This page provides more insight into the Nordic Summer University (NSU) and the study circle Ecology of Transformative Learning Practices With/In a More-than-Human World (2025–2027). It includes blog posts that document and reflect on what some of us have learned throughout this journey.
What is the Nordic summer university (NSU)?
The Nordic Summer University (NSU) is a Nordic and Baltic Network for Interdisciplinary Study and Research. It is organised as a Swedish non-profit organisation. Until 2020 the Nordic Summer University was funded through the Nordic Council of Ministers, organizing study circles in the social and human sciences, mainly for PhD students or post-doctoral scholars from the Nordic countries. The activity is organized in a maximum of ten study circles. Separate winter seminars are held for each study circle, and a more extensive summer conference is organised for all the study circles, in a different location within the Nordic countries each year.
The interdisciplinary groups in the circles meet twice a year in order to discuss a wide range of topics, primarily within the humanistic and the social sciences. The winter symposiums are shorter. All circles meet separated. Our circle’s symposia take place in the following countries:
- 2025: Denmark (spring equinox weekend)
- 2026: online. (17-18 January)
- 2027: Lithuania (probably in end of March)
During the summer symposium, all ten circles of the Nordic Summer University (NSU) join in a physical location in the Nordic-Baltic region of Europe for a week of academic discussion and experimentation:
- 2025: Finland (21-28 July)
- 2026: Latvia (24-31 July)
- 2027: Sweden (rumor, gossip)
About our study circle: Ecology of Transformative Learning Practices With/In A More-than-human World (circle 5)
In this study circle, we nurture a diversity of practices for mutual learning and knowledge creation through conversation and play with the “more than human”. We build a community of practice, where we create ‘playgrounds’, ‘ephemeral ponds’ or spaces of not knowing, which are focused around prompts and themes for especially young scholars to experience and test methods, and examine afterwards through their own frameworks/theories. These spaces aim to instill opportunities to grow epistemological humility and inner pathways toward responsibility.
More information about NSU and our study circle
- wikipedia page NSU: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nordic_Summer_University
- website page NSU about our study circle: click here
- subscribe to our newsletter here.
blogposts documenting and processing the outcomes of our study circle
Writing(with)Oak trees – an outdoor experiment in Denmark and Discovering the initial thread for a new journey into financial ecofeminism.
Over the past few years, most of our writing sessions were conducted online within plant circles, with participants generally isolated in their rooms. Despite this, we were aware that some participants chose to walk outside during the sessions, which indeed required a certain level of presence. The facilitator, however, always remained indoors. During a spring equinox gathering at the Nordic Summer University, we chose to hold our session outdoors, seated beside the oak trees. This time, I stepped back from my usual role as facilitator and allowed Heide to lead the session. This blog captures my impressions of being outdoors,…
Flowing with Eglė: Encountering the Oak Prince in a Danish Castle Estate
During the spring equinox weekend, I had the pleasure of staying at Sandholt Slot, a centuries-old castle on the Isle of Fyn. The day before, I was in Copenhagen where the plants creeping on the old walls caught my attention. During the bus ride, I noticed all the signs of spring, like crocus flowers and other purple flowers. And then… entwined spruce hairs. Oh, entwined trees and bark that looks like snake skin, we are in the phase where they already got married, I thought. After the spruce (Eglė), I noticed the birches. Three white churches. Overgrown houses. And lonely…
A fishbowl in Finland: Moomins, queer ecology, decolonizing art practices, whiteness and Sápmi
During the 2025 Summer Symposium in Finland, our study circle on transformative learning practices with the more-than-human world at the Nordic Summer University organized a fishbowl discussion—a participatory format where a smaller group (the “inner circle” or “fishbowl”) engages in focused conversation while a larger group (the “outer circle”) observes and later provides feedback. For me, it was important to engage with the country where we hosted our event, as well as with the ideas and even the imaginary creatures that shape its cultural landscape, grounding our symposium in its local context – even if we had only a small…
Photovoice in Finland: What can we learn from the more than human world about economy?
