Conference: The Making of Apprenticeships

Until the late eighteenth century, apprenticeship systems across much of Europe, Asia, and Africa followed comparable patterns of skill transmission and moral discipline. In Europe, these were shaped by the guild system; in the Islamic world and elsewhere, similar forms of corporate organization and craft hierarchies governed access to trades, linking work, education, and community life. Apprenticeship was thus not only a European phenomenon, but part of a wider pre-industrial world in which learning a trade meant entering a moral, social, and economic order – one that was also marked by exclusivity and hierarchy.

By the nineteenth century, this order came under pressure from industrialisation, technological change, and new intellectual currents associated with the Enlightenment. Across different regions, new forms of vocational education and training emerged. Some societies dismantled the guilds and their regulations in pursuit of economic liberalisation; others drew on emerging educational theories to strengthen formal vocational schooling. Between these poles, the old apprenticeship tradition endured, evolving into hybrid forms that combined workplace and school-based learning. These developments were deeply interconnected – circulating through imperial, commercial, and intellectual networks that linked Europe with Asia, Africa, and the Americas. The diverse configurations that resulted continue to shape labour markets, educational policies, and social identities around the world today.

Existing scholarship on these transformations has often focused on Europe’s internal developments, tracing the effects of industrialisation, nation-building, legal reform, or explaining institutional persistence through mechanisms such as path dependency. While such studies have yielded important insights, they frequently portray the evolution of apprenticeship systems as a linear, largely European story – often only focused on German speaking countries. This perspective tends to portray institutional development as a logical or inevitable process, leaving little room for contingency, dissent, or lived experience.

This conference seeks to move beyond that perspective – to understand apprenticeship as a global historical process shaped by exchange, translation, and mutual observation across regions. At the same time, the conference invites a renewed focus on experience. Institutional histories alone cannot capture the everyday realities of those who experienced the often-told meta-narratives. It asks how people – apprentices, masters, parents, reformers, and officials – experienced historical transformations, and how they coped with, resisted, or reinterpreted them. In doing so, it aims to restore the complexity of historical experience and foreground the perspectives of those most directly involved. Understanding these lived dimensions is crucial for explaining how vocational education and training took on the forms we know today.

We particularly encourage comparative, national, transnational, and interdisciplinary perspectives that connect local case studies with broader historical and global developments. While the nineteenth century was certainly influential, we do not place this century at the centre of interest. We invite studies from all historical periods that shed light on the making and remaking of apprenticeship as a social, educational, and economic institution. Possible topics include, but are not limited to, the following:

Historical Transformations

• From guild to state: how late guild structures adapted or collapsed under industrial capitalism and state-building and how this adaption or collapse influenced apprenticeships.
• National divergence: how and why certain countries institutionalised more work-based or more school-based systems.
• Development of mixed VET systems: how different approaches to VET evolved in certain countries that co-exist.
• Early combinations of school and workshop: when and why dual forms of apprenticeships emerged.

Experience, Agency, and Social Worlds

• Apprentices’ everyday lives: their work, mobility, conflicts, and aspirations.
• Gender, age, and discipline: apprenticeship as a moral, social, and generational formation.
• The shifting role of the apprentice between productive worker and protected learner within changing regulatory frameworks.
• Motives and interests of employers, governments, trade unions, and educators in shaping apprenticeship systems.

Knowledge, Pedagogy, and Practice

• Changing relationships between labour, learning, and expertise.
• Evolving didactical concepts, curriculum models and educational methods for apprentices.
• Theoretical and conceptual studies: how apprenticeships have been defined and redefined over time.

Global and Colonial Dimensions

• Transfers and adaptations of vocational models in colonial and postcolonial contexts.
• Circulation and translation of “European” concepts of skill and training across regions.
• Encounters between different traditions of craft learning and their effects on vocational education globally.

Cultural and Discursive Representations

• How apprenticeship was represented in literature, art, and political discourse.
• How reformers and institutions defined, represented, or instrumentalised apprentices in public debates.
• How apprentices themselves expressed their wishes, expectations, and self-understandings.

By exploring these topics, the conference seeks to advance not only a European but also a global dialogue on the history of apprenticeships that reveals both the structural differentiation of vocational education and training systems and the historical alternatives that were once possible. This shift in perspective will enrich existing explanations of the emergence and evolution of (dual) vocational education and training systems and offer new insights for the ongoing development of VET structures.

