CSSE Conference - May 27-June 1, 2023 - York University - Toronto, Canada

This symposium invites a transdisciplinary discussion about reimagining education in the geologic and political times often referred to as the Anthropocene (a term that is uneven in its affects and has its own politics and history). It brings together the work of educators and researchers from many different locations and disciplines in an effort to meet the CSSE 2023 call for reimaginings and reconfigurations of education for justice and the flourishing of all life.

Jessie Beier — Black Hole Sustainability

In this presentation/provocation, I will respond to the questions posed, and then pose a few more, via a short speculative study of what I call “black hole sustainability.” My own take will approach the tensions raised by the Anthropocene, and more specifically the affirmative relaunching of post-Anthropocene educational futurity, by situating the panel questions in relation to education and the problem of sustainable futures. In a move to enact a resituating of (science) education, I bring the (purported) problem of educational futurity in contact with the computational imaging of a black hole so as to develop a weird pedagogy of endurance — a black hole sustainability - that might be capable of upending education’s unquestioned salvation narratives so as to navigate horizonless futures. Taking off from this example, I will raise questions about the potentials, but also limitations, of speculative practice in and as educational research.