Elisa Thevenot

Elisa Thevenot is a postdoctoral researcher in the Department of Social Pedagogy at the Institute of Education, University of Tübingen. Since September 2025 she is postdoc fellow of the Margarete-von-Wrangell Programme and conducting a research project “Doing Youth by Making (Commons) Space” under the supervision of Jun.-Prof. Yağmur Mengilli. The project investigates youth cultural practices and informal learning processes in socio-ecological experimental settings also known as commons spaces.

From 2020 to 2024, she was a research associate at the Institute of Education at the University of Tübingen and a fellow of the second cohort of the DFG Research Training Group “Doing Transitions”

PhD Topic Working Out Sustainability in Transition – Empirical reconstruction of work life trajectories within the sustainability context

How do individuals make sense of sustainability transitions through work? How through biographical narratives are sustainability transitions related to life courses, embedded in personal stories and used to explain life course transitions? Exploring the concept of sustainability from a subject level perspective opens up many questions about: subjectivation processes, learning processes and micro social practices in the context of rapid social change related to the sustainability context.

For this qualitative research project, biographical work-life narratives were conducted with individuals contemplating a reorientation of their professional activities in accordance with their understanding of sustainability transitions. The analysis using a Documentary Method approach consisted in reconstructing implicit meaning given to career transition experiences and how it informs contemporary approaches to doing sustainability through work. 

The findings highlight the importance of personal narratives in shaping sustainability transitions and underscore the biographical learning processes embedded in contemporary work transitions. The research contributes to the development of a new field at the intersection of adult education and sustainability transitions, focusing on individual meaning-making and coping strategies in response to sustainability challenges – offering a complementary perspective to the established emphasis on education for sustainable development.

PUBLICATIONS

Thevenot, E. (2025). Learning from Rhythms: Navigating Personal Life Transitions at the Intersection of Work and Sustainability. In M. Bernhard, S. Billett, C. Hof, K. Kraus, V. J. Marsick, & P. H. Sawchuk (Eds.), Adult Education in Changing Times: Learning at the Nexus of Life, Work, and Transitions. Routledge. (forthcoming)
Thevenot, E. (2025). Biographical learning in the context of sustainability transitions: Conceptual reflections and Methodological insights. Studies in Adult Education and Learning. (forthcoming)
Schmeiduch, L., & Thevenot, E. (2025). Lifelong learning in sustainability-led initiatives: Exploring their learning potential along the reworked four pillars of education. International Review of Education – Journal of Lifelong Learning. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11159-024-10122-
Thevenot, E., & Hof, C. (2024). Den Widersprüchen einen Sinn geben: Biografisches Lernen berufstätiger Erwachsener im Kontext der Anforderung von Nachhaltigkeit. [Meaning-Making Amid Contradictions: Biographical Learning of Working Adults in the Context of Sustainability Imperatives] Zeitschrift für Weiterbildungsforschung, 47(3), 533-549. https://doi.org/10.1007/s40955-024-00295-9
Thevenot, E. (2022). Quand le développement durable devient un projet professionnel : reconstruction des pratiques d’acteurs abordant la transition écologique par le travail [When Sustainable Development Becomes a Professional Project: Reconstructing the Practices of Actors Approaching Ecological Transition Through Work]., Le Monde du travail face aux défis de la transition écologique, Chroniques du Travail, 12, 175-197.

CONFERENCE PRESENTATIONS (LATEST)

09/2025 – “Using rhythmanalysis to understand the temporal disharmony of environmental transitions issues faced by adult learners” presentation for the Symposium Temporalities in dialogue: a stake for education in environmental transitions, in ESREA Triennial Conference, Prague.
03/2024 “Life Course and Transitions” in the ESREA STREAM Network research Symposium “Spaces and Times of Transitions”. Online. Recording: www.youtube.com/channel/UCXAsOkeInX4OQdzWhOjoTcA
09/2023 “Time to combine work and sustainability: learning to accommodate rhythms.” presentation for the event ‘Adult Learning at the Nexus of Life Course, Work & Transitions’, Goethe University Frankfurt (https://adult-learning.de/)
08/2023 “When sustainability becomes something professional: Diverse ways of learning between Work & Sustainable Development” in symposium ‘Understanding Transitions to and Through Working Life: Concepts, Methods and Procedural Imperatives’ at the ECER (European Conference on Educational Research) Glasgow

TEACHING (CURRENT)

WS 25/26 – BA-Seminar: „Environmental Justice from the perspective of Social Work”. Institut für Erziehungswissenschaft, Universität Tübingen.
WS 25/26 – BA-Seminar: „Kindheit als Gemeinschaftsaufgabe – Institut für Erziehungswissenschaft, Universität Tübingen.
WS 25/26 – Blockseminar: „Polykrise: ein neues Schlagwort und seine Bedeutung für die Nachhaltigkeit”. Seminar. Studium Oecologicum Programme. University of Tübingen
SS 25 – BA-Blockseminar: „Nachhaltigkeit als Herausforderung professionellen erwachsenenpädagogischen Handelns”. Institut für Sozialpädagogik und Erwachsenenbildung. Goethe University Frankfurt
SS 25 – BA-Blockseminar: „Hands-on qualitative Forschung: Selber ausprobieren und Verstehen”. Institut für Sozialpädagogik und Erwachsenenbildung. Goethe University Frankfurt
WS 24 – Lehrauftrag: “Wie lassen sich Schule und Nachhaltigkeit zusammendenken?“ Lehramt Studium (Teachers College). Blockseminar. Goethe University Frankfurt

NETWORKS

European Society for Research on the Education of Adults (ESREA)
Network: Spaces, Times, and the Rhythms of the Education of Adults and its Movements (S.T.R.E.A.M)
Association Francaise de Sociologie (AFS)
Working Group (active participation): RT22 Parcours de Vie et Dynamiques Sociales (monthly meetings)
Deutsche Gesellschaft für Erziehungswissenschaft (DGfE)
Working Group: Erwachsenenbildung
TepLab (Laboratory for Teaching Practices)