Embodying Transdisciplinarity: An Alternate Narrative Framework to the Hero’s Journey as a Tool for Transformation

Abstract

Although ubiquitous in its use as a conceptual metaphor for transformation, the hero’s journey is limited in its relevance and applicability in a postmodern world in which truth and reality are understood as individually shaped by personal history, social class, gender, culture, and religion. Presenting a linear path toward transformation, the hero’s journey cannot readily accommodate the postmodern worldview. Transdisciplinarity, however, holds promise as a new way to conceptualize transformation in a postmodern world in its use as both a tool and methodology to produce knowledge and to collaboratively solve complex societal problems. It is this study's contention that transdisciplinarity itself suffers from Western biases and assumptions that contribute to complex issues in the 21st century.

How can decolonizing transdisciplinarity provide an alternate narrative framework to the hero’s journey as a tool for personal and societal transformation in a postmodern world in active ecological crisis? This study answers this question through a transdisciplinary exploration of the ecological crisis through the lenses of ecopsychology, consciousness studies, Indigenous thinking, Taoism, Buddhism, Ubuntu, and moral philosophy. The anticipated contribution of this study is the foundation for a decolonized transdisciplinarity that is more inclusive in its use of multiple perspectives and ways of knowing. This decolonized transdisciplinarity may be particularly useful and relevant for Anglo-American, cisgendered males, although the explicit intent is to attract a broad audience.

To meaningfully address the ecological crisis, transformation is needed at both the individual and societal levels. In applying a decolonized transdisciplinarity to critique the hero’s journey as a useful metaphor for transformation in a complex world, this study provides a loose framework for those in fields that explicitly and/or unwittingly subscribe to the conceptual underpinnings that give life to the hero’s journey. These fields include, but may not be restricted to counseling, education, leadership, and business. The objective of this study is to encourage individuals from these and other fields to reimagine themselves and behave more compassionately as human beings.