Här nedanför hittar du länkar och information om böcker jag har författat, medförfattat och redigerat
Below you will find links and information to books I’ve authored, co-authored, and edited.
Please note that Towards a Pedagogy of Higher Education should be available at your nearest University library. If it is not, please ask your library to purchase a copy, an e-book at a library will make the book accessible to more readers, and of course, that is always the ambition. My Ph.D. thesis, Traditions and Challenges, is available open access online, as is the peer reviewed project report Speciella yrken, and the peer reviewed books Specialpedagogik i politik och praktik and Between inclusion and education standards (see links below).
Between inclusion and education standards. Special education professions since the 2000s from a comparative perspective (2025).
Wermke, W., Magnússon, G. & Beck, Inken. (2025). Between inclusion and education standards. Special education professions since the 2000s from a comparative perspective. Peter Lang Verlag.
Peer reveiwed and Open Access.
National school systems have been significantly conditioned by two global trends since the end of the 20th century. On the one hand, there is a shift towards inclusive education that aims at accommodating schooling to all pupils’ learning conditions. On the other hand, there is a rapidly growing focus on standards, emphasising goal achievement for all pupils as well. In this field of tension, the profession of special educators has been central, as it has traditionally focused on students for whom instruction in regular classrooms lacks appropriate educational solutions yet still expects regular goal achievement. While much is known about how global trends have changed national school systems and teaching professions, we know little about how these trends have affected special education professions internationally
Against this background, this volume presents studies on the formation of Special education professions since the 2000s in Germany and Sweden.
Teacher Education and its Discontents. Politics, Knowledge, and Ethics (2024)
Magnússon, G., Phelan, A., Unsworth, R. & Heimans, S. (2024). Teacher Education and its Discontents. Politics, Knowledge, and Ethics. Routledge.
Teacher education and its Discontents. Politics, Knowledge, and Ethics is a unique collection of essays from researchers and teacher educators from around the world. Presenting innovative approaches to education theory, critical policy analyses, de-colonializing reformulations of teacher education, and a “standard of dissensus” for teacher education, this volume is an important contribution to contemporary education discourse.
This first volume from the International Teacher Education Research Collective (ITERC), illustrates common themes and problems in politics of education – in particular as regards standardization, marketization, governance of-, and policy in education – with both country-specific cases and generally formulated theoretical discussions.
The book has three primary aims: to illustrate and critique the ethical, epistemological, and political discourses shaping teacher education; to identify and unravel the entanglements of politics, knowledge, and ethics in teacher education in a range of international settings; and, to revitalize teacher education by proposing and exploring alternative modes of thought and practice. Addressing an audience including (but not limited to) education researchers, education theorists, Ph.D. and Master-students in education, and teacher educators, this volume can contribute to further reflection and in-depth discussion in education, to the formulation of new areas for educational research, and for critical resistance to hegemonic discourses of education.
Specialpedagogik som politik och praktik. Specialpedagogiska professioner i den svenska skolan sedan 1980. (2024)
Wermke, W. Höstfält, G. & Magnússon, G. (2024). Specialpedagogik som politik och praktik. Specialpedagogiska professioner i den svenska skolan sedan 1980. Stockholm University Press.
Peer reviewed and Open Access
Denna bok är en berättelse om speciallärar- och specialpedagogprofessionerna i den svenska skolan sedan 1980-talet. Bokens syfte är att belysa varför vi idag har två professioner med specialpedagogisk inriktning och hur likheter och skillnader mellan de båda grupperna kan förstås. Bokens bidrag är även ett klargörande av specialpedagogers och speciallärares roll i dagens en skola för alla, något som alltmer efterfrågas av såväl professionerna själva som rektorer, lärare och föräldrar
Boken är resultat av ett forskningsprojekt finansierat av Vetenskapsrådet (2021-2024) ”From Salamanca to PISA. The professionalization of special educators since 1990 from a comparative perspective.” I projektet fokuserar vi på specialprofessionernas form och uppdrag mellan två utbildningspolitiska ”megatrender”: å ena sidan inkluderingsrörelsen som manifesterades i Salamancadeklarationen från 1994 och å den andra standardiserade kompetensmätningar och internationella rankningar. Andra utvecklingstrender som vi uppmärksammar under denna tidsperiod är den svenska skolans decentralisering, marknadisering samt under senare tid juridifiering och re-centralisering.
Bréf úr sjálfskipaðri útlegð (2023)
Magnússon, G. (2023) Bréf úr sjálfskipaðri útlegð. Selfoss: Sæmundur
(Brev från självvald exil (på svenska); Letters from self-appointed Exile (in English))
Collection of essays and poetry, discussing various themes relating to having lived abroad (i.e. away from Iceland) for over 20 years. Among other themes, a specific focus is placed on nature, landscape, community, mental health, homesickness, longing, death, and religion.
