Abstract
This chapter explores the environmental consequences of both neoliberal capitalism and religious fundamentalism in the rural United States. It examines the ideologies shaping rural communities, and the ways education reproduces these ideologies. Capital’s need to dominate nature, combined with fundamentalist Christianity pressing an end-times theology wherein preserving the environment, is meaningless. Under these dual ideologies, capitalism takes on a sacred quality wherein any space not being used for production is profane and must be commodified in order to become sacred. The chapter concludes with new directions for rural environmental education focusing on de-commodifying nature, examining the sociopolitical aspects of ecological crises, and providing students the opportunity to engage with their communities to reclaim nature in a manner that improves quality of life for all.
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Notes
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- 53.
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- 55.
Ibid., 156.
- 56.
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Cervone, J.A. (2018). Environmental Sacrifice. In: Corporatizing Rural Education. New Frontiers in Education, Culture, and Politics. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-64462-2_4
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