If you wish to present a paper at the conference, please submit an abstract of no more than two pages (approximately 500–800 words) outlining your research question, sources, and methodological approach. Deadline for abstract submission: 31 March 2026.

Please send abstracts to:  Christoph Porcher ( chrisporcher@uos.de).

Notification of acceptance will be sent by 15 April 2026.

Each accepted paper will be allocated 30 minutes for presentation, followed by 15 minutes of discussion.

To facilitate a meaningful exchange, presenters are asked to submit an extended abstract no later than four weeks prior to the conference. These extended abstracts will be compiled and circulated to all participants in advance, ensuring lively and informed discussion. The extended abstract should present substantially more information on the research question, sources, and methodology than the initial abstract and also include results.

The organisers will edit a special issue of the International Journal of Vocational Education Studies ( IJVES) dedicated to the conference theme. All conference participants are invited to contribute to the volume. Submissions will undergo double-blind peer review in accordance with the journal’s editorial standards. The special issue is scheduled for publication in Winter 2027/28. If you intend to contribute to the IJVES special issue, please indicate this clearly in your abstract or email. The deadline for submitting the full paper for peer review is 15 June 2027.

The conference is free of charge for all participants. We are also applying for a research grant which – if successful – will enable us to cover travel and accommodation costs for all presenters, making participation even easier. In any case, we are committed to supporting emerging researchers. If you identify as an emerging researcher (PhD student, early career researcher, etc.), please mention this briefly in your registration email. We will calculate support based on the number of applicants and inform you individually, so that you can participate without financial concern.

Everyone is welcome to attend the conference, i.e. you do not necessarily need to submit a paper for the conference. Please register with an email send to Christoph Porcher ( chrisporcher@uos.de). Please let us know if you have any food allergies or need any assistance with traveling. Registration is open until 1 February 2027.

The conference will take place at Osnabrück University’s main lecture building. As this building was originally a castle, it is quite hard to miss. The address is Neuer Graben 29, 49074 Osnabrück. You can download a campus map  here. The building number is 11.

We have pre-booked rooms at  Vienna House Easy by Wyndham Osnabrück, which is located right next to the conference venue. A total of 20 rooms have been reserved at a rate of 109€ per night for single occupancy and 129€ per night for double occupancy. The rooms are available from 9 to 11 March 2027. When booking, please use the keyword 110927UNI. In addition to this hotel, we would recommend the following:

•  ibis budget Osnabrueck City: rooms available for ~60€ per night, located next to central station
•  Dom Hotel: rooms available for ~130€ per night, located next to the cathedral and the old town
•  Bergmann Boardinghouse Osnabrück: rooms available for ~80€ per night, located in the city centre

There will be a conference dinner on 10 March. Please indicate clearly in your registration if you wish to attend. The conference dinner will be held at  Holling, a traditional Osnabrück restaurant serving classical German dishes. We try our best to financially support the conference dinner so that cost for each attendee is reduced to a minimum.

Arriving by Plane

The closest airport is Münster/Osnabrück Airport (FMO). The airport offers domestic and some European connections. From FMO, taxis or shuttle buses can get you to Osnabrück city centre in about 30–40 minutes. For international flights with more connections, consider arriving at Frankfurt Airport (FRA), Hamburg Airport (HAM), or Düsseldorf Airport (DUS) and then continuing by train to Osnabrück Central Station. We advise you to download the Deutsche Bahn app, DB Navigator, where you can check train schedules and book your tickets.

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Arriving by Train

Osnabrück is a major railway hub with direct ICE and IC connections to Berlin, Hamburg, Cologne, Amsterdam, and other European cities. Trains arrive at Osnabrück Central, located near the city centre and well linked to local bus lines and taxis. We advise you to download the Deutsche Bahn app, DB Navigator, where you can check train schedules and book your tickets.

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Arriving by Car

The city is accessible via major motorways such as the A1 and A30.

Local Transport

Once in the city, Osnabrück’s compact old town and conference venue will be within easy walking or short public-transport distance. We advise you to download the VOSpilot app, where you can check bus schedules and book your tickets.

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