U radu su predstavljeni rezultati istraživanja mogućnosti promjena stavova studenata učiteljskoga studija o glazbenom obrazovanju nakon dva semestra vokalno-instrumentalne nastave. Istraživanje je provedeno sa studenticama druge godine učiteljskoga studija na Fakultetu za odgojne i obrazovne znanosti u Osijeku, Hrvatska. Rezultati su pokazali kako studentice imaju relativno pozitivne stavove o glazbenom obrazovanju prije i poslije nastave glazbe, a pozitivniji stavovi su zabilježeni kod studentica koje imaju iskustvo pjevanja u zboru. Iako se može uočiti trend pozitivnijih stavova nakon nastave glazbe razlika u (...) stavovima studentica o glazbenom obrazovanju prije i poslije nastave glazbe nije statistički značajna. Sugerira se istraživanje stavova o glazbenom obrazovanju na većem uzorku studenata učiteljskoga studija, kroz duže vremensko razdoblje i to opsežnijim mjernim instrumentom. (shrink)

For many countries instrumental music tuition in secondary schools is a ubiquitous event that provides situated and personalized instruction in the learning of an instrument. Opportunities and methods through which teachers operate during the COVID-19 outbreak challenged music educators as to how they taught, engaged, and interacted with students across online platforms, with alarm over aerosol dispersement a major factor in maintaining online instrumental music tuition even as students returned to “normal” face to face classes. This (...) qualitative study investigated the practices employed by instrumental music educators in secondary schools in Melbourne, Australia, analyzing teacher perspectives to music tuition amidst the restriction of interaction with students remotely via online means. Thematic analysis of the interview transcripts revealed music educational approaches that fostered connection, empathy and receptiveness to relationship-building, guiding students in slower and deeper learner-centered approaches, asserting pedagogical practices that reinforced and promoted interpersonal connectedness in and through musical experience and discovery. These findings provide a framework for how music educators can facilitate connection, motivation and student autonomy generating personal meaning and commitment to music making and the learning relationship, which can translate to significant student learning and value in the learning music. Exploring teachers’ pedagogical practices and behaviors within this dyadic teacher-student relationship is a significant addition to the literature, enabling the consideration of the type of connective behaviors required to stimulate and develop long-term interest in music. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Philosophy of Music Education Review 12.2 (2004) 126-138 [Access article in PDF] Music Education for the Twenty-First Century A Philosophical View of the General Education Core Anthony J. Palmer Boston University We are all one species with one brain and neural system, yet consciousness about our existence is highly contextual. Any culturally transcendent view will still be limited to one's personal experience, analytical capabilities, (...) and cultural shaping. Nevertheless, looking beyond our narrow perspectives is essential if we are to find commonality and compatibility with all humankind.Therefore, I find it incumbent that we, as college/university professors, examine our present culture-national and global-to ascertain current conditions and what positive roles each citizen may be able to play on the larger stage of world affairs. Musician-teachers, who are the products of the curriculum, should not be exempt from the responsibilities of contributing solutions. Rather, they should produce a program that is sensitive to the larger context in which we all reside. To be sure, we have no direct control over global events. We do, however, exercise at least a modicum of control over the kind of person emerging from our courses of study.In light of the foregoing, this paper will examine (1) the present global conditions with which we are confronted, (2) responsibilities of the college/university [End Page 126] faculties toward developing students with greater awareness, (3) examination of the general education that all baccalaureate students must satisfy for the degree, (4) the education within the general education courses with a focus on the music education student, and (5) a proposal on general education. The Present Context Today we are at a juncture where no one can predict the future with any assurance of accuracy. The world in the twenty-first century has taken an unexpected turn toward greater chaos and has the potential to end life as we have known it in previous centuries. Although earlier generations experienced many changes and watershed moments, the conditions were never potentially as cataclysmic as they are today because of the explosive power of our so-called defensive weapons. In addition, fed by technology, the pace of change is extremely rapid and multiplies exponentially. Robert Wright states in this regard, Neither biological evolution nor human history is a smooth, steady process. Both pass through thresholds.... To some people, the current era has the aura of a threshold; it has that unsettling, out-of-control feeling that can portend a major shift. Technological, geopolitical, and economic change seem ominously fast, and the fabric of society seems somehow tenuous.1He goes on to say, World currency markets are rocked by the turbulent force of electronically lubricated financial speculation. Weapons of mass destruction are cultivated by rogue regimes and New Age cults. Nations seem less cohesive than before, afflicted by ethnic or religious or cultural friction. Health officials seriously discuss the prospect of a worldwide plague-the unspeakably gruesome Ebola virus, perhaps, or some microbe we don't yet know about, spread around the world by jet-propelled travelers. Even tropical storms seem to have grown more intense in recent decades, arguably a result of global warming.2The foregoing was written in 2000, well before the devastating events of September 11 and subsequent human-initiated disasters, yet it still rings true. Where are we heading? What is our future with a world torn by terror, the continual development of more destructive weapons, and a seeming lack of desire to ameliorate our differences in a peaceful manner? Add to these the inexorable advance of technology that seems to know no end. It is most likely that the world in 2050-perhaps even as early as 2025-will not be recognized by our present population, assuming that we do survive as a civilized world.Of course, the outlook is not exclusively bleak and the continued development of technology is not all on the debit side of the ledger. Advances made in [End Page 127] medicine portend the re-growing of brain cells, repair... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Philosophy of Music Education Review 12.2 (2004) 126-138 [Access article in PDF] Music Education for the Twenty-First Century A Philosophical View of the General Education Core Anthony J. Palmer Boston University We are all one species with one brain and neural system, yet consciousness about our existence is highly contextual. Any culturally transcendent view will still be limited to one's personal experience, analytical capabilities, (...) and cultural shaping. Nevertheless, looking beyond our narrow perspectives is essential if we are to find commonality and compatibility with all humankind.Therefore, I find it incumbent that we, as college/university professors, examine our present culture-national and global-to ascertain current conditions and what positive roles each citizen may be able to play on the larger stage of world affairs. Musician-teachers, who are the products of the curriculum, should not be exempt from the responsibilities of contributing solutions. Rather, they should produce a program that is sensitive to the larger context in which we all reside. To be sure, we have no direct control over global events. We do, however, exercise at least a modicum of control over the kind of person emerging from our courses of study.In light of the foregoing, this paper will examine (1) the present global conditions with which we are confronted, (2) responsibilities of the college/university [End Page 126] faculties toward developing students with greater awareness, (3) examination of the general education that all baccalaureate students must satisfy for the degree, (4) the education within the general education courses with a focus on the music education student, and (5) a proposal on general education. The Present Context Today we are at a juncture where no one can predict the future with any assurance of accuracy. The world in the twenty-first century has taken an unexpected turn toward greater chaos and has the potential to end life as we have known it in previous centuries. Although earlier generations experienced many changes and watershed moments, the conditions were never potentially as cataclysmic as they are today because of the explosive power of our so-called defensive weapons. In addition, fed by technology, the pace of change is extremely rapid and multiplies exponentially. Robert Wright states in this regard, Neither biological evolution nor human history is a smooth, steady process. Both pass through thresholds.... To some people, the current era has the aura of a threshold; it has that unsettling, out-of-control feeling that can portend a major shift. Technological, geopolitical, and economic change seem ominously fast, and the fabric of society seems somehow tenuous.1He goes on to say, World currency markets are rocked by the turbulent force of electronically lubricated financial speculation. Weapons of mass destruction are cultivated by rogue regimes and New Age cults. Nations seem less cohesive than before, afflicted by ethnic or religious or cultural friction. Health officials seriously discuss the prospect of a worldwide plague-the unspeakably gruesome Ebola virus, perhaps, or some microbe we don't yet know about, spread around the world by jet-propelled travelers. Even tropical storms seem to have grown more intense in recent decades, arguably a result of global warming.2The foregoing was written in 2000, well before the devastating events of September 11 and subsequent human-initiated disasters, yet it still rings true. Where are we heading? What is our future with a world torn by terror, the continual development of more destructive weapons, and a seeming lack of desire to ameliorate our differences in a peaceful manner? Add to these the inexorable advance of technology that seems to know no end. It is most likely that the world in 2050-perhaps even as early as 2025-will not be recognized by our present population, assuming that we do survive as a civilized world.Of course, the outlook is not exclusively bleak and the continued development of technology is not all on the debit side of the ledger. Advances made in [End Page 127] medicine portend the re-growing of brain cells, repair... (shrink)

This paper presents the results of research on changes in attitudes towards music education among teacher education students who were exposed to vocal-instrumental lessons over the course of two semesters. The research was conducted among second-year students of teacher education at the Faculty of Education in Osijek, Croatia. The results have shown that students’ attitudes towards music education are relatively positive both before and after exposure to music lessons. Students with choir experience (...) had more positive attitudes towards music education. Although positive attitudes after music lessons are somewhat higher, there is no statistically significant difference between the attitudes of students before or after music lessons. Further research on attitudes towards music education is suggested across a larger population of teacher education students, over a longer period of time, and using a wider range of instruments. U radu su predstavljeni rezultati istraživanja mogućnosti promjena stavova studenata učiteljskoga studija o glazbenom obrazovanju nakon dva semestra vokalno-instrumentalne nastave. Istraživanje je provedeno sa studenticama druge godine učiteljskoga studija na Fakultetu za odgojne i obrazovne znanosti u Osijeku, Hrvatska. Rezultati su pokazali kako studentice imaju relativno pozitivne stavove o glazbenom obrazovanju prije i poslije nastave glazbe, a pozitivniji stavovi su zabilježeni kod studentica koje imaju iskustvo pjevanja u zboru. Iako se može uočiti trend pozitivnijih stavova nakon nastave glazbe razlika u stavovima studentica o glazbenom obrazovanju prije i poslije nastave glazbe nije statistički značajna. Sugerira se istraživanje stavova o glazbenom obrazovanju na većem uzorku studenata učiteljskoga studija, kroz duže vremensko razdoblje i to opsežnijim mjernim instrumentom. (shrink)

