• English & American cultural studies
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• v.17 no.1
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• pp.129-162
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• 2017

Ruth Ozeki(Japanese-American female novelist)?s recent novel, A Tale for the Time Being (2013) draws our attention because the fiction shows very interesting fictional experiments, especially in terms of post-humanism. Indeed, the novel is not a science fiction at all which has been, and still is, the typical fictional field employed in the discussion for the transhumanism and posthumanism. It also does not include any cybogs, robots, or aliens which provoke the posthumanism-related issues like mind/body, human/nonhuman, nature/culture relations. Indeed, it seems "merely" represent realistic day-to-day lives of ordinary people living in contemporary Japan and Canada, and in very minute and particular details at that. Indeed, the central action of the main characters of the novel seems very traditional, that is on the one hand writing a diary by a teenage girl who is counting the days and weeks before her suicide and on the other hand reading it by a female novelist who happens to find her diary several years later. Nevertheless, I would like to suggest that underneath this traditional narrative surface are simmering post-humanist and post-anthropocentric worldviews beyond liberal Humanism which takes human beings to be exceptional against human or non-human others. Not only in narrative contents and characterizations but also through narrative structure and strategies, the novel enacts post-humanist and post-anthropocentric worldviews which are interestingly drawn from both age-old Buddhist ideas and modern eco-philosophy and quantum physics. I would like to stress that what triggers the author's fictional experiments helping our rethinking and redefining "what human beings are" and "what the relation between humans and nonhumans" is not merely intellectual interests but her keen and passionate response to the heart-breaking pains and sufferings of human and nonhuman beings caused by the contemporary natural-artificial catastrophes and techno-scientific predicaments.

• Hwankyungkyoyuk
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• v.14 no.1
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• pp.92-106
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• 2001

The main goal of this paper is to suggest a new path to new ecological paradigm in social environmental education. The old paradigm of environmental education consists of two elements. The first element is emphasis on the seriousness and urgency of environmental problems while the second one is the presentation of concrete action programs as solutions of environmental problems. The missing point of this paradigm is the internal process of meaning construction of actors. Any kind of social action must be based on the meaning which the actors gives to their own action. Becoming an environmentally conscious actor, therefore, actor himself needs to interpret the world from the new perspective. In this paper, we call the change of worldview in the deepest sense 'conversion'. Ecological conversion means shift from anthropocentrism to ecocentrism. In the following sections, main characteristics of ecological world view are specified and some examples of ecological confessions which reveal ecological world view are presented. In this last section, 7 ways of lifestyle change which can facilitate ecological conversion are suggested: 1) trying to be alone for a while everyday; 2) making peaceful state of mind; 3) sharpening the 'green sensitivity'; 4) creating slow way of life; 5) choosing voluntary simplicity; 6)raising spirituality; 7) practicing sharing and caring. Social environmental education in the new ecological paradigm could be considered as a starting point towards a civilizational shift from the dominant materialist civilization to the post-material ecological civilization.

• Journal of Christian Education in Korea
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• v.72
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• pp.367-392
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• 2022

The purpose of this study present directions and a model of Christian ecological spirituality education in the post-corona era, and to expand Christian education beyond the private to the public. There are various problems in today's modern society. The 4th Industrial Revolution and COVID-19 has changed daily life and standards over the past few years As a result, the post-corona discourse is becoming more active. In this context, this study conducted a study on what educational alternatives should be prepared in terms of Christian education for the post-corona era. Especially, one of the urgent problems that modern society needs to solve today is the problem of the ecological environment, and I tried to prepare an alternative in perspective of Christian spiritual education. To this end, the causes of today's ecological environmental problems were examined in three perspectives: global, social, and personal. It could be summarized as the problems of neoliberal globalization, anthropocentrism, and ecological ignorance, respectively. To solve this, the direction of Christian ecological spirituality education was presented as the spirituality of participatory responsibility, the spirituality of ecocentrism, and the spirituality of ecological conversion. The specific model of Christian ecological spirituality education was established by presenting educational purposes and goals, educational methods and contents, educational environment and evaluation.

• Cross-Cultural Studies
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• v.41
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• pp.381-413
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• 2015

This article aims to trace a historical trajectory of "Humanism" as a Modern scientific concept in the light of Michel Foucault's genealogy. Generally, we believe that Humanism is a natural and eternal idea for mankind, because no one doubts that he or she is not included in the category of a "Human Being." On the contrary, according to French philosopher Foucault, the Idea of Humanism, or anthropocentrism, appeared only in the Modern Age, from the 16th century downward. Before the Renaissance, human beings did not occupy the most important status in Nature, and only existed as natural beings. As soon as mankind was liberated from the superstitious of fear and religious dogma, the concept of "Human Being" is supplied with new meanings and values. The famous maxim, such as, "Man is the lord of creation" constitutes modern human science as an inviolable category of modernity. However, Foucault tried to illuminate the hidden sides of humanism, and gave us the strict warning on the end of the human beings, which turned out to be an object of Modern knowledge. If there would be no reason to maintain a knowledge system of Modernity, in other words, Modernity as knowledge would lose its validity and we could give up Humanism as a heavy burden. Moreover, it is very clear that we are confronted with the critical moments of radical skepticism on the meaning and value for Humanity. That means that we need to think about the new transformations of Human Beings, which will probably appear in the forms of "Non-Humans," "Machines (Deleuze & Guattari)," or "Post-Humans" etc. At the present time, we cannot know if it will be positive, or negative for mankind. We should look back at the history of Humanism from a genealogical perspective, which is why we have to investigate the conceptual trajectory of Humanism in this moment.