The two professors team teaching this cli-fi literature/science combo class next fall tell this blog:
Hi Dan,
The course will be offered again in the fall. We are at John Carroll University in Cleveland, Ohio. The course is part of a new integrated core curriculum. It consists of two classes. As an English professor, Debby Rosenthal, will teach Environmental Literature of North America, and will include Barbara Kingsolver's book Flight Behavior. Jeff Johansen will teach Climate Change in North America (he is a biologist).
"We will have a theme of "sense of place" as we both feel people cannot understand the environment or love it unless they have a sense of the place. We feel that one of the problems non-scientists have getting concerned about climate change is that they lack this sense of place (we have students from urban settings that typically do not have strong connections to nature, land, environment), and that past successful environmental literature has always had this sense.
''As a combined project between the two classes, we are having the students imagine a plot line for a movie set in a time and place that has been affected by climate change. They will write the story line of the movie, as well as a critique of the science behind the movie, and pitch the movie to a board of producers (the class), who will then rate the movie idea. This experience will hopefully help the students really imagine the future in a way informed by science, and develop a sense of place for a future changed world.
''If you or others in academia or the media want to know more, just let us know. We are excited about the prospect of doing this class next fall. We may incorporate other books or short stories as well. I just finished reading The Water Knife and since I have western origins and a good sense of place for the arid west!).
''Thanks for the info you sent us on the California cli-fi books and Claire Vaye Watkins' new novel GOLD FAME CITRUS. They are certainly feeling it out there. It is really difficult to get people in Ohio to care.''
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