Joost van Wijchen

Joost van Wijchen is a physiotherapist, educator, and critical pedagogue based in Norway. He serves as Associate Professor and Programme Lead Physiotherapy at the Western Norway University of Applied Sciences (HVL). With more than twenty years of experience in higher education and clinical practice, Joost’s work explores how we learn, reason, and act within complexity — and how we navigate uncertainty in health, education, and society.

Drawing from critical pedagogy, existential philosophy, and the capability approach, his work focuses on becoming, praxis, and emancipatory learning. He collaborate with learners and practitioners to look beyond the clinic walls — to engage with uncertainty, resist reductionism, and rediscover physiotherapy as a relational, ecological, and ethical practice.

Joost is actively involved in international collaborations on complexity-oriented and transformative learning, including the Critical Emancipative Learning (CEL) and Embracing Complexity-Oriented Learning Approaches in Health (ECOLAH) initiatives. He also wrote about pain and patient education, co-authoring reflective and creative explorations of patient communication alongside Jo Belton.

His essays bridge philosophy, health, and education, inspiring conversations about justice, care, and planetary responsibility in professional life.