Literary Understanding as an Access to a Digital, Sustainable World? Ideas for a Transformative Literature Teaching

Abstract

In this article, modules for the interlocking of digitization and sustainability in literature teaching are designed and concretized using various examples. The modules are based on the assumption that the choice of subject matters, method sets, and goal formulations could be aligned and thought together in a sustainable and digital way. On the one hand, the associated requirements are illustrated by literary works, in which digital media are closely connected to sustainability related topics and perspectives. Readings for different grades will be considered in order to test the spiral curricular viability of the modules. On the other hand, the focus lies on sustainability narratives in the media, which develop stories, fictional worlds or motives with media-specific means. Here, too, the modules are used to test its applicability beyond writing-based school reading. In both parts, the focus is set on the question of how human-environment-media relationships are narratively staged, which teaching settings result from this, and how the goals of literary comprehension, education for sustainable development, and digital learning can be combined.