Saturday 13.6.2026
13:00–15:00 Edu’s cafe, Virta, Tampere University
Argentinian-Brazilian professor of philosophy of education Walter Kohen will visit Finland for the first time in June. In addition to participating in the Dialogue in Democratic Education conference at the University of Oulu (Democratic dialogue), he will also stop in Tampere, where we will host an informal discussion session as an afternoon research meeting.
At the meeting, Walter and Jan Varpanen – who completed his doctorate at EDU last year – will give presentations based on their philosophical work in education, addressing the themes “Childhood as Questioning” and “Education as Hospitality”. After the presentations, there will be ample time reserved for open discussion.
All those interested in philosophy of education and childhood are warmly welcome to attend, listen, participate in the discussion, and meet Walter and Jan in a relaxed, informal summer afternoon setting.
Walter Omar 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 (www.e-publicacoes.uerj.br/childhood). His books on philosophy, childhood and democratic education have been published in several languages. Walter is a pioneer of the Community of Philosophical Inquiry pedagogy and Philosophy with Children in Latin America, and a renowned scholar of Paulo Freire’s educational philosophy.
Of publications, see e.g.:
Childhood, Education and Philosophy. New ideas for an old relationship (2015) (www.routledge.com/Childhood-Education-and-Philosophy-New-ideas-for-an-old-relationship/Kohan/p/book/9781138712980)
Paulo Freire. A Philosophical Biography (2025) (www.bloomsbury.com/us/paulo-freire-9781350195998/)
Philosophy and Childhood: Critical Perspectives and Affirmative Practices (2014)
(https://link.springer.com/book/10.1057/9781137469175)
Translated article in Finnish by Walter and David Kennedy “Aiōn” in Sokrates koulussa. Itsenäisen ja yhteisöllisen ajattelun edistäminen opetuksessa (toim. T. Tomperi & H. Juuso) (2008; netn.fi/syn_publication/tuukka-tomperi-hannu-juuso-toim-sokrates-koulussa-itsenaisen-ja-yhteisollisen-ajattelun-edist/).
Jan Varpanen works as a postdoctoral researcher in the interdisciplinary Child Studies unit at Linköping University, Sweden. His research focuses on the existential role of childhood in life, especially from a generational perspective, including but not limited to education. His work is philosophical in a broad sense, drawing mainly on French theories from an interdisciplinary postphenomenological angle.
Of publications, see e.g.:
A Place Regained. Re-imaging Education with Immanence (diss. 2025) (https://trepo.tuni.fi/handle/10024/163411)
Education as hospitality – re-thinking the ‘educational’ in education (2025) (https://doi.org/10.1080/17449642.2025.2450944)
Open-ended and unresolved: Criticality as a practice and a process (2025) (https://doi.org/10.1080/00131857.2025.2589319)
Organized by Tuukka Tomperi
DELIBERATE-consortium (Research Council of Finland)
FutuPedaFilo-project (Kone Foundation)
POISED 