Recent studies in music education have investigated the ways in which different groups construe music and music education, and the ways in which these constructions are culturally bound. A Cultural Psychology of Music Education explores the ways in which the discipline of cultural psychology can contribute to our understanding of how music learning and development occurs in a range of cultural settings, and the subsequent implications of such understanding for the theory and (...) practice of music education. The book opens with an overview of the theoretical underpinnings of a cultural psychology of music education. Ten eminent music education scholars and researchers provide chapters that illustrate the application of this approach to key issues in music education; its theory and practice. These chapters provide opportunities to look more deeply into the practices of music education in order to understand the role culture plays in shaping children's musical learning and thinking, the learning and teaching of music teachers, the formal and informal institutions and structures within and through which learning and teaching occur, and, the intersection of these processes and structures in the development of musical thought and practice. As the first major publication to explore a cultural psychology of music education, this volume signals new directions for the study of music educational theory and practice, and the continuing transformation of the discipline. It draws together a number of music education researchers working within a cultural psychology framework establishing a basic reference in this developing field. A fascinating subject, this volume will be of interest to music educators, students and researchers of music education, and music psychologists. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Pictures of Music Education by Estelle R. JorgensenPaul WoodfordEstelle R. Jorgensen, Pictures of Music Education. Indiana University Press, 2011Estelle Jorgensen has long been a mainstay of the philosophy of the music education community, having served as founding chair of the Philosophy of Music Education Special Research Interest Group of the National Association of Music Educators (formerly the Music (...) Educators National Conference) and founding co-chair of the International Society for the Philosophy of Music Education along with Frede V. Nielsen whose work is the focus of this special issue. She remains editor of the Philosophy of Music Education Review, one of the premiere professional journals in the field of music education, and general editor of the Indiana University Press book series Counterpoints: Music and Education, which has published several of her books, including the current one, Pictures of Music Education (2011), that is the subject of this review. Over the course of her career, she has also contributed many chapters to other leading professional books and to the success of international symposia as host and frequent keynote speaker. One could easily continue to enumerate Jorgensen’s many contributions to the profession, but owing to lack of space it will suffice to simply observe that the field of music education would not be what it is today had it not been for her leadership, mentorship, and commitment to building a community of scholars. It is thus a pleasure to have been invited to review the aforementioned book, which [End Page 209] ventures into “the ground between metaphor and model,” the tension between the figurative and literal, to define music education as fundamentally imaginative and open-ended.1Among the advantages of conceiving of the nature of music education as involving a dialectical tension between various metaphors and derived models, Jorgensen recounts, is that the former, because figurative, evocative, and overlapping, allow for the kinds and degrees of ambiguity and slippage that are necessary for the exercise of imagination leading to more open and productive conversation about ideas. Models, on the other hand, are by definition more literal and thus more subject to direct criticism because intended to represent reality in ways that can be empirically tested through application to practice. Indeed, models make systematic assessment and critique of ideas possible. As Jorgensen continues, models serve to simplify “difficult ideas in terms that can be readily grasped, studied, and tested,” which is particularly important to the credibility of the music teaching profession in the eyes of today’s politicians and the public.2 Nevertheless, and for the obvious reason that what Jorgensen refers to as metaphoric models are derived from metaphors and thus bear some similarity, their boundaries can be “fuzzy.”3 As already suggested, it is here, in the fertile ground between metaphor and model, that Jorgensen thinks the most creative and productive thinking about music education philosophy and practice can occur as scholars and teachers recognize and grapple with, and perhaps celebrate, the various tensions and paradoxes found therein. This approach is intended by her as an alternative to the either/or grand narratives that have in the past stifled conversation by reducing philosophy, research, and pedagogy to a search for “the ‘one’ … true or best way, or ‘high road’ to music education.”4 Jorgensen’s own purpose is more modest, and potentially more liberating, which is to open “other fruitful avenues for understanding the ways in which people come to know music.”5The book consists of fourteen chapters in all, each one, with the exception of the introductory and concluding ones, dedicated to a specific metaphor and its chosen derived model that has been “systematically teased out” before being analyzed for its potential strengths and weaknesses when applied to music education.6 Owing to limited space, it is not practical here to address all of the metaphors and models that Jorgensen presents for the reader’s consideration, but it behooves me to provide a short list in order to facilitate discussion of the overall aims of the book. They are: boutique and consumption; village and community; artist and apprenticeship; revolutionary and transgression; factory and production; garden and growth; therapist and healing; court and... (shrink)

Burnout is a risk for many music teachers, particularly the highly successful and effective teachers. Burnout is more than a personal feeling of discomfort or fatigue. It is an attack on professional efficiency and personal integrity. Burnout is affecting male and female music teachers in different ways, because women tend to react to stress in other ways than men and are in a different position in schools, often suffering from the various roles they have both (...) in professional and private life. The school environment, which is often male dominated, output-oriented, and focused on achievement, is sometimes not a good place for a female music educator's creativity, intuition, and search for personal growth. This paper explores ways philosophy of music education can contribute to a more comprehensive understanding of female music teachers' burnout, also offering opportunities for prevention or treatment. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Philosophy of Music Education Review 11.2 (2003) 200-202 [Access article in PDF] Bennett Reimer, A Philosophy of Music Education:advancing the Vision, Third Edition. (upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Prentice In his third and greatly revised edition of A Philosophy of Music Education, Bennett Reimer fulfills the promise of his subtitle, Advancing the Vision. While incorporating essentials and a few passages of his previous (...) edition, its thrust is to present and argue for a new theory of musical intelligences. Here Reimer is pushing into a theoretical frontier, one that he sees as crucially relevant to the music education concerns that have so long been at the heart of his thinking.So although this is a new edition, third time around, of a classic in the field of philosophy of music education by one of its "elder statespersons," it is in many ways a new book. Reimer has never been a thinker to rest on his past achievements. He demonstrates here his ongoing curiosity about issues he has been wrestling with for decades. He engages in debate (as sympathetically as possible) with others who are also forging new ideas. Interacting with their ideas and his own former ones, he generates new ways of thinking about what is involved in musical composing, performing, listening, and theorizing. He uses all this as ground for challenging students and teachers of music to reflect on their own philosophical or pre-philosophical assumptions, their learning and teaching practices, and their [End Page 200] opportunities to make music even more meaningful in their lives and the lives of others. All this is informed by his evident (without his ever making an overt claim for it) love of music, love of philosophizing about music and music education, and his love of teaching about music. I will comment here on just some of the many notable features of the new edition.Reimer announces his approach as synergistic—that is, looking for areas of agreement beneath the surface of what seem to be radically opposing positions (between absolutism and relativism concerning musical value, for instance). What is especially noteworthy is that he demonstrates this moderation throughout his book. This does not lead to his being uncritical; in fact, he is highly critical of some stances and in Chapter 1 makes a devastating attack on postmodernism in music education. But generally he seeks to find what is worthwhile in the views of others and what he can assimilate from their thinking.While valuing musical performance and especially the successful record on teaching performance in American schools, Reimer believes that music education should have much wider concerns: to provide the groundwork for students interested in composing, conducting, improvising, arranging, reviewing, theorizing, and above all listening. Listening, he persuasively argues, is the core skill for all the other activities or roles, and it is also the skill probably most useful in the long run for the greatest number of students. Few, after all, will go on to become professional performers or music creators in some other role, and not many will even become highly competent performing amateurs. But almost everyone can develop some skills in active listening, and they deserve the attention in music education that has been mostly lacking. In the program Reimer advocates, the largest potential student population will become (in his aptly chosen term) aficionados—intelligent, discriminatory listeners. Some of this is attended to in colleges and universities, but by then the opportunity for many has passed.Building on Howard Gardner's theory of multiple intelligences, Reimer points out the limitations of analysis in terms of simply one musical intelligence. The abilities needed for musical activities are not all the same, even though they have the common requirement of listening skill. The notion of multiple musical intelligences (specifically composing, performing, improvising, listening, music theory, musicology, and music teaching) provides a rich basis and suggests new possible methods for broadening music education at all school levels. It also indicates a worthwhile area both for future research and for application beyond the field of music. Education, Reimer says, should be thought of... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Musician and Teacher: An Orientation to Music EducationBrent GaultPatricia Shehan Campbell (with chapters contributed by Steven M. Demorest and Steven J. Morrison), Musician and Teacher: An Orientation to Music Education (New York, NY: W. W. Norton and Company, 2008)If one were to review the course content of undergraduate music education programs at various colleges and universities, an "Introduction to Music Education" (...) or "Foundations of Music Education" course would most likely be included. This course often serves a variety of functions for a given program. It can provide students with an overview of the various instructional settings found in the music education profession and introduce theoretical information regarding student development and learning. Foundation courses often review historical and philosophical information, allow students to develop their own justifications regarding why music should be part of a school program, and present information regarding practical issues in the music teaching profession including assessment, planning for instruction, use of technology, and working with diverse learning situations.Because the curricular content within given foundation courses can be quite varied, finding a text that is broad enough to cover the myriad of topics that might be addressed in this type of course yet detailed enough to make each topic meaningful is a true challenge. While no single text can truly meet all needs [End Page 213] that are unique to each instructional setting, Patricia Shehan Campbell's Musician and Teacher: An Orientation to Music Education is an example of a text that succeeds in both providing a broad view of the music education profession while also presenting specific and meaningful information related to each topic addressed within its pages.One of the unique aspects of this book is Campbell's attempt throughout the text to discuss music education from personal, theoretical, and global perspectives. Many of the chapters utilize case descriptions of music education students and practicing teachers to highlight the theoretical ideas discussed in the text. In addition, Campbell relates learning theories and instructional approaches not only to instructional settings within the United States but throughout the world so that the reader can see both similarities and differences in how music is experienced in each setting.The first six chapters of the text deal with general principles related to the music education profession. An opening chapter sets the stage by discussing the decision to become a music educator, relating this decision to the personal stories of five individuals, and describing the qualities that can lead to a successful career in music education. The second chapter, "Great Minds on Music Education," provides an overview of the philosophical arguments for music education. Campbell uses this chapter to relay the ideas of perennial figures commonly identified with music education philosophy including John Blacking, Christopher Small, Bennett Reimer, Keith Swanwick, David Elliott, and Estelle Jorgensen, and adds to this a description of the views of political leaders, scholars, and thinkers throughout the world. In addition to discussing the views of Plato, Aristotle, Boethius, and Lowell Mason, Campbell also includes the ideas of Hildegard von Bingen, Akbar the Great (India), Chulalongkorn (Thailand), and Nelson Mandela to provide a richer portrait of how members of cultural communities throughout the world experience and value music.Continuing with this global perspective, Campbell uses the third chapter to discuss the ways that communities transmit music via formal, nonformal, and natural learning. These three ways of transmitting knowledge are similar to the ideas she described related to Bateson (Learning I, II, and III) and Merriam (enculturation, training, and schooling) in Lessons from the World. 11 After defining these approaches to learning, Campbell describes several learning contexts both past (Medieval Europe) and present (West Africa) to illustrate how formal, nonformal, and/or natural learning is utilized. The cross cultural comparison continues in Chapter Four, as Campbell describes various systems of music education in Africa, Asia, Australia, Europe, North America, and South America to illustrate similarities and differences related to standards for education, goals for instruction, and allotment of instructional time and resources.After providing this global view related to approaches to learning and systems [End Page 214] of instruction, the fifth chapter attempts to personalize music education through vignettes of music programs... (shrink)

