Course Literature GCSF 2017 – Part 2


← Back to course website “Global Challenges and Sustainable Futures”

Here you can find the weekly readings that you need to prepare before we come together in the course. Please read and watch all the articles, book excerpts and videos that you can find under “Mandatory Reading/Watching”. Please keep the guiding questions for each week in mind when reading. You don’t need to answer the questions on your own, they just serve as the basis for discussions in class. Under “Further Reading”, you can find other material that you can dig into, if you are interested in the topic.

Oct 3: Back to a 2°C Future

Guiding Questions:

  • How can we reach a 1,5°/2° future?
  • What are some of the catastrophic scenarios that might occur due to climate change?
  • Who wins and loses from Climate change?

Mandatory Reading/Watching:

Context:


Cases:

Reading/Watching added by the Student-led Session group:

Further Reading/Watching:

Documentaries:

Oct 10: Transition Stories: Imagination for the Future(s) we Want and Need

Guiding Questions:

  • What is the Transition Movement? What is a sustainable future for them?
  • What are limits and challenges of the Transition Movement? Transition by whom and for whom?

Mandatory Reading/Watching:

Oct 17: Me, myself and futures: #30daysofsustainability later

Guiding Questions:

  • What is a utopia? How does it relate to sustainability?
  • What does it mean to create one’s own future vision about sustainability?

Mandatory Reading/Watching:

Further Reading/Watching:

Oct 24: No (or) more borders?: Moving towards multicultural futures

Guiding Questions:

  • What drives global migration patterns now and in the future?
  • What possibilities and challenges does that bring?
  • How does and will global/local environmental change affect migration?

Mandatory Reading/Watching:

Context:

Cases:

Reading/Exploring added by the Student-led Session group:

Further Reading/Watching:


Oct 31: Technology – what is it good for?

Guiding Questions:

  • How is technology changing and will change environmental (eg energy use by smart devices), social (eg community life, love, privacy), and economic sustainability (eg robots as labour)?
  • Do you think that technology is autonomous from humans? What is ‘technosphere’, and why/how do Rosol et. al (2017) argue that it is a useful concept? 
  • Do you agree with Winner (1980) that ‘certain technologies in themselves have political properties’ (p.122)? Are there any other examples you can think of that support (or doesn’t support) this perspective?

Mandatory Reading/Watching:

Context:

Cases:

  • About automation – The Rise of the Machines 

Reading/Watching added by the Student-led Session group:

 

Further Reading/Watching: