Tuomas Tervasmäki is a co-leader of POISED and a postdoctoral researcher in two research projects at the Tampere University, Finland. His main areas of interest are politics of education, philosophy of education, curriculum studies and theories of ideology.
Tervasmäki defended his doctoral dissertation ”Tracing Ideology in Education – Investigations in Discourse Theory” on 8th of November 2024. The dissertation scrutinizes the post-structuralist Essex School of Discourse Theory in the ideology-critical analysis of politics of education and Finnish education policies. The work argues that it is indispensable that we theorise the workings of ideological and use concepts of theories of ideology in educational research. In this undertaking, it applies the Discourse Theoretic framework and conceptual toolkit in the analyses of empirical case studies and further develops frameworks of ideology-critique while also exploring the advantages, but also some limitations of this framework in educational research.
Currently Tervasmäki works in two research projects: first, ”Democracy in Finnish universities: the crisis of representative liberal democracy and university self-governance” 2023–2026 lead by associate professor Hanna Kuusela (JyU), funded by KONE Foundation, Finland.
Second, ”Comparing the Organization of Durable Inequalities in Childhood: Inequality in childhoods, schools and associated welfare systems” (CODIC) 2023–2027 scrutinises education systems in Norway, Sweden, Finland and USA, and is lead by professor Håkon Leiulfsrud (NTNU).
You can find Tervasmäki’s publications from Tampere university research portal, Researchgate and Academia.edu, or you can follow him on Bluesky.
Email: firstname.surname(a)tuni.fi
Väitöskirjatutkimuksesta suomeksi: (dissertation in brief in Finnish):
POISED 