Ingrid Forsler
Associate Professor
Subject Coordinator
Senior Lecturer
I work as a lecturer and researcher in media and communication studies as well as within teacher education. My research interests concern media technologies in education.
Culture and Education
PC241
My research interests concern imaginaries surrounding digital media in education and how they are expected to transform learning. Such imaginaries include both utopian visions of digital technology as a way to make learning more efficient and personalized, and more critical perspectives warning that the digitalization of schools has gone too fast. I am also interested in media education and have been involved in the field of media and information literacy in both research and education. With a background as a teacher in visual arts, I have specifically focused on media pedagogy within the framework of art education and how visual methods can be used to explore and create knowledge about media technologies.
Current research projects
Between 2025 and 2027, I am participating in the VR-funded research project Art Education in Transformation: Reconstruction and Subject Development for Visual Arts in the Revised Primary Teacher Education, which examines how the reformed teacher education in visual art contributes to reshaping art as a school subject. By studying the relation between policy and the conditions for art education at different universities across the country, the project provides a broad overview of the conditions for art education in Swedish primary teacher education, aiming to identify and challenge traditional subject perceptions.
The project is carried out by a group of four researchers from different institutions (HDK Valand, Malmö University, and Södertörn University) in collaboration with a group of university teachers from seven parttaking higher education institutions.
I am also participating in the project Anticipating and Mediating Future Classrooms: Ed-Tech Imaginaries of Learning, Communication, and Citizen-Making in Estonia and Sweden, which examines conceptions of future classrooms within the ed-tech industry in Sweden and Estonia (2022–2025).. The project is funded by the Baltic Sea Foundation and is a collaboration between researchers at Södertörn University and Tartu University in Estonia. You can read more about the project here: https://blogg.sh.se/future_classroom External link, opens in new window.
Background and previous research
I have both my bachelor's and master's degrees from the Department of Art and Craft Education at Konstfack, Sweden. In 2020 I defended my thesis on how visual arts education in Sweden and Estonia has been historically transformed in relation to different media technologies, Enabling Media: Infrastructures, imaginaries and cultural techniques in Swedish and Estonian visual arts education. The dissertation received the FSMK (Association for Swedish Media and Communication Research) dissertation prize 2021 and can be acsessed here: https://www.diva-portal.org/smash/get/diva2:1428060/FULLTEXT02.pdf. External link, opens in new window.
I have also participated in the following research and development projects:
- Teacher education, Södertörn University (2023-2024) for the project The Algorithm – The Student’s Best Friend? AI, Examinations, and Critical Thinking in Higher Education.
- SI Creative force (2020) for the project Media Literacy for Tomorrow: Learning with MENA Youth Media Activists. https://www.diraya.media/
External link, opens in new window.
- Teacher education, Södertörn University (2020) for the project "Skärmhjärnan goes to school" - neuropedagogical discourses on media and learning.
Networks and positions of trust
- Developmental manager for digitalization, The Development Unit for Higher Education Pedagogy, Södertörn University (2024-)
- Director of studies, Media and communication studies, Södertörn University. (2022- )
- Chair of Division 7: Media Literacy and Media Education, NordMedia (from 2023, previously co-chair).
- Board member of InSea Sweden (UNESCO-affiliated association for visual education) (2021- ).
The researcher is not participating in any projects at this moment.