Bakhlið bókar:
„En útlegðin minnkar mengi klukkutíma sem við getum eytt með þeim sem við elskum og við finnum suma daga meira fyrir því en aðra. Með tímanum fær maður svo svolítinn skráp á hjartað, öll litlu sárin verða að örum – aum en þykkari en húðin var áður. Söknuðurinn hættir að vera óbærilegur, útlegðin gerir hann hversdagslegan, að munstri á veggfóðrinu, alltaf til staðar og bara truflandi suma daga.“
Bréf úr sjálfskipaðri útlegð er safn esseya og ljóða um reynsluna af því að vera búsettur erlendis, langt fjarri heimahögum. Í bókinni fjallar Gunnlaugur Magnússon á persónulegan hátt um þemu eins og heimþrá og söknuð, gleði og fögnuð, náttúruna og vatnið, lífið og dauðann.
Towards a Pedagogy of Higher Education (2022)
Magnússon, G. & Rytzler, J. (2022). Towards a Pedagogy of Higher Education. The Bologna Process, Didaktik, and Teaching. London/New York: Routledge
Towards a Pedagogy of Higher Education illustrates how international policy shifts, primarily the Bologna-process, have affected debates around both the purpose and organization of higher education at different levels.
This book formulates a theory of teaching in higher education that is grounded in educational theory, contributing to a critical perspective on current ideal forms of higher education and a deeper understanding of the pedagogical role of the university. It illustrates how international policies affect conceptualizations of the purpose of higher education and critically examines the pedagogy of higher education in order to develop a comprehensive educational theory for teaching in higher education. The book illustrates the consequences of discursive ideals of education on teaching practices and provides a theoretical framework for new thinking on higher education.
Offering a unique contribution that combines policy analyses, curriculum theory, and educational theory, this book will appeal to academics, scholars, and postgraduate students in the field of higher education research and teaching, educational theory, and educational policy.
Note: Currently, the e-book version of Towards a Pedagogy of Higher Education is available at a more accessible price than the hardback. A paperback version was released in the autumn of 2023 at a more reasonable price.
Traditions and Challenges (2015)
My Ph.D. Thesis:
Magnússon, G. (2015). Traditions and Challenges: Special Support in Swedish Independent Compulsory Schools. Västerås: Mälardalen University. Open access PDF link here
This thesis has two overarching aims. The first is to generate further knowledge about Swedish independent schools, specifically regarding the organisation and provision of special support and how these relate to special educational traditions and inclusive education. This was conducted through four empirical studies, utilising data gathered in two total population survey studies.
The second overarching aim of the thesis is to further develop the discussions initiated in the articles about how special education and inclusive education can be understood in light of the education reforms that introduced the independent schools. A critical theoretical analysis and contextualization of the empirical results from the articles is conducted to explain and describe the consequences of the new (market) education paradigm.
Results show that, generally, the independent schools have not challenged special educational traditions to a significant degree. Rather, traditional conceptions, explanations and organisational measures are reproduced, and in some cases enhanced, by market mechanisms. However, there are great differences between the different types of schools with regard to both their perspectives on special education and their organisational approaches. There are also indications that the principle of choice is limited for this pupil group as compared to some other groups. Additionally, the increasing clustering of pupils in need of special support at certain schools replicates a system with special schools. In this case, market mechanisms are contributing to a system that is in contradiction to the idea of an inclusive school system.
Speciella yrken? (2015; Peer reviewed project report)
Göransson, K., Lindqvist, G., Klang, N., Magnússon, G., & Nilholm, C. (2015). Speciella yrken? : Specialpedagogers och speciallärares arbete och utbildning. Karlstad universitet: Karlstad.
Forskningsprojektet ”Speciella yrken? Ett projekt om speciallärares och specialpedagogers arbete och utbildning” är finansierat av Vetenskapsrådet. I den här rapporten redovisas resultat från delprojekt 1.
Syftet med rapporten är att ge en övergripande och representativ bild av specialpedagogers och speciallärares yrkesroll. Det empiriska materialet utgörs av data från en enkätundersökning som omfattar alla som tagit specialpedagog- eller speciallärarexamen från och med 2001 års examensordning (4252 personer, svarsfrekvens 75%). I rapporten redovisas vilka kunskaper och värderingar yrkesgrupperna bedömer att deras utbildning har resulterat i, vilka arbetsuppgifter de menar kännetecknar deras praktiserande av yrkesrollen, och även vilka förutsättningar yrkesgrupperna har att hävda en specifik expertis vad gäller att identifiera och arbeta med skolproblem. Rapporten riktar sig i främsta hand till praktiskt verksamma inom skolverksamheten på olika nivåer, lärarutbildare och blivande specialpedagoger och speciallärare.
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Gunnlaugur Magnússon 