Uncertainty is gaining a high profile in environmental education, suggesting an apparent 'common interest'. Environmental education is an eclectic field, however, and common interests cannot be taken at face value. The diversity of philosophical positions that comprise the field results in 'common interests' being configured and justified in entirely different ways. This paper explores why uncertainty can be entertained as an issue worthy of consideration within key philosophical orientations that comprise the field, namely positivism, liberalism, critical theory and postmodernism/poststructuralism. The paper then goes on to consider, in detail, how uncertainty could be engaged from postmodernist/ poststructuralist positions. Given that postmodernist/poststructuralist positions eschew totalisation, the paper considers whether it is possible to theorise and engage uncertainty in a manner that regards uncertainty as uncertainty. That is, the paper considers whether it is possible to engage uncertainty in a manner that does not result in uncertainty losing the honour of its name.

This article proposes that resonances exist between the curriculum vision advanced by the Panel for Education for Sustainable Development (1998) and key Bakhtinian motifs, such as dialogism, polyphony, and heteroglossia. The Panel's support for postmodern perspectives, however, makes the conjunction with Bakhtin problematic, due to anxieties that inhabit Bakhtinian scholarship concerning the assimilation of Bakhtinian notions into postmodernisms. In response to this concern, I formulate thespatial figuration of the neighborhood of as a theoretical geography that enables the ideas offered by Bakhtin and those of postmodernists to form a strategic alliance, without threatening to subsumeBakhtin or obscure the distinctiveness of his ideas. Working in the neighborhood of Bakhtin and postmodernisms creates a space to theorize dialogic uncertainties, creating both textual spaces for conversations around environmental education and new subject positions, or subjectivities, for students.

This paper draws upon content and critical discourse analysis to probe the infiltration and material effects of neoliberalism in environmental education. Specifically, the analysis explores how neoliberal discourse in Australian online recruitment advertisements discursively constructs environmental education in terms of its nature, subject positions and social practices. The argument subscribes to the view that neoliberalism is not a monolithic project based on a unitary and coherent philosophy, but a complex, contradictory and often hybrid assemblage. Furthermore, the argument advances that empirical studies. such as the qualitative analysis of recruitment advertisements (re)presented here. contest the putative hegemony of neoliberalism by drawing the contextualised complexities and contradictions into relief and, thereby, open to critique and resistance.

Emmanuel Levinas has been acclaimed as 'one of the most significant ethical thinkers of the twentieth century' (Kearny & Rainwater, 1996, p.122), as 'the greatest moral philosopher of this century' (Bauman, 1992, p.41) and as one whose thought 'can make us tremble (Derrida, 1967/1978, p. 82). These outstanding accolades from leading figures in contemporary philosophy follow assiduous engagements, both critical and interpretive, with Levinas' ethics of responsibility for the Other (1961/1991, 1974/1991). Furthermore, attention to Levinas' thought has not been confined to the philosophy arena. Levina's thought has attracted transdisciplinary attention and Levinas' influence is beginning to be felt in education.

The topic of uncertainty is gaining a high profile in education. ...In education for sustainable development, the topic of uncertainty has been used as a structural element in curriculum. The Panel for Education for Sustainable Development (1998), for example, has identified seven dimensions that are essential for education for sustainable development, the last of which is uncertainty and precaution in action. This placement is significant because the panel contends that uncertainty and precaution in action are logical consequences of engaging with each of the preceding dimensions. Thus, uncertainty and precaution in action can be read as the ultimate achievement in education for sustainable development.Further, the Panel for Education for Sustainable Development has developed behavioural objectives within each of the seven dimensions. Within the dimension of uncertainty and precaution in action, the panel states that students should "understand the concept of cultural change in the shift from the certainties of the modern age to the uncertainties of the postmodern age, and what opportunities this may afford for realising a more sustainable society" (p. 11). Clearly, the panel is investing a great deal of faith and hope in 'postmodern uncertainties', but uncertainty per se has not been theorised in environmental education or in the broader arena of education.This paper takes its cue to explore the (im)possibilities of theorising 'postmodern uncertainties' from the Panel for Education for Sustainable Development. In keeping with the postmodernist / poststructuralist imperative to refrain from inflicting violence on the Other, this paper strives to respect uncertainty as uncertain. In other words, this paper strives to refrain from depriving uncertainty of the honour of its name.