In today's multi-ethnic classroom, multiculturalism plays an increasingly vital role. What it is, how it developed, and what it means for education, especially music education, are the questions that form the essence of this book. Music, Education, and Multiculturalism traces the growth and development of multicultural music education in the United States from its start in the early 1900s to the present, and describes the state of multicultural music education internationally. Beginning (...) with a discussion of the philosophical foundations surrounding multiculturalism, Part I addresses the various definitions of multiculturalism and its associated problems and possibilities in both education at large and music education in particular. It offers a succinct discussion of the various philosophical concepts and rationales for a multicultural approach, and concludes with current thoughts and applications in music education. Part II follows multicultural music education in the U.S. as it paralleled changes in general education brought about by social and historical events. The last chapter in this section outlines multiculturalism in music education around the world. Part III focuses on the implications of multiculturalism for music education, both in teacher training and in classroom instruction. Designed to assist music educators at all levels in understanding and implementing multicultural education, Music, Education, and Multiculturalism provides suggestions for curricular development, offers teaching strategies, and provides practical applications including materials and methodologies. Combining personal narrative and oral history with the support of primary and archival documents, this text is essential reading for all students and teachers of the history and foundations of music education and of multiculturalism in general education. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Musik–Vielfalt–Integration–Inklusion: Musikdidaktik für die eine Schule [Music–Diversity–Inclusion–Integration: A New Philosophy of Music Education for an Inclusive School] by Irmgard MerktBeatrice McNamaraIrmgard Merkt, Musik–Vielfalt–Integration–Inklusion: Musikdidaktik für die eine Schule [Music–Diversity–Inclusion–Integration: A New Philosophy of Music Education for an Inclusive School] (Regensburg: Conbrio, 2019)Irmgard Merkt, a German music education scholar, is a pioneer of intercultural music education with regard to (...) the development of the concept Schnittstellensansatz, literally “interface approach,” as an initial concept of intercultural music education in the 1980s. Her book Musik–Vielfalt–Integration–Inklusion: Musikdidaktik für die eine Schule [Music–Diversity–Inclusion–Integration: A New Philosophy of Music Education for an Inclusive School] is a new philosophy of music education for schools, in which children and young people with and without disabilities as well as children and young people from the most diverse milieus and cultural backgrounds share a learning space.1 Merkt advocates for a broad concept of inclusion that refers both to the inclusion of children with different skills and abilities on a physiological and psychological level along with the integration of pupils from different cultures of origin. The overriding goal for the author is recategorization,2 which makes the terms “common school,” “school for all” or “inclusive music instruction” obsolete and which allows pupils to attend a kind of school and a kind of music education [End Page 187] that is inherently inclusive. Merkt even goes as far as promoting the dissolution of subject-specific margins of music education and establishing an omnipresence of music in everyday school life instead.3 However, I think it should be pointed out that completely dissolving or dismissing music education into interdisciplinarity or integrating music education into subject groups such as Aesthetic Education,4 would be compliant with attempts made on the level of educational policy in order to reduce the quantity of qualified music teaching within the curriculum.5 Nevertheless, Merkt’s critique of the German school system is nothing short of appropriate in view of the prevalent system-immanent character of exclusion as the recent Programme for International Student Assessment-report of 2018 reveals.6 Furthermore, it is essential to draw conclusions as to the extent to which music instruction can do justice to the diversity of the student body, both on an integrative and on an inclusive level.The first chapter of Musik–Vielfalt–Integration–Inklusion offers an overview of past and present viewpoints on the topic of inclusion. Ensuing, the second chapter outlines the evolution of music education and teacher training in view of students with special needs. Chapter Three focuses on integration, Chapter Four traces the lines of development in the field of intercultural music pedagogy, while in Chapter Five Merkt advocates an encompassing culture of recognition in which educators, learners, and different music cultures are acknowledged to an equal extent. In Chapter Six the author delves into the very beginning of music and its coincidence with the evolution of humanity from homo sapiens to homo musicus through the lens of science and musicology. The seventh chapter of the book constitutes a synopsis of the main ideas which are then amalgamated into the concept of “Mit einer Frage um die Welt” [around the world with one question].A key tenet of Merkt’s publication is decategorization. The term inclusion, going back to its Latin origin of inclusio or includere is bound to the existence of its antonym exclusion. Despite endeavors nowdays to reverse the term’s meaning from reclusion to all-embracing,7 efforts to establish inclusion would not be necessary without exclusionary preconditions. On a terminological level, the expression inclusion implicates that there is an existing dualism between an inclusive or enclosed in-group and an exclusive or excluded out-group. This close and inextricable linkage between the existence of inclusion and exclusion, shows the importance of Merkt’s endeavor of highlighting efforts and development of decategorization, both on a terminological and legislative level, as well as on the ideological level. She is portraying concepts of thinking and acting in view of disability as a recurring process of progression and regression in reference to exclusionary... (shrink)

When searching for justification for music education, researchers often make an analytical distinction between ends and means as well as between intrinsic and extrinsic values as related to them. These distinctions are often combined with a view in which ends with stable intrinsic values are seen as above means as extramusical. The article examines how John Dewey’s theory of experience and valuation challenges these distinctions by taking use-value and different aspects of quality in experience as part of the (...) process in which valuation is born. Pedagogical actions of the teacher, social interaction between the students, the questions of how, as well as desires and shared interests become constituting elements of valuation in the means-ends continuum of learning music. The article argues that for justifying its practices, the value of music education ought to be more strongly anchored in the learner’s experience and the question of how educational practices create the attitude for lifelong learning. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Transforming Music EducationCarolyn LivingstonEstelle R. Jorgensen, Transforming Music Education ( Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 2003)Estelle Jorgensen's vision of the transformation of our profession is lofty but not ostentatious, exacting but not rigid. The dream she unveils in her latest book, Transforming Music Education, "challenges music educators to raise their expectations of themselves, their colleagues, their students, and their publics; to look (...) beyond the ordinary; and to aspire to distinction in every facet of its enterprise" (145). A powerfully convincing writer, Jorgensen, author of In Search of Music Education, begins appropriately in her preface by detailing the reasons why music education needs to be transformed. Many of her students and former students at Indiana University are not only satisfied with the status quo in music education, but demonstrate reluctance about even considering the need for change. Others, she has found, long for improvement, having encountered paternalistic administrators, loneliness, fear, and a loss of enjoyment in teaching and in music. Although the author is happy for the former group, she empathizes with the latter. "Gone are the hope, joy, and love of connecting with students or of the art that led them to teaching in the first place," she writes. "In their place I hear the voices of weariness, discouragement, and ennui" (x). [End Page 211]In addition, Jorgensen has observed the anti-intellectualism abroad in education, evident in a variety of symptoms. One of the most troubling is the idolization of scientific research resulting in a loss of interest in philosophical and historical inquiry. She decries the "declining regard for the long and distinguished narratives of education and for the critical insights that would help guard the profession against repeating past mistakes and making ill-conceived plans. Pretentious jargon invoked by educational scientists and theorists often cloaks a paucity of ideas frequently unintelligible to the teachers it is supposed to benefit, and few teachers read it," she asserts (x).Pointing out that we have lost much of our culture other than that promoted in the popular media, Jorgensen reminds us that, after graduation, high school students no longer play their instruments and that some churches now project words to hymns on large screens for parishioners no longer willing or able to read from a hymnal. She is as appalled as the rest of us by restaurant employees' attempts to sing "Happy Birthday" to celebrating patrons, and she notices that even consumers of culture increasingly rely on media opinions for assistance with choices about art exhibits, books, recordings, and performances.The resegregation of schools, the "back to basics" movement, and public apathy about education are other indicators that transformation is needed. If these reasons are not enough, Jorgensen states that ongoing renewal will always be a necessity for education. Since education is often defined as the process by which culture is transmitted, musicians and artists, as purveyors of culture, Jorgensen believes, can create a humane and holistic music education to serve as a model for education in general. "To conceive of music education as enculturation... requires placing culture at the heart of education," she states. "Regarding music along with other arts as important manifestations of human expression suggests that they should be central and essential to a complete education" (9).The purpose of each chapter is clear from its beginning, and the chapters are concisely summarized. The first, "Setting the Stage," discusses several problems of our present society as they affect education. Jorgensen considers possible resistance to transformation and the need for support from organizations like MENC and NASM. She maintains that transformation can only be achieved through the cooperation of many groups and individuals. One of the most difficult problems would seem to be the one that occurs when groups who have previously been oppressed, such as members of female, economic, ethnic, racial, religious, or other minorities, achieve a measure of power and then begin to behave toward others as their oppressors behaved toward them. She cites the work of Paulo Freire who believes that this phenomenon can only be eradicated through emancipatory education.Jorgensen gives homage to past and present music educators who have already recognized the need for change. She makes the point... (shrink)

Différend: A case of conflict between (at least) two parties, that cannot be equitably resolved for lack of a rule of judgment applicable to both arguments. . . . A wrong results from the fact that the rules of the genre of discourse by which one judges are not those of the judged genre or genres of discourse. This paper looks at the State of Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction (DPI) Guidelines for Music Teacher Education, a governmentally defined (...) technology of accountability for preservice teacher education.1 In this investigation I draw upon Jean-François Lyotard’s2 analysis of différends to frame the conflict between the state-authorized technologies for accountability (DPI Guidelines) and .. (shrink)

Abstract:The examination of racist, normalized ideology within American education is not new. Theoretical and practical conceptions of social justice in education have attempted to attend to educational inequality. Oftentimes, these attempts have reinstated the status quo because they were framed within the same Eurocentric paradigm. To address this, Django Paris proposed culturally sustaining pedagogy as a means of empowering minoritized students by sustaining the cultural competence of their communities and dismantling coloniality within educational practices. He, Michael Domínguez, and (...) others argue that epistemic expansion is imperative for equitizing educational spaces and closing the ontological distance between teachers and students. Drawing from their work as well as scholarship from the fields of educational policy, urban education, Afrocentrism, and Indigenous studies, this paper seeks to expand the discussion about culturally relevant and responsive music education to account for students’ musical epistemologies and the ways in which “epistemic travel” might inform normalized musical practices. (shrink)

