Keynote speakers & panelists

Nicholas C. Burbules is Emeritus Professor from the Department of Education Policy, Organization and Leadership at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC). The University of Illinois is one of the leading universities in the fields of philosophy of education and educational policy studies. Burbules’s research focuses on philosophy of education; the ethics of communication; critical social and political theory; and technology and education.

Silvia Edling is Professor of Education at the University of Gävle and Scientific Director of the research programme Democracy and Equality: Learning Processes for Social Sustainability. Over the years, Edling has deepened her interest in the ethical, pluralistic, communicative and controversial dimensions of democracy in educational contexts. A sustainable and vibrant democracy cannot focus solely on democratic procedures and majority principles, but depends on issues of equality, ethics and diversity. In recent years, Edling’s research has come to approach democracy through the grid of historical consciousness as an educational means to understand its role in the past, present and future.

Andrea English is Professor in Philosophy of Education at the University of Edinburgh. She is President of the John Dewey Society. For more than two decades, she has developed scholarship on dialogic teaching and transformative learning that draws on and extends Dewey’s theory of democratic education. A particular focus of her work is on the role of teacher listening in building equitable, democratic classrooms. 

Maughn Gregory is Professor of Educational Foundations at Montclair State University (USA), and successor of Matthew Lipman as the director of the Institute for the Advancement of Philosophy for Children (IAPC). He is one of the leading figures of the Community of Philosophical Inquiry education in the world. He serves as Research Coordinator for the International Council of Philosophical Inquiry with Children (ICPIC). He publishes and teaches in the areas of philosophy of education, philosophy for children, pragmatism, gender studies, and Socratic and contemplative pedagogies.

Walter Kohan is Professor of Philosophy of Education and the Director of the Center of Studies in Philosophy and Childhood at the State University of Rio de Janeiro, and co-editor of the journal Childhood & Philosophy. His books on philosophy, childhood and democratic education have been published in several languages. Walter is a pioneer of Community of Philosophical Inquiry pedagogy in Latin America.

Jonas Lieberkind is Associate Professor of Educational Sociology at the Danish School of Education, Aarhus University. His research combines theoretical and empirical approaches to the study of political identity, engagement, and socialisation, with educational perspectives on democracy and citizenship education. In particular, his work focuses on contemporary trends among young people. He is part of the Danish research team responsible for the International Civic and Citizenship Education Study (IEA).

Dina Mendonça is Senior Research Fellow at the Institute of Philosophy of the Nova University of Lisbon (IFILNOVA), coordinator of the research group on Philosophy and Argumentation in Society (PAIS) and Principal Investigator of Erasmus+ project Early Childhood and Sustainable Citizenship Routes in the Digital Era (EACH). Her research interests center on philosophy of education, especially philosophy for/with children (which she studied under Lipman and Sharp at the Institute for the Advancement of Philosophy for Children in Montclair), and philosophy of emotions, focusing on developing a situated approach to emotions, based on Deweyan pragmatism.

Panel discussion of the invited speakers: Enabling Conditions and Obstacles to Deliberation in Democratic Education. Nicholas C. Burbules, Silvia Edling, Andrea R. English, Maughn Gregory.

Pre-seminar panel: Dialogue in Philosophizing with Children and Young People. Maughn Gregory, Walter Kohan, Dina Mendonça.