Glossary of Key Terms

Heightened emotional distress, worry, and/or uncertainty related to climate change and its actual or anticipated effects. Throughout the curriculum, eco-anxiety is used interchangeably with climate anxiety.

Long-term alterations in temperature, precipitation, and other atmospheric conditions. These changes can be natural, but since the 1800s have largely been driven by human activities such as burning fossil fuels, which release greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions into the atmosphere. These emissions cause heat from the sun to become trapped and cause warming.

A range of natural feelings and emotional responses to the challenges and realities of climate change, sometimes also referred to as eco-emotions.

Deep sorrow and a sense of loss that people feel in relation to climate change and environmental destruction, sometimes also referred to as eco-grief.

A principle that addresses the human rights and inequities of climate change, strives for justice and fair treatment for all, seeks equitable systems and decision making processes, and recognizes that those least responsible for climate change are often the most impacted. Climate justice also recognizes the systems that have led to climate change are rooted in inequity and harm, and works towards just, restorative, caring systems instead.

Describes a wide-range of psychological, physical, and social reactions and consequences that are related to the anticipated, observed, or experienced effects of climate change and/or the perception that our individual and collective responses to climate change are insufficient.

Multiple and interacting emotions, capacity, strategies, and actions used to cope with the acute and chronic anticipated, observed, or experienced effects of climate change and/or the perception that our individual and collective responses to climate change are insufficient.

A harmful system of power and extraction where a colonial external force tries to control and extract resources from another people and their lands. In Canada, this took the form of settler-colonialism, whereby settlers took and continue to hold power over Indigenous Peoples’ land, communities, and ways of life. This has involved controlling resources, changing laws, banning cultural practices, and hindering Indigenous Peoples’ connections to land. The effects of colonialism are not just in the past; they are ongoing and continue to shape Indigenous Peoples’ experiences, health, and well-being.

Often used alongside climate anxiety, or even synonymously with it, to refer to anxiety regarding environmental or ecosystem concerns, which can include climate anxiety, but may also be broader and not as climate specific. For example: if a company is dumping toxic chemicals into a river near your home, this may not be directly related to climate change, yet it still can provoke intense emotional responses. Throughout the curriculum, eco-anxiety is used interchangeably with climate anxiety.

A community of living and non-living things which interact within a specific environment or geographic area.

The interconnected physical, biological, and chemical conditions and relationships that support and influence all forms of life. It is also used synonymously at times for place, space, or ecosystem.

A type of systemic racism where communities of color are disproportionately exposed to environmental hazards such as toxic waste sites, polluted air, and urban heat islands. These disproportionate impacts are due to combined effects of racism, political exclusion, colonialism, and other harmful systems. Environmental racism creates unequal exposure to environmental risks, exacerbating both physical and emotional impacts of climate change and environmental degradation.

People have what they need to be safe, healthy, supported, and thriving, even if different people need different things. Equity aims to remove unfair imbalances that are caused by injustice and inequitable treatment of different groups.

The diverse cultural, relational, experiential, and scientific approaches through which Indigenous Peoples both singly and in groups understand the world. Closely linked to frameworks such Two‑Eyed Seeing, and Indigenous cultural safety, in the shared emphasis on respect for the importance of both Indigenous knowledge systems and Western knowledge and scientific methods. Indigenous Ways of knowing recognizes the strengths of each and maintains their distinctiveness, while also using them together to generate deeper, more holistic understanding for the benefit of communities and the environment.

A framework which outlines how individuals possess multiple, overlapping identities that interact to create unique experiences of privilege and oppression. In a climate context, it allows us to see how these overlapping systems affect who bears the brunt of environmental harm and who is most impacted emotionally.

Marginalization involves the systematic exclusion of individuals or groups from power, resources, and decision-making processes. This exclusion intensifies the impacts of climate change on already disadvantaged populations.

Planetary health is both a hopeful emerging field and social movement that relates to climate change and how it is connected with the health of people and the planet. It emphasizes that human well-being is connected to the environment.

An ethical practice rooted in the connections between people, communities, and the environment rather than individual needs and hierarchical power structures and systems.

The act of being in right relations and relational accountability by centring an awareness of the interconnectedness of all things. Key to this is understanding the importance of trust, reciprocity, and respect for dignity and Rights in systems, structures and relationships in ways that disrupt inequality and inequity between all things both living and non-living.

The emotional distress of witnessing ongoing environmental change in one’s home environment. Unlike grief that follows a recognized loss, solastalgia is the sense of homesickness and dislocation that arises when you are at home, but that home is fundamentally changed in real time.

Ways in which inequities and harm are embedded within laws, policies, institutional practices, and broader societal norms, disproportionately affecting certain groups based on identity.

An approach that recognizes what trauma is and how it can affect people, focuses on key areas like safety, trust, clarity, connection and inclusion and works to prevent further traumatization or re-traumatization.

Refers to the degree to which individuals or communities are at risk of harm from climate impacts. It is not a fixed trait but a dynamic condition influenced by various social, economic, and environmental factors.