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Published
2025-06-05
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Critical Essay
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Copyright (c) 2025 Daniel Feldman, Dong Yeol Park, Hunseok Oh
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Orphans of the Earth
Climate Refugees in Young Adult Science Fiction
Daniel Feldman
Bar-Ilan Univesity and Seoul National University
Dong Yeol Park
Seoul National University
Hunseok Oh
Seoul National University
DOI: https://doi.org/10.24926/cle.v3i1.6582
Keywords: climate refugee, orphans, migration, environmental destruction, climate change
Abstract
The climate crisis is emerging as a major driver of migration. Climate refugees—those displaced by climate disasters or gradual ecological degradation—are likely to play a significant role in global migration patterns as climate impacts intensify. This evolving crisis presents challenges for educators and remains underexplored in critical scholarship, yet it is already influencing literary narratives. In contemporary young adult (YA) fiction, climate refugees take on the archetypal role of the orphan, a destabilizing figure that disrupts social structures. This essay examines War Girls (2019) by Tochi Onyebuchi and The Marrow Thieves (2017) by Cherie Dimaline to highlight how these novels depict climate refugees as both vulnerable and transformative figures.
Author Biographies
Dong Yeol Park, Seoul National University
Professor of French Education, College of Education, Seoul National University
Hunseok Oh, Seoul National University
Professor of Education, College of Education, Seoul National University
