Research analysis of Fridays for Future, Youth for Climate and School Strike 4 Climate

This research project analyses discourses presented by school students under the banner of the movements: Fridays for Future, Youth for Climate and School Strike 4 Climate.  It contends that these movements go beyond just presenting a vision of an inescapable future, or a simplistic request for adults to listen to science.  Instead, their vision is constructive of a better world as they challenge the failures of politicians, and arguably the adult public, demanding to play an active role in policymaking when it comes to the climate crisis.

The research argues that this movement is constructed of a critical utopian discourse expressed through complex temporalities, which define the role of resistance as anticipation.  It considers how the anxiety in the Student Strike movement creates a militant optimism, and the narratives of cathedral thinking are demonstrative of an open-ended utopian process.

Read the full article ‘THE OCEANS ARE RISING AND SO ARE WE’: Exploring Utopian Discourses in the School Strike for Climate Crisis from Brief Encounters journal: http://briefencounters-journal.co.uk/BE/article/view/217

‘Save the future’: lessons in practical utopianism from the School Strikes for Climate Crisis McKnight, Heather. Renewal : a Journal of Social Democracy; London Vol. 28, Iss. 4,  (2020): 81-90.

A video essay work covering some of the key points of the discourse analysis is available here:

For further information please contact: Dr Heather McKnight, heather@magneticideals.org