Teaching The Tragedy of the Commons through an Iterative, Performance-based, Embodied Cognition Pedagogy

ABSTRACT Garrett Hardin’s The Tragedy of the Commons is a classic piece of academic literature in geography and cognate fields. Applying theories of embodied cognition and performance pedagogies, this paper presents a classroom-based activity that can be used to teach the concepts of The Tragedy of the Commons in a way that will likely intersect with students’ own lived experiences more meaningfully than Hardin’s central example of a group of livestock owners making use of a shared field for grazing. The activity involves a dialogue among five student volunteer actors that iteratively portrays a group of friends trying to negotiate their own advantages alongside a sense of equity in the context of dividing the cost of a shared meal. During and after the performance, key opportunities are presented for the instructor to lead a discussion about Hardin’s “tragedy” as well as the solutions he proposes by which it might be overcome. The model of scripted performance plus impromptu discussion used here can be applied to the teaching of other complex topics in the geography classroom.