Worldwide initiatives have been promoting awareness on marine environmental issues. In Brazil Maritime Mentality Program arises from political disputes over the right to use maritime spaces, Coastal Marine Environmental Education shares the same theoretical basis as Environmental Education and Ocean Literacy appears in the USA and became globally widespread after its inclusion as one goal of Ocean Decade. Based on a literature review this article gives a panorama of the history, working groups, institutional links, theoretical framework and impact of the published material of these three working fields. The conclusion is that the conceptual framework of all three is limited and do not address the deep causes of environmental degradation which is the current social-political-economic system.

Ocean literacy (OL) proposes to include ocean and marine environment-related content in school curricula. Such a topic has been deemed effective for citizens to develop actions and attitudes towards the health of marine ecosystems. This study aimed to verify the presence and frequency of OL principles and concepts in the Brazilian high school curriculum at the federal (National Curricular Parameters-PCN) and regional (Rio de Janeiro - Curricular Reference-RC) levels. Both PCN and RC contained OL-related content. Moreover, Biology and Geography were the subjects with the highest numbers of OL concepts, both in the PCN (26 and 27, respectively) and in the RC-RJ documents (28 and 24, respectively), while OL concepts were very little represented in History subject. A Mann–Whitney U-test did not indicate statistically significant differences in the number of concepts between PCN and RC-RJ (p = 0.54). A principal component analysis discriminated the documents according to subjects, regardless of their origin (federal or regional). These results provide an unbiased assessment of the relationship between the curriculum and OL in a strongly affected area (Rio de Janeiro State coastal zone [CZ]). Therefore, these results provide valuable support for managers seeking to promote effective CZ management practices and public compliance.

A Cultura Oceânica diz respeito ao conhecimento público sobre o oceano para a cidadania no uso dos ambientes e recursos marinhos. Para investigar como conteúdos relacionados ao oceano e ambientes marinhos se relacionam com a educação formal, este estudo entrevistou professores da educação básica da cidade de Niterói, Rio de Janeiro. Os resultados indicaram que os professores demonstram conexão e percebem a importância do tema para a escola e para os alunos, porém, relataram uma abordagem limitada ou indireta desses conteúdos no currículo. Os professores sentem-se dispostos a incluir esse tema em suas aulas, porém acreditam que a formação e a vinculação do tema ao currículo são necessárias e, sobretudo, uma sociedade disposta a valorizar esse conhecimento.

Natural resources are used by society to produce goods and this proceeding mediated by human work which transforms nature. This process is called social metabolism and is expressed differently throughout history. In the capitalist mode of production, the exchange value subsumes use value and nature is modified on a scale beyond its reproduction capacity, establishing a metabolic rift that expands to different environments, including the marine. Ocean Literacy (OL) – understanding the human influence on the oceans and the influence of the oceans on human society – aims to contribute to overcoming the ecological crisis in the ocean, however, it is focused on a logic that ranges from the Enlightenment to post-modern perspectives. In the present work, it is proposed that OL incorporates the theory of metabolic rift in order to be able to organize society to face the challenges related to oceanic issues such as acidification, extinction of biodiversity, overfishing, etc. Finally, a case study of the “Onda Cultural’” (Cultural Wave) educational initiative of the “Laboratório de Genética Marinha e Evolução” (Marine Genetics and Evolution Laboratory) at Universidade Federal Fluminense (Rio de Janeiro, Brazil) is presented in its attempt to incorporate this theory into its OL practices and activities in public schools. Key Words: Oceanic crisis. Metabolic rift. Social metabolism. Estate schools.