Incorporating Climate Change Across the Curriculum
Quotes from Yavanna Brownlee, Ph.D., assistant professor of English in the College of Humanities and Social Sciences.
Yavanna Brownlee has been teaching English since 2004 and at UNC since 2019, although her roots in teaching about environmental issues go back even further to a class she taught at Ohio University called Writing About the Environment.
According to Brownlee, studying English gives students a unique opportunity to examine a wide variety of topics through a writing and literary lens.
“One of the joys about English is that we teach students to think and solve problems,” Brownlee said. “We’re able to give them topics to think about. It doesn’t have to pertain to their campus, their friend groups, their sororities or fraternities. It can be more conceptual, giving them a perspective to write through and engage in research through.”
Here at UNC, Brownlee teaches, among other things, ENG 225: Research Writing for Contemporary Culture with an emphasis on environmental relationships. In the course, she encourages students to explore the topics of climate change, sustainability and caring for the planet through their writing.
“The biggest problem is that we’ve separated ourselves from the ecosystem,” Brownlee said. “We think we can use it all rather than taking care of it. So my goal is to really try to get students back into that mindset.”
But she doesn’t limit her instruction on environmentally-relevant issues to writing alone. She also provides her students with a selection of books, podcasts and other related media to engage with in small chunks in their free time.
“It’s important to make it fun,” Brownlee said. “I’ve given students weekend challenges in the fall before – things like going to a pumpkin farm and supporting local farmers or picking up five pieces of trash while they’re out on a walk. Giving them little things to help demonstrate the impacts they can have, so that they can then see how larger impacts can be made.”
“We need to make teaching these topics pervasive, and we need to do it with care,” Brownlee said. “It’s all intersectional, and everything we do needs to be done with our ecosystems in mind.”