Public open spaces as arenas for learning : informality, transformation and the pedagogy of the unknowable

Furlan, Meta (author)

The paper examines public open spaces as sites of informal and transformative learning and engages with the frameworks of public pedagogy and the pedagogy of the unknowable. The study aims to understand how learning unfolds through unplanned, relational, affective and non-representational encounters with space, others and the self. Based on a qualitative case study conducted along the Path of Remembrance and Comradeship in Ljubljana (PATH), the paper analyses this urban memorial site as a multi-layered learning environment that evokes historical, symbolic and social dimensions. The findings suggest that such spaces not only harbour social interaction, but also actively shape reflective, critical and emotional learning processes that promote personal change and social awareness. By conceptualising the unknowable as a pedagogical condition, we foreground the unpredictability, openness and ambiguity inherent in learning in public open spaces and offer a conceptual rethinking of pedagogy beyond formal institutions.

• Language: English
• Keywords: adult education, public open space, pedagogy of unknowable, informal learning, transformative learning, public pedagogy
• Work type: Article
• Typology: 1.01 - Original Scientific Article
• Organization: FF - Faculty of Arts
• Publication status: Published
• Publication version: Version of Record
• Publication date: 01.01.2026
• Year: 2026
• Number of pages: pp. 197-212
• Numbering: Vol. 17, no. 2
• PID: 20.500.12556/RUL-183827
• UDC: 374.7
• ISSN on article: 2000-7426
• DOI: doi.org/10.3384/rela.2000-7426.6054
• COBISS.SI-ID: 282238211
• Publication date in RUL: 19.06.2026

Record is a part of a journal

• Title: European journal for research on the education and learning of adults
• Publisher: Linköping University
• ISSN: 2000-7426
• COBISS.SI-ID: 50135650

Licences

• License: CC BY 4.0, Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International
• Link: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
• Description: This is the standard Creative Commons license that gives others maximum freedom to do what they want with the work as long as they credit the author.

Secondary language

• Language: Slovenian
• Keywords: javna vzgoja, transformativno učenje, izobraževanje odraslih, priložnostno učenje, javni odprti prostor, vzgoja neznanega