This paper is an invited response to a one published by David Elliott in _The Music Educator_ in 2012 in which music teachers were enjoined to encourage children to use music’s expressive power as a political tool in pursuit of social justice. While in agreement with him that this can be an appropriate use of music, there is a curious avoidance of controversy in Elliott’s article that might frustrate that end in that nothing is said (...) about whether students should be prompted to critically examine sacred myths, such as the American Dream or historical narratives, and pedagogical practices that might limit their understanding of social problems. Much of my response is given to consideration of some of the possible reasons for Elliott’s avoidance of controversy, including an over-emphasis on “doing” or “making” music that might leave little curricular time for the kinds of study and controversy and debate that are essential to understanding social (in)justice. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Response to Frede V. Nielsen, “Didactology as A Field of Theory and Research in Music Education”Marja HeimonenFrede Nielsen describes the two main aspects of music pedagogy as the normative (and prescriptive) and the descriptive (and analytical) aspects. As a precondition for his discussion, he explores some important concepts and terms such as Didaktik. He argues that it is impossible to translate and transfer certain concepts into (...) English. The German tradition, however, has influenced Scandinavian pedagogical discussion and the content of pedagogical terms and concepts in Denmark and Finland is usually congruent with German terminology. Therefore, Nielsen analyzes the German concepts carefully.An example from my own experience as a teacher of both pedagogy and didactics at the Helsinki Conservatory/Polytechnic may throw some light on this [End Page 98] matter from the Finnish perspective. The traditional title of the subject "piano pedagogy" (offered to students who aim to become instrumental teachers) was changed to "piano didactics" some years ago. The content of this course also changed in that alongside practical work (teaching) theoretical courses were also included. The reason for this change was expressed in the same terms that Nielsen presents in his paper: Didaktik (in Finnish didaktiikka) signifies both a theoretical and a practice-oriented approach to teaching.According to Nielsen, the principal question concerning Didaktik is What is the essential content in music education? This is a philosophical (as well as a legal) issue concerning the aims of education and the matter of who has the right to decide the content. These kinds of matters can also be drawn on a larger canvas: the education of human beings generally. Music education (especially in the context of general education) is not only concerned with the skills that will enable pupils to become competent musicians. On the contrary and more profoundly, it aims to broaden the mind and expand the possibilities of thought and feeling. According to several researchers (such as Estelle Jorgensen, Anthony E. Kemp, David Best, Matti Huttunen, and Heidi Westerlund) music teachers should cultivate a wide understanding of the meaning of education so that music education can relate to human experience and social practices.Nielsen has created four paradigms that might be used when the content of music teaching is formulated. The point of departure may be (a)the subject itself, music, (b)the pupil's culture (or the local culture); in other words, the micro-cultural level, (c)the social problems or conditions of democracy (the macro-cultural level), and/or (d)the fundamental existential condition of human beings. These paradigms do not exclude one another. I consider their function to resemble that of legal principles: they have to be weighed and balanced in a particular situation and context. One or several may, for some time, take priority and push the others into the background just as Nielsen argues. Legal principles are not used as legal rules, but they are "strong" as rules.Legal rules have been compared with rails: rules and regulations (just as rails) are either followed or not. This comparison to a train running on rails also clarifies the relationship between legal regulations and human behaviour: most of these rules are obeyed by habit without profound thinking about aims and principles (c.f. Nielsen's paradigms) behind the legal texts.The most important question Nielsen attempts to raise is the relationship between music and pedagogy (Didaktik). He points out that his aim is not to give normative regulations about what should or should not be taught. Raising questions is an important aim of philosophical research. However, this kind of research may also have normative implications. For instance, philosophical [End Page 99] questions regarding the aims and the content of a subject (such as music) are included in the planning of a National Curriculum (or the National Framework Curriculum formulated by the National Board of Education, as we used to have in Finland). This curriculum is normative: the regulations have to be obeyed when syllabi are formulated in schools at the local level. The Framework Curriculum includes several educational aims; for instance, "a good relationship to music" should be created between the pupil and music. The normative character of this kind of... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Philosophy of Music Education Review 12.2 (2004) 188-193 [Access article in PDF] Response to June Boyce-Tillman, "Towards an Ecology of Music Education" Mark Garberich Michigan State University June Boyce-Tillman's "Towards an Ecology of Music Education" challenges the foundations of music education philosophy and its application to practice. Beginning with the identification and clarification of what are described as "subjugated ways of (...) knowing," she advocates the restoration and application of these approaches to instruction. She completes the description and definition of the interlocking [End Page 188] areas of musical experience by providing an actual project that exemplifies these tenets. I offer my humble appreciation of the attention she gives to the exploration of alternate approaches to music instruction and to the need for a clearer connection between community and individual and between culture and music education."Toward an Ecology of Music Education" is about values. Values may well be the defining word of this era in Western education and society. Changes in demographics, belief systems, and political dogma have de-stabilized the foundations of social and political frameworks, regardless of their efficacy. So, I would like to elaborate on the values represented in this paper, discussing them in relation to teaching, democracy, and diversity in music education. Values and Teaching Each of us carries our worldview into our work and we cannot deny our philosophical identity. However, the degree to which we allow our worldview to affect our teaching should be limited by the priorities of our instruction. Consider music education as having three broad perspectives: (a) purpose in society, (b) purpose for the individual, and (c) aesthetics (inherent value). The position of the three is not hierarchical and each can be considered apart from the others. We give evidence of our real motivation in music education by the emphasis we place upon each of these three. The aesthetically inclined find appeal in teaching for the inherent value in music. Those who strongly maintain a social agenda may be attracted by the possibilities of improving society as a whole through music education. Plato's view of music education was oriented almost exclusively toward his purposes for society. In his writing, any consideration of effect on the individual was only incidental to his primary concern of its effect on society.The true teacher, however, will always gravitate toward the purpose for the individual. A person is the source of his ideas, and does not the creator stand above his creation? Do music teachers teach music? No, they teach students about music. Though we cannot separate ourselves from our love of beauty of form and expression in music nor can we forget our personal commitments toward improving the world around us, yet we must remember that it is the individual student who is the focus of music instruction. If this is true, we can draw some conclusions about our right to bring about change.Do we have the right to proselytize individual students so that they might become adherents of our worldview? As an evangelical Christian, perhaps even a fundamentalist, I admit that I have observed changes in society over my lifetime with some sadness. It is difficult to see the country I love, which was founded upon Judeo-Christian principles, gradually losing touch with those principles. How will departure from those principles affect the direction and stability of the [End Page 189] nation founded upon them? As a teacher, however, I understand that it is my responsibility to teach students about music and that I have a responsibility to parents, who in a democratic society, hold responsibility not only for the spiritual, moral, and social education of their children, but also for the spiritual, moral, and social direction of a nation. Teachers are obliged to live as moral examples to students and to demonstrate values in their actions, but to consider the wishes of parents when it comes to the advancement of personal agendas. We do not have the right to encroach upon the mentoring relationship between parents and children. We must also be careful lest we... (shrink)

This article is divided into three parts: the problem (globalized learning); the consequences (for general music education); and the vision (the music teacher as a cultural figure). In the first part, I claim that the current learning agenda is being increasingly instrumentalized as a carrier of a global education policy driven by technical rationality. In the second part, a range of possible implications of this paradigm for music education are outlined. What is being sacrificed (...) on the altar of learning measurement is the crucial ability of schooling to be ingrained in the historical, cultural, musical background-understanding of the world. Thus, the world of schooling slowly becomes reduced to a neutral, geometrical space of measured performance governed by input-output/producerconsumer calculations. Finally, in the third part, I pick up some ideas from the German phenomenologist Martin Heidegger to suggest an open possibility for today's music teachers to act as cultural figures for their subject. Such action is about disclosing a shared, common world in which music since prehistoric times has belonged by way of all kinds of communal acts. This crucial point invites music teachers to create and nurture marginal spaces together, where the output-oriented school paradigm temporarily becomes suspended. (shrink)

Abstract:How might identity and identity politics inform music teachers' practices and assumptions about disability? In this article, we engage in a critical discussion about how music educators might respond to disability. This article is presented in three parts as a collaborative dialogue between the two authors, using the landscape of identity politics to frame the discussion. In the first part, Warren Churchill discusses Tobin Siebers' theorizing of "the ideology of ability" as it relates to music (...) class='Hi'>education's dominant response to disability. Building on his idea of "complex embodiment," Siebers lays out a justification for disabled individuals to actively engage in identity politics for self-advocacy. Churchill connects Siebers' ideology to Joseph Abramo's epistemology of sound. In the second part, Cara Faith Bernard makes a counter-argument against deploying identity politics in the music classroom, drawing upon Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak's notion of strategic essentialism to examine its potential risks with regards to music education curricula, in which essentialism may lead to establishing detrimental "best practices" for students. Thereafter, in Part Three, the authors join together to make sense of these seemingly contradictory philosophical outlooks on identity politics, in the hope of furthering conversation about music education's ongoing response to disability. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Philosophy of Music Education Review 12.2 (2004) 181-186 [Access article in PDF] Response to June Boyce-Tillman, "Towards an Ecology of Music Education" Claudia Gluschankof Levinsky College of Education, Israel I begin with two confessions. First, music was not my favorite class at school. I cannot even recall what we did there. It did not at all connect with the powerful, meaningful place that (...) music had in my private life, where I loved to sing with my family, and play and sing in ensembles in classes at a private music school. The private piano lessons were fine, but I found no joy in practicing on my own. Music was for me-and still is-a communal experience, associated with personal choice. School did not, and probably could not, provide that.Second, during a recent marketing meeting at the college where I teach and work, I finally said aloud, "I am not sure that I can market a product in which I don't believe." Being a teacher in overcrowded, resource-poor schools where parents are less involved yet more interfering and being expected to conform to standards and to act more as a producer of school ceremonies and festivals and less as a music educator is not a profession I would recommend entering. Boyce-Tillman's paper offers a model for music education in which the corrective emotional experience, in my own case, becomes a remedial object lesson in the setting of the music classroom and a reason to recommend music school teaching as a rewarding profession.Boyce-Tillman calls us to conceive of music "as intimately related to human society and the environment rather than as a discrete and separated category of knowing." Her position is in tune with Christopher Small's coined term "musicking": The act of musicking establishes in the place where it is happening a set of relationships, and it is in those relationships that the meaning of the act lies. They are to be found not only between those organized sounds which are [End Page 181] conventionally thought of as being the stuff of musical meaning but also between the people who are taking part, in whatever capacity, in the performance; and they model, or stand as metaphor for, ideal relationships as the participants in the performance imagine them to be: relationships between person and person, between individual and society, between humanity and the natural world and perhaps the supernatural world.1The five interlocking areas proposed in Boyce-Tillman's model are present in Small's musicking: the relationships among the sounds parallel the area called Materials; the relationships between people and sounds may parallel the area called Expression, which refers to the personal meaning given to the organized sounds. "In the area of Construction, effectiveness often depends on the right management of repetition and contrast within a particular idiom." Such a particular idiom is part of the style ideal of a particular culture. It is defined in terms of form and content, and expresses some inner quality of the society that produced it. The style ideal can be characterized by different factors (for example, historical period, geographic location, school, manner of performance, individual composer, and so on) and can be examined in terms of musical components (form, texture, harmony, melody).2According to Boyce-Tillman, the area of Values "is related to the context of the music-making experience. All musical experiences are culturally related." Because values are shared by groups, I found this present in the relationships be-tween a subculture and the larger society, in its broader meaning. The fifth area is Spirituality, defined by Boyce-Tillman as "the ability to transport the audience to a different time/space dimension." That different time/space dimension may be understood as the supernatural world, referred to by Small.Small sees the greatest challenge to music educators today to be that of providing "that kind of social context for informal as well as formal musical interaction that leads to real development and to the musicalizing of the society as a whole,"3... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:A Reconception of Performance Study in the Philosophy of Music EducationValerie L. TrollingerThe actual place of performance in music education has been the subject of numerous debates over the years. Most debates have revolved within the paradigm of the performance ability of the teacher and consequently the performance ability of the students. Is the level to be attained that of a winning concert band/marching band/choir? Or, (...) is the level to be attained the level at which the students and teacher feel the most comfortable and pleased? Most of this debate, along with the development of various assessments (including the Watkins-Farnum Test) and various rubrics to score music performance competitions, has emphasized characteristics of performance pertaining to accuracy of notes, precision of rhythm, and attendance to musicianship, style, and interpretation. On the other hand, the aesthetic value of performance has also been questioned in that the value of music in the schools should not be assessed solely by the importance placed on the attainment of performance skills by the students, suggesting that it is only through performance that one may know music. For example, in a recent article in the Music Educator's Journal,1 Bennett Reimer promotes the [End Page 193] position that time spent in either performance studies and active performance in music education (both at the K-12 and college teacher training levels) is not vital to the reconception of the National Standards (USA) for music education and, by extension, the field of music education itself. In the MEJ article, Reimer wrote:there is no reason to believe that highly developed performers make the best general music teachers, just as there is no reason to believe the reverse. We must get over the outdated and unrealistic assumption that performance is the one, singular, royal road to being musical and being an effective music educator.... [T]eachers cannot be expected to do what performance specialists do, and their teacher education curriculum must reflect that fact.2This position has also been recently supported by sociological publications3 and the following statement—echoed by several colleagues of mine—by a music teacher-training specialist,There is one big misconception among many music education students. Many graduates view themselves as musicians who are going into teaching. I attribute my own success to the realization that I am a teacher at heart. My first responsibility is teaching children. The vehicle through which I connect to them is music.4It is likely within the previous paradigm in which these respected authors positioned their arguments for the place of performance in the music curriculum and in that regard these assertions are unquestionably valid. What this particular paradigm concerns is the quantity and quality of performance based on purely musical attributes. The omission is that it does not include the quality of performance in relationship to health-based music education, a growing area of concern in the performing arts medicine field and, by extension, music educators who are concerned about this particular aspect of performance.5 The reason for the concern and hence this paper calling to the philosophical community to re-think the place and quality of performance in music education is that these viewpoints have had a great impact upon the validity of music education, in that they ignore a growing body of research from the performance and medical fields. While it must be made clear for the purposes of this paper that the writers of the above quotes have framed their ideas gracefully within their individual philosophical structures of music education, it must be pointed out that current research and knowledge in performance arts, in its conception as a physical human activity, needs to be incorporated into a revised philosophy of music education and curriculum. Music performance in music education has traditionally been viewed as a cognitive and emotional experience. However, it [End Page 194] is also a psychomotor experience, involving all sorts of soft body tissues, bones, and cartilages, which can enhance or detract from the total musical experience. Many music educators do not get enough instruction in college on how to teach voice or instruments healthfully and this is the reason for the concern... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:A Reconception of Performance Study in the Philosophy of Music EducationValerie L. TrollingerThe actual place of performance in music education has been the subject of numerous debates over the years. Most debates have revolved within the paradigm of the performance ability of the teacher and consequently the performance ability of the students. Is the level to be attained that of a winning concert band/marching band/choir? Or, (...) is the level to be attained the level at which the students and teacher feel the most comfortable and pleased? Most of this debate, along with the development of various assessments (including the Watkins-Farnum Test) and various rubrics to score music performance competitions, has emphasized characteristics of performance pertaining to accuracy of notes, precision of rhythm, and attendance to musicianship, style, and interpretation. On the other hand, the aesthetic value of performance has also been questioned in that the value of music in the schools should not be assessed solely by the importance placed on the attainment of performance skills by the students, suggesting that it is only through performance that one may know music. For example, in a recent article in the Music Educator's Journal,1 Bennett Reimer promotes the [End Page 193] position that time spent in either performance studies and active performance in music education (both at the K-12 and college teacher training levels) is not vital to the reconception of the National Standards (USA) for music education and, by extension, the field of music education itself. In the MEJ article, Reimer wrote:there is no reason to believe that highly developed performers make the best general music teachers, just as there is no reason to believe the reverse. We must get over the outdated and unrealistic assumption that performance is the one, singular, royal road to being musical and being an effective music educator.... [T]eachers cannot be expected to do what performance specialists do, and their teacher education curriculum must reflect that fact.2This position has also been recently supported by sociological publications3 and the following statement—echoed by several colleagues of mine—by a music teacher-training specialist,There is one big misconception among many music education students. Many graduates view themselves as musicians who are going into teaching. I attribute my own success to the realization that I am a teacher at heart. My first responsibility is teaching children. The vehicle through which I connect to them is music.4It is likely within the previous paradigm in which these respected authors positioned their arguments for the place of performance in the music curriculum and in that regard these assertions are unquestionably valid. What this particular paradigm concerns is the quantity and quality of performance based on purely musical attributes. The omission is that it does not include the quality of performance in relationship to health-based music education, a growing area of concern in the performing arts medicine field and, by extension, music educators who are concerned about this particular aspect of performance.5 The reason for the concern and hence this paper calling to the philosophical community to re-think the place and quality of performance in music education is that these viewpoints have had a great impact upon the validity of music education, in that they ignore a growing body of research from the performance and medical fields. While it must be made clear for the purposes of this paper that the writers of the above quotes have framed their ideas gracefully within their individual philosophical structures of music education, it must be pointed out that current research and knowledge in performance arts, in its conception as a physical human activity, needs to be incorporated into a revised philosophy of music education and curriculum. Music performance in music education has traditionally been viewed as a cognitive and emotional experience. However, it [End Page 194] is also a psychomotor experience, involving all sorts of soft body tissues, bones, and cartilages, which can enhance or detract from the total musical experience. Many music educators do not get enough instruction in college on how to teach voice or instruments healthfully and this is the reason for the concern... (shrink)

