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About us Practical matters How to find us B.A.J. (Johannes) Westberg, Prof PhD

B.A.J. (Johannes) Westberg, Prof PhD

Professor of Theory and History of Education, Chair basiseenheid Pedagogiek

Research interests

Westberg promotes the use of historical perspectives and methods within the field of educational research, and has paid special attention to the history of primary schooling and early childhood care and education (ECCE). He has a particular interest in questions regarding the how's and why's of educational expansion, not the least the rise of mass schooling during the 19th century and the expansion of ECCE since the 1960s. As a result, he has published monographs, edited books, textbooks and journals articles covering issues relating to the social and economic history of education; school finance; material culture, school architecture; teachers, teachers' salary and livelihoods, discipline and governmentalities; educational borrowing and educational transfer.

Westberg has published more than 60 book chapters and articles, the latter in journals including History of Education, Paedagogica Historica, Scandinavian Journal of History and IJHE Bildungsgeschichte, and been editor and co-editor of more than 11 edited books and special issues, including the text book Utbildningens historia - en introduktion [History of Education - An Introduction] (3 ed. 2019), and School Acts and the Rise of Mass Schooling (Palgrave Macmillan, 2019). In addition to his dissertation, he has also written two monographs: Att bygga ett skolväsende (Nordic Academic Press, 2014, 445 pp.) And  Funding the Rise of Mass Schooling (Palgrave Macmillan, 2017, 242 pp). 

Publications

Bright Nordic Lights: a revitalised interdisciplinary history of education in the massified higher education of the Nordics

Human capital in Europe, 1830s–1930s: A general survey

Interdisciplinary Expansion and the History of Education in Sweden

La fabrique des corps nationaux: Autour de l’institutionnalisation de l’éducation physique en Suisse et en Europe (XIXe-XXIe siècle)

La fabrique des corps nationaux ou la fabrique nationale des corps ?: De l’importance de (re)penser l’histoire de l’éducation physique

L’éducation physique au service de la nation: Ling, l’Institut central royal de gymnastique et l’enseignement primaire en Suède au xixe siècle

Multifaceted knowledge actors: Nineteenth-century teachers as authors, researchers, administrators, and politicians

On older learners’ naïveté: an examination of the emancipatory function of critical older adult education

Rethinking the History of Education: Considerations for a New Social History of Education

Rethinking the Social in the History of Education

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Press/media

Tina van der Vlies wins the Georg Eckert Research Award

The comprehensive school: 60 year [Grundskolan fyller 60 år – så har det gått sedan starten]

What can we learn from the history of education?

Some pointers about the quality of Swedish schools in the past [Några pekpinnar om hög kvalitet i svenska skolans historia]

Hardly a silver age [Knappast en silverålder]

Loneliness, Male Violence, and the Work and Living Conditions of Female Teachers in Sweden

Why History of Education?

Democracy 100 years: A School for All

A School for All

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