Study on the representation of sustainability in modern American literature for use in education for sustainable development

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To respond to the imminent need to create sustainable societies and communities, I examined how modern American literature has represented sustainable societies and sustainable relationships between human beings and nature. On the basis of the findings of this examination, I developed materials for use in education for sustainable development (ESD) and actually used them in classrooms. During the period from 2011 to 2012, with financial support from JSPS, I examined works by William Faulkner, Robert P. Warren, Gary Snyder, and Pearl Buck and created a database of the representation of sustainability in these works. In general, literary works describe un-sustainability instead of naively believing in the possibility of sustainable relationships between human beings and nature. Specifically, works in which the disasters of war are narrated often tell us that although human beings pursue freedom and are able to achieve it temporarily, the freedom is inevitably evasive and never per anent. However, by carefully examining these extreme difficulties and looking for something positive, literature can hopefully provide us with something to pray for in this difficult world. This perspective on the world in many ways resonates with the ideal of ESD, that is, the aim to see the problems of our society and our time and struggle to find possible resolutions by collaborating with others.