ABSTRACT
English has a powerful part to play in responding to the environmental issues that face us in the twenty-first century. It is worth reflecting that the true worth of a school subject is revealed in how far it can account for, and respond to, the major issues of the time. Environmental discourse has appeared in all sectors of public life. In popular culture, Vanity Fair, a magazine which is usually more concerned with the worlds of celebrity and fashion, proclaimed on the front cover of its first green issue that the environmental crisis may be ‘a threat graver than terrorism’ (Vanity Fair 2006).1 In the scientific community, the latest report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC 2007) backed up the media hype in more sober and scientific language. In the sphere of politics, Jonathan Porritt’s recent book Capitalism as if the World Matters (2005) examined the potential of capitalism to respond to the environmental crisis. Rather less controversially, this book breaks new ground in examining the potential of English to respond to the issues raised by the ‘planetary emergency’ (Gore 2006). English is the subject that encourages and develops reflection, debate and emotional and aesthetic responses to cultural issues and texts. The environmental crisis is not just about physical changes to the world: it is about cultural responses; changes to our ways of perceiving and acting on the world. English teachers are pivotal in drawing together ideas from a range of disciplines in the reading of texts that explore nature, the built environment and the issues of climate change and environmental stress.
