A Flower in the Grim City: Urban Environmental Education, Anti-Urban Philosophy, and Trips to the Field

Abstract

An essay on urban environmental education is presented. Three pivotal moments in philosophizing about education that cast the city as a fallen space are discussed while urban approaches to environments are explored. The author draws on the works of Jane Jacobs and the Situationist movement's engagement with urban geographies and proposes that meaningful interactions with city environments are possible and such may suggest different ways educators can think about educational processes. The essay ends with the conclusion that Urban Environmental Education may be in a position to ask educators to rethink preconceptions about environments and what the experience of education can be. An essay on urban environmental education is presented. Three pivotal moments in philosophizing about education that cast the city as a fallen space are discussed while urban approaches to environments are explored. The author draws on the works of Jane Jacobs and the Situationist movement's engagement with urban geographies and proposes that meaningful interactions with city environments are possible and such may suggest different ways educators can think about educational processes. The essay ends with the conclusion that Urban Environmental Education may be in a position to ask educators to rethink preconceptions about environments and what the experience of education can be.