The twenty-seven contributors to this book are professors, teachers, and students representing all parts of Canada, as well as the USA, Brazil, Norway, Finland, and South Africa. They wrestle with the meaning and practice of social justice in and through music education.

Music teachers are often inclined to advocate the aesthetic value of music that is uncritically propagated by their conservatory training.1 Consequently, a host of misleading assumptions that music is a "fine" art that exists solely to promote aesthetic experience is simply taken for granted as the benefits of art and music education—thus ignoring the differences of purpose between school music and university-level training. Just offering routine musical activities and performances is thereby assumed to (...) kindle students' aesthetic appreciation. Whether the experiences provided have led to an enriched life of playing and enjoying... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Justifying the Right to Music EducationMarja HeimonenIn this study I will explore legal philosophical questions related to music education.1 I will begin by asking, "Is there a right to music education?" and move on to consider what constitutes a right and what kind of music education is at issue. My argument is that there is a right to music education (...) and to a certain kind of music education in terms of content.In the Nordic countries, Finland, Sweden, Denmark, Iceland, and Norway, the right to general music education is based on law. All these countries belong to the Nordic legal culture. They are part of the Continental civil-law system consisting of enacted statutes with abstract norms. Case- and judge-centered common law that develops from decision to decision is used in Anglo-American societies such as the United States and England.2 The law usually leaves the contents of education more or less open.This study explores music education in the light of the ideas of Aristotle and some of his modern followers.3 Philosophers of music education significantly influenced this study, in which I argue that the principal aims of education are connected not only to musical skills, but also to virtues, moral philosophy, and the education of the human being as a whole. My objective is to make the differences [End Page 119] between the aims and content of music education in various societies more explicit and understandable.The right to music education is closely connected to its justification. In practice, music education is justified in terms of internal goods (in other words, by self-justifying values emphasizing personal well-being and self-expression) and external goods (favoring the effective training of future professionals, for instance). I will suggest that external goods should be subordinate to internal goods, and that an optional balance between the two is needed. This balance is achieved through continuous debate in a living tradition that focuses on the holistic view of the aims in music education.However, deeper arguments are needed in justifying the right to music education. According to Estelle Jorgensen, a dynamic and dialectic process characterizes music and education, both of which are part of the changing society and the culture that surrounds them: transformation is ongoing all the time.4 I will argue that music education has an important role not only for the individual, but also for society as a whole, since music could be regarded as an instrument in the teaching of virtues.The question that follows is: what kind of virtues? This essay explores the role of music education in developing one of the fundamental virtues in society, the sense of justice. The role of the music teacher could be compared with that of the judge: to build cases in real practical situations in the framework of general principles, which may be both written (such as law and curricula) and unwritten (tradition). Theory and practice have to go hand in hand—general principles always have to be adapted to individual situations (and not vice versa)—when music educators are acting in the present society.The ApproachThe right to music education includes not only the question of the right of every child and adolescent to receive a certain number of music lessons or to attend a music school. It also involves aspects related to values, aims, and contents. To clarify the complexity of rights in this context, we might think of several levels. The first level of ideological options comprises training for a professional career for which the notion of legal philosophy leans on analytical legal positivism. The second level of ideological options refers to artistic self-expression and the notion of law for this is outlined in terms of "law as culture" and natural law philosophy. The third level consists of the maintenance of societal or cultural values through music education and its notion of legal philosophy is given in terms of the historical school of law and natural law philosophy. A child's rights to music might be regarded as a negative freedom right, with protection against illegal interference on the part of the state, a positive welfare right (an [End... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Toward Mindful Music Education:A Response To Bennett ReimerSandra L. StaufferIn her book Composing a Life, Mary Catherine Bateson reminds us to acknowledge our antecedents—those who have gone before in whatever way or whatever path.1 I believe we should also acknowledge our co-conspirators—those who have listened to us and wrestled with our ideas. Following Bateson, I wish to recognize the contributions of my teachers and my colleagues, (...) particularly the members of the doctoral seminar at Arizona State University. I am grateful for your contributions to the life of my mind and the words of this morning. For the record, I also want to say that Bennett Reimer is both antecedent and co-conspirator for everyone in this room, and we are indebted to him."The first task of philosophy involves learning to ask a good question," says Walter Feinberg in his essay on the philosophical scholar.2 Reimer asks us, "Who is philosophy of music education for?"—a provocative question indeed. He also gives us an answer: K-12 students.I agree, but not really. How can that be? Imagine this. A music teacher I know, Stephanie, was engaged with some first-grade children in singing songs and moving and reading rhythms. She turned to write on the white board. When she turned back to the children, one boy, Alex, was standing, perfectly still, on his head. What happened next? I will tell you in few minutes. Reimer says, "Philosophical issues are not disconnected to or incidental to musical experience. [End Page 135] They are foundational for musical experience, because one's values, beliefs, desires, preferences, and so forth, directly affect how one engages with music and what one gets from doing it." Abridging those two sentences at my own peril, Reimer appears to be saying that philosophical issues are foundational to musical experience.That idea works for me only if I am standing, figuratively and metaphorically, not literally, on my head. It seems to me that experience is the foundation of philosophy or, put another way, that one's philosophy derives from one's experiences; the richer the experiences, the richer the philosophy. A philosophy based on limited or weak experience is a limited or weak philosophy. This, however, is only surface-level logic for a deeper epistemological question—where does one's philosophy come from? If I take the Deweyan perspective that philosophy derives from experience, then surely I am obligated, in this forum, to define my terms—particularly "experience." It would be easy to say that experience means making music and listening to music, and surely it does. By experience, however, I mean not only these actions—the doing of music—but also thinking, or what Ellen Langer calls mindfulness.3 Langer describes mindful learning as having three characteristics: "the continuous creation of new categories; openness to new information; and an implicit awareness of more than one perspective."4 I like how Robert Duke articulates the same idea: "Teach things that are intellectually interesting and functionally valuable."5 Engage students not just in doing, but also in thinking—in mindful learning. Rich experience makes for rich philosophy. If we are talking about music education at all levels that is not only participatory, but also mindful, then I am all for it.Reimer asks a second question: how are we to accomplish the teaching of philosophy to K-12 students? I want to know what we are trying to accomplish. Are we trying to teach the content of philosophy or are we trying to help students develop their own abilities to think about their experiences as musicians, whether as listeners or as music makers, in whatever contexts they find themselves? The former seems to be a reification of philosophy in which I am not eager to engage most K-12 students. I hope we are aiming for the latter. If so, then our task is to provide rich and mindful experiences in every music setting. Our task is to model the disposition of a philosopher—one who asks questions, is curious, and is engaged in the life of the mind.This seems so obvious. Why aren't we doing it already? There... (shrink)

