The two-year degree programme of a Master in Transcultural European Outdoor Studies (TEOS) offered by the Philipps-Universität Marburg (Germany, coordinator), the University of Cumbria (England) and the Norges Idrettshogskole in Oslo (Norway) is a response to the fact that outdoor practice and the pedagogy connected with it has gained tremendous significance in all industrial countries in recent years. The aim of the course is to impart a qualifications profile that, on the one hand, embraces the accumulated knowledge of the three central traditions of the philosophy of outdoor pedagogies - the Norwegian Friluftsliv, the English Outdoor Education and the German Erlebnispädagogik, and that, on the other hand, leads to the development of a transcultural sensitivity which allows students to discern the cultural transitions and open borders between the three national concepts that have been there from the beginning and have been retained until today.
The degree programme has been designed as a peregrinatio academica, in which a study group remains together throughout the whole course of studies and spends a semester each at one of the three universities in England, Norway and Germany. This organisational frame quite consciously picks up the metaphor of travelling, not as a reminder of a past phase of European university history, but to illustrate the process of temporarily leaving one culture and entering another - the transition, in fact. To read about a culture and study it from books is one thing, to experience it first-hand is quite another.
The qualifications profile graduates thus acquire will enable them to take on leadership and planning tasks especially on a conceptional level in outdoor centres, in youth work and in clubs, in schools development, in personnel development or in companies of the outdoor industry.
The classes of the two-year full-time course of studies (120 credits) will be conducted in English. The first semester will take place at the University of Cumbria in Ambleside and will comprise the teaching of the English national outdoor discourse as well as the historical origins of outdoor practice in Europe. Following this the students will travel to the Norges Idrettshogskole in Oslo to study the second part of transcultural rationality (landscape and outdoor practices) and the Norwegian concept of Friluftsliv. The third semester will be offered in autumn/winter at the Philipps-Universität in Marburg, where the topic of adventure pedagogics in Germany will be dealt with as well as the design and processing of cultural transitions. In the middle of December students will choose Ambleside, Oslo or Marburg in order to write their MA thesis at the place of their preference.
The degree programme has been designed as a peregrinatio academica, in which a study group remains together throughout the whole course of studies and spends a semester each at one of the three universities in England, Norway and Germany. This organisational frame quite consciously picks up the metaphor of travelling, not as a reminder of a past phase of European university history, but to illustrate the process of temporarily leaving one culture and entering another - the transition, in fact. To read about a culture and study it from books is one thing, to experience it first-hand is quite another.
The qualifications profile graduates thus acquire will enable them to take on leadership and planning tasks especially on a conceptional level in outdoor centres, in youth work and in clubs, in schools development, in personnel development or in companies of the outdoor industry.
The classes of the two-year full-time course of studies (120 credits) will be conducted in English. The first semester will take place at the University of Cumbria in Ambleside and will comprise the teaching of the English national outdoor discourse as well as the historical origins of outdoor practice in Europe. Following this the students will travel to the Norges Idrettshogskole in Oslo to study the second part of transcultural rationality (landscape and outdoor practices) and the Norwegian concept of Friluftsliv. The third semester will be offered in autumn/winter at the Philipps-Universität in Marburg, where the topic of adventure pedagogics in Germany will be dealt with as well as the design and processing of cultural transitions. In the middle of December students will choose Ambleside, Oslo or Marburg in order to write their MA thesis at the place of their preference.
Moreinfo: www.erasmusmundus-TEOS.eu