This blog post is linked to our study circle about learning with the more-than-human-world at the Nordic Summer University, specifically to the first summer symposium, which took place in Finland from 21 to 28 July 2025. Photovoice as a method At the start of our summer symposium, we used Photovoice, a participatory visual research method that combines photography and storytelling to empower individuals—especially those from marginalized communities—to share their experiences and advocate for change. Normally, participants capture their perspectives on a specific issue through photos or drawings, then reflect and discuss these images to create narratives that expressed their concerns…
Forest bathing and foregrounding plants in Finland – two ecofeminist choices
This blog post offers guidelines on photography inspired by care ethics, particularly during intimate experiences such as forest bathing. It also acknowledges the practical need for promotional materials for our study circle and small enterprises, balancing respect for participants with the necessity of sharing our work. Please comment if you have feedback. Forest bath One of the sessions during the summer symposium 2025 in Finland, as part of our NSU study circle: Learning with the More-than-human-world, was a forest bath by Katriina, a Finnish certified guide, a friend of us-the coordinators. “Forest bathing principles are central to her work. There…
A micro-fermentation of the poem ”in appley cycles” with other alchemists during the NSU Summer Symposium in Finland
During the 2025 Summer Symposium of the Nordic Summer University in Finland, our study circle on the ecology of transformative learning practices with/in a more-than-human world explored the overarching theme of economy, woven through our sessions, practices, and workshops. I hosted a short session on reimagining economies through a poem about practices of reciprocal care between place, humans, and more-than-humans – as a portal to transformative learning and a (possible) shift toward post-anthropocentrism. The 30-minute session invited the group to sense, listen, and share, using In Appley Cycles – Practicing Reciprocal Care and Commoning in the Collective Micro-Orchard as our…
EcoMythology online winter symposium (17-18 January 2026)
We welcome anyone on this online weekend event, who wants to learn together more what the methods are to create an eco-mythology for your watershed, city, region, neighbourhood, or your life. The programme Timezone: Brussels time (CET). Timeslot CEST Saturday 17 January Sunday 18 January 09.00-09.30 Wendy Wuyts: Welcome and stone soup story, explanation rules Vitalija Povilaityte-Petri: welcome, repetition rules and objectives 09.30-10.00 Wendy Wuyts: Eglė’s Ecomythology: Restor(y)ing the Baltic Sea Rick Dolphijn x Irena Chawrilska (TBC) 10.00-10.30 Alette Willis: Storytelling as dialogue 10.30-11.00 Magdalena Tabernacka: Mediating entities in the non-human world around us 11.00-12.00 Photovoice Photovoice 12.00-13.00 Lunch break, zoom…
Brewing Soil Soup in a Cauldron – Tools for an online symposium
During the weekend of 17–18 January 2026, we hosted an online Winter Symposium for our study circle Ecology of Transformative Learning Practices With/In a More-than-human World. This gathering marked the third of six symposia taking place between 2025 and 2027. The central theme was eco+mythology. We intentionally chose to make at least one symposium fully online, opening the space to participants who may not have the time or resources to travel to a physical location in the Nordic–Baltic region, yet are eager to explore theories and practices of transformation with plants and other-than-human animals. A winter symposium felt just right for this…
Swamp-thinking, Soil soups and a Billion Folk Songs in the Nordic-Baltic region of Europe – a synthesis of our eco+mythology symposium
The eco+mythology winter symposium was dense with richness and layers. What I carried out of it will inevitably differ from what others took home. What follows is not a neutral report, but a situated retelling, one spoonful from a much larger soil soup. The Cauldron: What Is Eco-Mythology? We began with a question that stayed with us throughout the two days: what do we mean by eco-mythology? Before the symposium, presenters had shared their own definitions, which we collected on our MiroBoard, our shared digital cauldron. I exported this frame of definitions, because it already tells a story of plurality, friction, and…
A Million Songs: How Latvian Folk Songs Preserved a More-than-human Mythology
This blogpost is part of a documentation of a lecture by Kārlis Lakševics, a researcher and lecturer at the University of Latvia, during the NSU winter symposium on Eco+Mythology. This blogpost follows Rivers, Folk Songs, and the More-Than-Human World: Exploring Latvian Ecomythology. Colonial History and the Preservation of Folk Songs Despite the richness of Latvian folk traditions, the historical conditions under which they survived were complex. Folk songs were prohibited for several centuries, yet many elements of the tradition persisted. Interestingly, the German colonization of the region was largely oriented toward political and economic control rather than deep cultural assimilation. While Christianization was introduced,…
Rivers, Folk Songs, and the More-Than-Human World: Exploring Latvian Ecomythology
Our summer symposium 2026 will take place in Latvia. Therefore, during our NSU circle winter symposium on Eco-mythology (17-18 January 2026), Kārlis Lakševics, a lecturer at the University of Latvia, shared ideas what an Eco-mythology in Latvia envelopes. This presentation includes the English translation of knowledge which is only available in Latvian. Using the Daugava River and a Latvian folk song as examples, he explains how rivers, water, stones, trees, and celestial bodies appear in folklore as active agents connected to life, death, cosmology, and human experience. He argued that Latvian mythology is preserved primarily in a vast tradition of folk songs,…