In the twenty-first century, many music education scholars seek to reconceptualize music education toward social justice. Critical pedagogy is at the fore-front of this shift. However, as teachers aim toward equity through employing critical pedagogy, some undesired effects of using this teaching approach may arise. In this paper, I consider the problematic side of critical pedagogy and ask two important questions: Are there any restrictions or limits placed on who can enact critical pedagogy in (...) class='Hi'>music education? And are there any so-called "casualties" of critical pedagogy in music education or in education more generally? To consider these questions philosophically, I employ a critical race lens to explore tenets of critical pedagogy and their applications to music education, as illustrated in the ideas and practices of four elementary music teachers who strove to challenge dominant paradigms of music education. By examining critical pedagogy in music education with a critical lens, I seek to illuminate the philosophical complexities and paradoxes of engaging critical pedagogy in the classroom. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Musician and Teacher: An Orientation to Music EducationBrent GaultPatricia Shehan Campbell (with chapters contributed by Steven M. Demorest and Steven J. Morrison), Musician and Teacher: An Orientation to Music Education (New York, NY: W. W. Norton and Company, 2008)If one were to review the course content of undergraduate music education programs at various colleges and universities, an "Introduction to Music Education" (...) or "Foundations of Music Education" course would most likely be included. This course often serves a variety of functions for a given program. It can provide students with an overview of the various instructional settings found in the music education profession and introduce theoretical information regarding student development and learning. Foundation courses often review historical and philosophical information, allow students to develop their own justifications regarding why music should be part of a school program, and present information regarding practical issues in the music teaching profession including assessment, planning for instruction, use of technology, and working with diverse learning situations.Because the curricular content within given foundation courses can be quite varied, finding a text that is broad enough to cover the myriad of topics that might be addressed in this type of course yet detailed enough to make each topic meaningful is a true challenge. While no single text can truly meet all needs [End Page 213] that are unique to each instructional setting, Patricia Shehan Campbell's Musician and Teacher: An Orientation to Music Education is an example of a text that succeeds in both providing a broad view of the music education profession while also presenting specific and meaningful information related to each topic addressed within its pages.One of the unique aspects of this book is Campbell's attempt throughout the text to discuss music education from personal, theoretical, and global perspectives. Many of the chapters utilize case descriptions of music education students and practicing teachers to highlight the theoretical ideas discussed in the text. In addition, Campbell relates learning theories and instructional approaches not only to instructional settings within the United States but throughout the world so that the reader can see both similarities and differences in how music is experienced in each setting.The first six chapters of the text deal with general principles related to the music education profession. An opening chapter sets the stage by discussing the decision to become a music educator, relating this decision to the personal stories of five individuals, and describing the qualities that can lead to a successful career in music education. The second chapter, "Great Minds on Music Education," provides an overview of the philosophical arguments for music education. Campbell uses this chapter to relay the ideas of perennial figures commonly identified with music education philosophy including John Blacking, Christopher Small, Bennett Reimer, Keith Swanwick, David Elliott, and Estelle Jorgensen, and adds to this a description of the views of political leaders, scholars, and thinkers throughout the world. In addition to discussing the views of Plato, Aristotle, Boethius, and Lowell Mason, Campbell also includes the ideas of Hildegard von Bingen, Akbar the Great (India), Chulalongkorn (Thailand), and Nelson Mandela to provide a richer portrait of how members of cultural communities throughout the world experience and value music.Continuing with this global perspective, Campbell uses the third chapter to discuss the ways that communities transmit music via formal, nonformal, and natural learning. These three ways of transmitting knowledge are similar to the ideas she described related to Bateson (Learning I, II, and III) and Merriam (enculturation, training, and schooling) in Lessons from the World. 11 After defining these approaches to learning, Campbell describes several learning contexts both past (Medieval Europe) and present (West Africa) to illustrate how formal, nonformal, and/or natural learning is utilized. The cross cultural comparison continues in Chapter Four, as Campbell describes various systems of music education in Africa, Asia, Australia, Europe, North America, and South America to illustrate similarities and differences related to standards for education, goals for instruction, and allotment of instructional time and resources.After providing this global view related to approaches to learning and systems [End Page 214] of instruction, the fifth chapter attempts to personalize music education through vignettes of music programs... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Response to Elvira Panaiotidi, “The Nature of Paradigms and Paradigm Shifts in Music Education”Wenyi W. KurkulAt the beginning, I would like to congratulate Elvira Panaiotidi on her interesting paper and on her proposal to move beyond the long-running debates that began in the mid-1990s between Bennett Reimer and David Elliott and their respective supporters. I also applaud her affirmation that, beyond the numerous debates within the (...) class='Hi'>music-education philosophy community, the ultimate goal is to put the theories to work in schools or, in other words, to convert theories into operative paradigms.Echoing her affirmation, I shared her article with a class of my graduate students after I received the invitation to respond to this paper. All of my graduate students are current schoolteachers in the greater Washington, DC metropolitan area in the United States. Some of them are young teachers; others have decades [End Page 114] of teaching experience. As a university professor, I have always been thrilled by how much my thoughts are inspired by my students—by their stories, writing, discussions, dialogues, and sometimes very challenging questions in class. Their concern for their daily jobs and their students constantly remind me of our responsibilities to the children in the schools. However, with our schools and students in mind, I have to ask the music education philosophy community a question: Is "producing a unified concept of music," or "searching for a unified approach," or even aiming to "develop a unified approach in music education" as proposed by Panaiotidi what we truly need?In her paper, Panaiotidi discusses the debate over the approaches in music education by Reimer and Elliott in the context of paradigm shifts. The term, "paradigm shift," was introduced by Thomas Kuhn in 1962 in his highly influential book, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. Kuhn proposes that almost every significant break-through in the field of scientific endeavor is first a break with tradition, with old ways of thinking, with old paradigms. For example, until the germ theory was developed, there was a high percentage of deaths during childbirth and scientists were not sure why. Likewise, in military settings, more people were dying from small wounds and diseases than from the major traumas experienced on the frontlines. But as soon as the germ theory was developed, a whole new paradigm—a better, improved way of understanding what was happening—made dramatic and significant improvements in the practice of medicine possible.The United States today is the setting for another fruitful and powerful example of a dramatic paradigm shift. The traditional concept of government had been monarchical, based on the divine right of kings. It was not until centuries later that a significant break-through paradigm was developed: government of the people, by the people, and for the people. A constitutional democracy was born that unleashed tremendous human energy and ingenuity. This new paradigm, over time, generated personal empowerment, free enterprise, a higher standard of living, freedom and liberty, and influence and hope unequaled in the history of the world.Stephen R. Covey, the author of a popular book in the late 1980s, The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, cites Kuhn's conception of paradigm shift to illustrate his own ideas. He describes an experiment at the Harvard Business School in which an instructor passed out a picture of a young woman to half of the class and a picture of an old woman to the other half. The students were asked to look briefly at the picture and pass it back. The professor then asked the class to describe the woman as he projected on a screen a picture of a woman that was a combined image of the "old" and "young" women. Needless to say, the students debated the age of the woman. If they had seen the "young" version, [End Page 115] they could see only a young woman now, and vice-versa. Each student was adamant about his or her position. They did not see the image in another way until the lines were pointed out to demonstrate the features of the old and young woman. Covey cites this exercise to prove the powerful conditioning effects of one... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:A Tale of Two ConferencesProfessional Discourse, Music Education, and JusticeEric ShiehThis is an exploration of misunderstandings. Beginning with my own.It is 3:15pm at the Pearson International Airport, Toronto. I am leaving the musica ficta/Lived Realities conference on "Engagements and Exclusions in Music, Education, and the Arts" held at the University of Toronto, January 2008, and this is what I write: "I am thinking about what (...) I am going to take from this conference and I think ultimately it may be a profound sense of disappointment. I do not feel anymore that I am part of a larger community that will support me, or that there is a web of people engaged in justice-oriented practice …."Explicitly addressing issues of equity and social justice in music education, the conference shared similar themes and a similar participant base with a conference held at Teachers College, New York City, in October 2006, titled the "International Conference on Music Education, Equity, and Social Justice," the first of its kind. Yet where I left the Toronto conference with a sense of disappointment, I found myself writing after the New York conference: "Don't forget—the [End Page 203] feeling of urgency … of wanting to engage again in philosophy, and wanting to read again and renew faith with the project of change."The difference that provoked these polar reactions, I contend here, is in part a difference in the research presented at the two conferences—a differing orientation toward issues of social justice as well as toward the music education profession itself. I also argue, however, that the researchers share more similarities than the discourses surrounding the conferences allow and in part the differences perceived are a by-product of professional structures that serve to polarize discourse—structures that are foregrounded in these two conferences. My intent here, then, is not to valorize the NYC conference or disparage the Toronto conference based on my reactions but to read these reactions as problematic, where euphoria can be reactionary and resistance productive, with the understanding that they are heavily limited by my identification as a young, unestablished music practitioner. I begin first by unpacking those reactions through a reading of the differences between the two conferences. Ultimately, I seek the implications of these differences and similarities for research and practice at the intersection of social justice and music education, and argue that my initial reactions are symptomatic of a wider and potentially harmful approach to this work.Justice, Positively and Negatively ConceivedI wish to begin explicating the differences between the two conferences at an oddly revealing detail: the inscriptions featured on the covers of the respective conference booklets and, in the case of the Toronto conference, replicated on the website and call for papers. The NYC conference features a lengthy and hopeful quote by Maxine Greene, worth reproducing in full: "Because it is only through the projection of a better social order that we can perceive the gaps in what exists and try to transform and repair…. This can happen in classrooms, in corridors, in schoolyards, in the streets around."1 Contrast this with the authorless four-word mantra of the Toronto Conference: "Charity is Not Justice," represented as a photograph of graffiti on what looks to be a construction site. The difference is stark: the Greene quote indicates that the NYC conference might seek to project a better social order from which action might arise. The Toronto conference, on the other hand, forcefully declares the project of justice in the negative: it is not charity.It is worth taking a moment to put these two inscriptions in dialogue. There is a way, certainly, that Greene in this quote allows for—and perhaps encourages—charitable work. If a person, for example, believes that a better world includes feeding the homeless, he or she might be moved to open a soup kitchen. Insofar as this is an act of charity (and most people would agree that it is), the mantra of the Toronto conference rejects it outright. Furthermore, the use of a [End Page 204] photograph of presumably authentic graffiti lays claim to a kind of streetwise, oppressed authority that throws a... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Response to Elvira Panaiotidi, “The Nature of Paradigms and Paradigm Shifts in Music Education”Wenyi W. KurkulAt the beginning, I would like to congratulate Elvira Panaiotidi on her interesting paper and on her proposal to move beyond the long-running debates that began in the mid-1990s between Bennett Reimer and David Elliott and their respective supporters. I also applaud her affirmation that, beyond the numerous debates within the (...) class='Hi'>music-education philosophy community, the ultimate goal is to put the theories to work in schools or, in other words, to convert theories into operative paradigms.Echoing her affirmation, I shared her article with a class of my graduate students after I received the invitation to respond to this paper. All of my graduate students are current schoolteachers in the greater Washington, DC metropolitan area in the United States. Some of them are young teachers; others have decades [End Page 114] of teaching experience. As a university professor, I have always been thrilled by how much my thoughts are inspired by my students—by their stories, writing, discussions, dialogues, and sometimes very challenging questions in class. Their concern for their daily jobs and their students constantly remind me of our responsibilities to the children in the schools. However, with our schools and students in mind, I have to ask the music education philosophy community a question: Is "producing a unified concept of music," or "searching for a unified approach," or even aiming to "develop a unified approach in music education" as proposed by Panaiotidi what we truly need?In her paper, Panaiotidi discusses the debate over the approaches in music education by Reimer and Elliott in the context of paradigm shifts. The term, "paradigm shift," was introduced by Thomas Kuhn in 1962 in his highly influential book, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. Kuhn proposes that almost every significant break-through in the field of scientific endeavor is first a break with tradition, with old ways of thinking, with old paradigms. For example, until the germ theory was developed, there was a high percentage of deaths during childbirth and scientists were not sure why. Likewise, in military settings, more people were dying from small wounds and diseases than from the major traumas experienced on the frontlines. But as soon as the germ theory was developed, a whole new paradigm—a better, improved way of understanding what was happening—made dramatic and significant improvements in the practice of medicine possible.The United States today is the setting for another fruitful and powerful example of a dramatic paradigm shift. The traditional concept of government had been monarchical, based on the divine right of kings. It was not until centuries later that a significant break-through paradigm was developed: government of the people, by the people, and for the people. A constitutional democracy was born that unleashed tremendous human energy and ingenuity. This new paradigm, over time, generated personal empowerment, free enterprise, a higher standard of living, freedom and liberty, and influence and hope unequaled in the history of the world.Stephen R. Covey, the author of a popular book in the late 1980s, The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, cites Kuhn's conception of paradigm shift to illustrate his own ideas. He describes an experiment at the Harvard Business School in which an instructor passed out a picture of a young woman to half of the class and a picture of an old woman to the other half. The students were asked to look briefly at the picture and pass it back. The professor then asked the class to describe the woman as he projected on a screen a picture of a woman that was a combined image of the "old" and "young" women. Needless to say, the students debated the age of the woman. If they had seen the "young" version, [End Page 115] they could see only a young woman now, and vice-versa. Each student was adamant about his or her position. They did not see the image in another way until the lines were pointed out to demonstrate the features of the old and young woman. Covey cites this exercise to prove the powerful conditioning effects of one... (shrink)

