovers how empty the dream is because he has sold

his soul for it. A broad eco-critical reading uncovers the

growing loss of land and culture of a people to tourism.

The economic drivers of tourism lead to the destruc-

tion of the natural environment as well as the social

and cultural environment. Conflict between economic

sustainability on one hand, and on the other hand,

social, cultural and physical sustainability is thus

represented by the writer. For Caribbean and other

small island people where tourism is the number one

foreign exchange earner, such a text exposes clearly the

tensions and the dangers of unsustainable tourism. The

point made here is that connecting the specificities of

the subject with the awareness of sustainability can lead

to students becoming citizens who are far more aware

of the ambiguities and tensions in their society and

are thus enabled to take meaningful action to address

these. Equally importantly, the students can begin to

articulate an eco-critical resistance to development that

threatens a sustainable future and also to imagine an

alternative future. This is a major part of what it means

to educate for sustainability.

to persuade them to change their way of life. Community action

projects undertaken by graduate students have included:

• Developing peace through literacy classes

• Creating green areas; raising awareness of sustainability in a

school through a recycling project

• Vegetable gardening

• Reshaping a conservative church’s mental space to include a

HIV/AIDS project.

Students are also encouraged to read more deeply and widely the

broader environmental, social and economic texts, so that they are

able to recognize other acts of unsustainable living – such as hotels

built on fragile coastlines, or hotel activities that destroy reefs, and

the economic and political power behind this – and to identify ways

to intervene. In other words, student teachers are encouraged to

examine further the concept of sustainable development, under-

standing that degradation of the environment (i.e. the ecological

and biophysical life support systems) places human beings at great

risk. They are encouraged to reflect on the connection between the

environment and social/cultural and economic development, to see

literature and its texts as part of the cultural capital, related to all

aspects of this ‘ecosystem’.

Literature texts are thus read/taught with the awareness of this

interconnection. Applying knowledge of various literary theories,

for example eco-criticism and post-colonialism, students deepen

their interpretation of the literature texts as well as the actual social,

economic and environmental texts of their world. In reading the

story of Limbo Island in

Blue Latitudes

, a collection of West Indian

Child participating in the early childhood education Roving Caregivers Programme in Jamaica