The relation between music pedagogy as a field of research and the practice of music education is characterized as a continuum ranging from remoteness through cooperation to full integration. A typology is drawn up (the where the relation is separate, co-operative, integrated,or parallel). All these types of relationship are considered necessary. The distinctive task of music pedagogical research is to question, explore, and develop issues, conditions, and potentialities within the practice of music education by (...) rendering them accessible to consciousness and conceptual thought in verbal terms. Consequently, it has to do its utmost not to degenerate into ideology. The role of teacher education is discussed. Examples show how research may matter to practical music teaching and learning. An overall conclusion is that the relationship in question should be marked by closeness and distance at the same time in order to ensure relevance as well as quality and integrity. (shrink)

Abstract:This theoretical inquiry approaches the challenge of reflexivity in the music education profession from the perspective of a collective and social understanding of memory. While memory is typically understood as being an individualistic, psychological, and cognitive phenomenon, in this paper we argue that the perspectives of collective and social memory may be of critical assistance to music teachers and music teacher educators who are facing the problem of increasing diversity. Teachers experience mounting pressure to (...) include a wider selection of available material from the diverse musics of the world in their curriculum. We suggest that understanding the politics of memory–how memory shapes the future and reveals our reflexive capacity in terms of our bonds to, or freedom from, the past–provides new tools and perspectives for considering diversity. Furthermore, we propose that in order to make a difference, the politics of memory require an agonistic engagement in pluralistic societies, with multiple, even conflicting, relationships to memory and time, place, and space. The article argues that a critical politics of memory is not just about combining the past and present, but about re-imagining, re-negotiating, re-working, and re-generating the collective futures of the school, its educational context, and broader society. (shrink)

This article attempts to bridge the philosophical gap between Western music education philosophers and practicing Suzuki music teachers. Specifically addressed is Estelle Jorgensen's critique of Suzuki-trained educators who may rely too heavily on rote pedagogical methods without careful reflection of the philosophical principles underlying their approach. By first discussing the cultural relativity of philosophical expression, this article suggests that Suzuki's philosophy may be better (although differently) articulated than Western scholars give it credit. On the other hand, (...) this article also invites contemporary string pedagogues who use Suzuki's methods to candidly consider how much attention they pay to Suzuki's (and their own) educational philosophy as they teach. Finally, this article articulates Suzuki's philosophy of music education, named here "Music Education as Love Education" (a play on words with the familiar term "Music Education as Aesthetic Education," to reflect Suzuki's principal focus on the nurturing of students)—in order to offer a fresh look at a philosophy that may be often, though differently, disregarded by both sides of the debate. Suzuki's writings and interviews with individuals who worked with Suzuki are used to demonstrate his belief in the spiritual nature of musical tone, and the high priority he placed upon character development. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Remixing the Classroom: Toward an Open Philosophy of Music Education by Randall Everett AllsupJuliet HessRandall Everett Allsup, Remixing the Classroom: Toward an Open Philosophy of Music Education (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 2016).As a leading voice in music education, Randall Allsup works continually to reconceptualize music education toward democratic and socially just praxis.1 He routinely challenges the field to become (...) self-conscious of practices that limit forward movement, providing powerful critiques2 and urging music education toward open possibilities.3 Remixing the Classroom: Toward an Open Philosophy of Music Education is work that will shift our field. His comprehensive philosophy of music education looks, longs, for moral openings4 through which twenty-first-century music education may become a space of possibility. His writing interweaves stories and theory toward what he calls an "open philosophy," drawing upon the ideas of John Dewey, Maxine Greene, and Roland Barthes. Allsup introduces stories of Dapper Dan, Jiro Ono, Kafka, Atul Gawande, and the Orpheus Orchestra in New York City to illustrate powerful points about current and possible paradigms of music education.Chapter 1, "Toward Open Encounters," discusses the making and breaking of the law (tradition) and explores how tradition and the Master-Apprentice model restrict what is possible in music education. Allsup explores the nature of music education and the limitations it places upon its participants. Chapter 2, "Music-Teacher Quality and Expertise," asks fundamental questions of our field and [End Page 100] explores and challenges the "place and purpose of public schooling in a democratic society."5 Allsup speaks to the function of education and critiques music education. Chapter 3, "learning in laboratories," puts forward a Deweyan laboratory model in which a museum is at the center of the school with learning laboratories situated around it. He explores what this structural fluidity might enable and develops notions of lawmaking and lawbreaking, extending possibilities of the open encounter. The final chapter, "looking, Longing, for Moral Openings," calls on music educators to embrace a more open music education paradigm. Allsup draws upon Greene to challenge music education to move "from the predictable to the possible."6 He puts forward the Orpheus Orchestra, a conductorless orchestra, as one possibility.I situate myself as an anti-racist, anti-colonial, feminist scholar rooted in anti-oppression scholarship.7 locating my review through this framework, I elaborate upon what I see as the major strengths and limitations of this work, drawing upon Judith Butler8 and postcolonial theory. significantly, Allsup's book calls upon music education to "give an account of [it]self" and promotes a self-consciousness crucial for our field in the age of high stakes accountability measures. I contend that he provides a music education philosophy for what stuart Hall terms the "postcolonial moment"9 and ultimately positions music education as a space of possibility. Alongside these strengths, I offer a challenge toward what I view as the open possibilities of closed forms and a critique of his "pedagogy of travel and surprise."Judith Butler points to the impossibility of giving an account of oneself. she notes,I speak as an 'I,' but do not make the mistake of thinking that I know precisely all that I am doing when I speak in that way. I find that my very formation implicates the other and me, that my own foreignness to myself is, paradoxically, the source of my ethical connection with others.10Butler notes the subject's "partial opacity to [her]self."11 In Remixing the Classroom, Allsup calls upon music educators to account for the practices and traditions continually reinscribed in the field. He poses challenging but fundamental questions in the work in music education, asking readers to consider what they do unconsciously. Butler asserts we can never fully account for ourselves. Allsup challenges the field to try, pushing music educators to face hard truths and limitations of what music education is and has been. In chapter 1, for example, he argues:To call a studying musician "unmusical" is to extinguish a light; it is to act as if the future is certain and that human potential is somehow fixed. It is to act [End Page 101... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Pax Americana and the World of Music EducationEstelle R. Jorgensen (bio)It may seem ironic to speak of a Pax Americana at a time when the United States is prosecuting a war and its aftermath.1 Still, imperialism, or the desire to keep the peace on one's own terms, has led other nations into war when their will and power was frustrated and thwarted. My purpose in this essay is (...) to raise four important and interrelated questions: What are the political tasks that hopeful music teachers, administrators, and those interested in their work need to undertake to pursue an ethically universalistic, democratic, and humane education? What are some guiding principleswhereby music educators and policy-makers can navigate this territory? What are the conditions that would facilitate educational dialogue of the sort that is needed? How should music to be taught in order to achieve the intellectual objectives necessary in dialogical education? I view these questions from the limited musical perspective of the Western classical tradition — a misnomer since it is now an international tradition practiced around the world by people of many different languages, ethnicities, and cultures — and in the context of my position that this tradition merits transformation.2 This is a particularly interesting example since its roots originally are European, Eastern, and African, and it potentially subverts the predominant American popular musical culture of our time.Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri write of a global empire in the making and the seeds of its decline and fall, the multitudes that arise against it and the challenges they encounter in making their voices heard in the political arena.3 The forces of globalization, interwoven as they are with those of capitalism and the ideologies that foster it, are so pervasive that it is difficult for nation states to resist. The powers of nation-states decline while pervasive internationalism lies like an "epidermis" over the many nation-states, religions, languages, and ways of life that characterize societies on planet earth.4 The United States might champion capitalism and its own [End Page 1] breed of democratic ideology, yet globalization engulfs it such that it becomes the creature of its own making. Its values and culture might lie at the heart of the cultural, economic, and political agents of globalization — the multinational corporations with their corresponding distribution networks, interlocking international corporate directorships, licensing agreements, technological inventions, and powerful political and religious liaisons — yet even the United States becomes the child of forces it has exported throughout the world and that it is now unable to control. A culture of fear and violence pervades the country.5 Outsourcing, off-shore export of production capacity, the power of the profit motive, and management decisions made far from the particular places they impact leave many Americans without jobs and security, and a sense of powerlessness to change their circumstances — a phenomenon that also appears in other countries. Eventually, as Hardt and Negri posit in Marxian vein, the people impacted by these developments both here and abroad begin to organize themselves and rise against the oppression they may at first sense if not fully understand; in the beginning they may march peacefully but as their anger and frustration grow, they may eventually revolt. One need not buy into their particular reading of history to notice that, at least over the long term of decades or centuries, there seem to be limits on the human willingness to tolerate oppression; when their patience is eventually exhausted, people resist, subvert, escape, or overthrow their oppressors.One of the particular challenges of our time is the "polyvocality" of contemporary societies. Globalism may constitute the epidermis overlying these "multiplicities and pluralities" but underneath are the hosts of differing tribes, religions, languages, colors, and identities. Ways need to be found for people to dwell together in peace and debate and reconcile their differences without resorting to violence.6 In such a world, even in societies that espouse democratic ideals and principles, moral conflicts cannot be avoided, and differences between and among individuals and groups are often deeply rooted, persistent, and pervasive. This necessitates forging mechanisms that enable deliberation about how to solve the conflicts that necessarily arise.7 Seyla... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Toward Mindful Music Education:A Response To Bennett ReimerSandra L. StaufferIn her book Composing a Life, Mary Catherine Bateson reminds us to acknowledge our antecedents—those who have gone before in whatever way or whatever path.1 I believe we should also acknowledge our co-conspirators—those who have listened to us and wrestled with our ideas. Following Bateson, I wish to recognize the contributions of my teachers and my colleagues, (...) particularly the members of the doctoral seminar at Arizona State University. I am grateful for your contributions to the life of my mind and the words of this morning. For the record, I also want to say that Bennett Reimer is both antecedent and co-conspirator for everyone in this room, and we are indebted to him."The first task of philosophy involves learning to ask a good question," says Walter Feinberg in his essay on the philosophical scholar.2 Reimer asks us, "Who is philosophy of music education for?"—a provocative question indeed. He also gives us an answer: K-12 students.I agree, but not really. How can that be? Imagine this. A music teacher I know, Stephanie, was engaged with some first-grade children in singing songs and moving and reading rhythms. She turned to write on the white board. When she turned back to the children, one boy, Alex, was standing, perfectly still, on his head. What happened next? I will tell you in few minutes. Reimer says, "Philosophical issues are not disconnected to or incidental to musical experience. [End Page 135] They are foundational for musical experience, because one's values, beliefs, desires, preferences, and so forth, directly affect how one engages with music and what one gets from doing it." Abridging those two sentences at my own peril, Reimer appears to be saying that philosophical issues are foundational to musical experience.That idea works for me only if I am standing, figuratively and metaphorically, not literally, on my head. It seems to me that experience is the foundation of philosophy or, put another way, that one's philosophy derives from one's experiences; the richer the experiences, the richer the philosophy. A philosophy based on limited or weak experience is a limited or weak philosophy. This, however, is only surface-level logic for a deeper epistemological question—where does one's philosophy come from? If I take the Deweyan perspective that philosophy derives from experience, then surely I am obligated, in this forum, to define my terms—particularly "experience." It would be easy to say that experience means making music and listening to music, and surely it does. By experience, however, I mean not only these actions—the doing of music—but also thinking, or what Ellen Langer calls mindfulness.3 Langer describes mindful learning as having three characteristics: "the continuous creation of new categories; openness to new information; and an implicit awareness of more than one perspective."4 I like how Robert Duke articulates the same idea: "Teach things that are intellectually interesting and functionally valuable."5 Engage students not just in doing, but also in thinking—in mindful learning. Rich experience makes for rich philosophy. If we are talking about music education at all levels that is not only participatory, but also mindful, then I am all for it.Reimer asks a second question: how are we to accomplish the teaching of philosophy to K-12 students? I want to know what we are trying to accomplish. Are we trying to teach the content of philosophy or are we trying to help students develop their own abilities to think about their experiences as musicians, whether as listeners or as music makers, in whatever contexts they find themselves? The former seems to be a reification of philosophy in which I am not eager to engage most K-12 students. I hope we are aiming for the latter. If so, then our task is to provide rich and mindful experiences in every music setting. Our task is to model the disposition of a philosopher—one who asks questions, is curious, and is engaged in the life of the mind.This seems so obvious. Why aren't we doing it already? There... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:A Brief Introduction to a Philosophy of Music and Music Education as Social Praxis by Thomas A. RegelskiRoger MantieThomas A. Regelski, A Brief Introduction to a Philosophy of Music and Music Education as Social Praxis (New York: Routledge, 2016)ANSWERS WITHOUT QUESTIONSThomas Regelski has earned a place as a major figure in music education, if for no other reason than his (...) role as co-convener of the MayDay Group in 1993. Regelski’s contributions to the profession, however, go much beyond the MayDay Group. His many books and articles provide both practical advice and suggestions for music teachers as well as rigorous discussions of important issues for scholars. He is among the most frequently cited authors in music education today and I count myself among those who have been deeply impacted by his work.1Those familiar with Regelski’s oeuvre and the history of the MayDay Group know that “praxial philosophy” has been his central concern since the early 1990s. The idea of praxialism, a term more or less invented by a small group of music education academics,2 has been driven, at least in part, by a desire to counter what has been considered (by some) to be the music education profession’s misguided adherence to and emphasis on “music education as aesthetic education,” particularly as an outgrowth of its Charles Leonard-Bennett Reimer [End Page 213] lineage.3 Along with contemporaries Philip Alperson, Wayne Bowman, and David Elliott (among others), Regelski has been a major voice in adopting and adapting ancient Greek (especially Aristotelean) thought in order to challenge the presupposition, predominant in twentieth-century academic discourse, that a (or the) philosophy of music education should unquestioningly derive from philosophies of art or aesthetics. Through the deployment of concepts such as theoria, techne, poiesis, phronesis, and especially, praxis, Regelski has, along with a cadre of like-minded thinkers, attempted, in the tradition of Christopher Small, to encourage educators to place greater emphasis on the social aspects of music making rather than on the so-called “aesthetic properties” of the music itself. For almost three decades, Regelski has been consistent, if not relentless in his promotion of all things “praxial.”A Brief Introduction to a Philosophy of Music and Music Education as Social Praxis (hereafter A Brief Introduction) comprises seven short chapters. The first three (Part One: Ideology Critique) provide an historical, if editorialized, overview of the history of aesthetics, from its ancient Greek origins in aisthesis to what Regelski calls today’s “aesthetic rationale” for music education. The last four chapters (Part Two: Theory into Praxis and Praxis Informed by Theory) provide arguments for why a praxial philosophy provides a superior basis for music education, along with illustrations of what music teaching based on praxialism might look like in practice. Readers already acquainted with Regelski’s previous writings are unlikely to find anything new in A Brief Introduction. Many of the book’s themes, such as “automania,” “sacrilization of music,” “legitimation crisis,” “pragmatic difference,” “action learning,” and “breaking 100” will be familiar to those who have read his essays over the years. A Brief Introduction, however, is not intended for those already familiar with his previous writings, but for newcomers, such as upper level undergraduates, for whom A Brief Introduction provides, as the title appropriately suggests, a succinct summary of his ideas distilled into just over a hundred pages. Rather than a stand-alone textbook, Regelski imagines the book as a “complement” to other courses, such as introductory classes in music education, conducting classes, instrumental method courses, and so on. Although not stated explicitly, much of the book’s content is relevant primarily (though perhaps not exclusively) for an American/Canadian readership.Regelski explains from the outset that the ideas in the book “are intended as a corrective to current practices and traditions in music teaching” (xx), ones he considers based upon and reflective of “aesthetic ideology.” As he explains, he wishes to operate in the tradition of Critical Theory, where ideology means the imposition of a dominant group’s values over a subordinate group. Although he never discusses processes of social reproduction, established norms and practices [End Page 214] in institutional... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Culturally Responsive Teaching in Music Education: From Understanding to Application by Vicky R. Lind and Constance L. McKoyEric ShiehVicky R. Lind and Constance L. McKoy, Culturally Responsive Teaching in Music Education: From Understanding to Application (New York, NY: Routledge, 2016).In the book’s penultimate chapter, titled “Community,” we encounter a teacher who agrees to a student’s request to start a mariachi band and gets “more (...) than he bargained for.”1 We hear from a teacher who seeks a greater understanding of the context for her Black students and finds herself the only White person in many of the community events she attends. We learn about a teacher who has her marching band, predominantly comprised of Latinx students, march in annual Korean and Black community parades in the city and why she does this. What to make of these stories—inspiring, provocative, suffused with honesty? I found myself restless to share these narratives with my own teaching colleagues, to ask not simply “What do you see happening here?” but also “Where would something like this take us?”What is notable about Vicky Lind and Constance McKoy’s achievement here is that they have given us a very full book and one that provides many different points of entry—stories and theories and activities and questions—through which to engage with ideas of culturally responsive teaching. In just under 150 [End Page 210] pages with index and references, the book encompasses four chapters that review various academic traditions connected to culturally responsive teaching, concludes with three chapters that relay narratives and vignettes from K-12 music teachers, and includes throughout lists of reflection questions and teaching strategies. The primary audience is pre-service and in-service K-12 music teachers. If a key requirement for culturally responsive teaching is continuous reflection over the impacts our pedagogies have on our students and ourselves as teachers, this book’s wide-ranging engagement is indeed a welcome one.What I offer here in terms of review, then, is first a consideration of the book’s various components and where they might lead us. Second, I bring its ideas of cultural responsiveness into dialogue with ideas more commonly found in anti-racist and social justice approaches to education—traditions the book does not directly engage with but which certainly have a place in conversations around it. This is a particularly relevant time, I suggest, to engage with questions of cultural responsiveness alongside perhaps more politically-minded approaches: this book will be read, I hope, by teachers grappling with our age of renewed and visible racial struggle, increased forced migration, and cultural insecurity.The first half of the book is explicitly dedicated to “understanding” culturally responsive teaching. Its chapters present a historical overview of its conceptual development, explicate the centrality of culture and cultural competence to teaching, and discuss the connection between music and identity in young people. The authors center their conceptualization of culturally responsive teaching around Geneva Gay’s framework, outlined in her Culturally Responsive Teaching, as “using the cultural knowledge, prior experiences, frames of reference, and performance styles of ethnically diverse students to make learning encounters more relevant to and effective for them.”2 “Effective,” here, is understood broadly and includes academic competence, self-efficacy, social critique, and the freedom to be “ethnically expressive.”3In laying this foundation, the authors negotiate thoughtfully a number of tensions inherent in this work that are too often simplified in the classroom. They recognize, for example, the need to acknowledge culture as a category through which human experience is mediated, but also one that too easily gives way to stereotyping. When discussing issues of music and identity they remind readers that musical identities are multiple and suggest that musical identities might be viewed as both “bottom-up” and “top-down”—constructed through a variety of ongoing experiences as much as they are constituted by national or ethnic affiliation.4 They also do not shy from language such as “high expectations” and “academic competence” when discussing the need for comprehensive and supportive classrooms, despite the uneasiness with which these terms often sit in arts education and alongside purposes of engendering social critique... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Response To June Boyce-Tillman, “Towards an Ecology of Music Education”Elizabeth BauerJune Boyce-Tillman explores the values implicit in the Western musical traditions that also dominate music education. She examines the five interlocking areas of materials, expression, construction, values, and spirituality and how these areas create a more holistic way of conceptualizing the musical experience within music education. By describing the divide between the values (...) of system A and system B, Boyce-Tillman reminds us that these issues are persistent and demand our constant attention as music educators. She supports the conviction that music [End Page 186] curricula should not be dictated by a national curriculum. Instead, education should be a powerful way of supporting the dominant value system of a culture. As an educator focusing on the population of students with special needs, I find myself agreeing with her advocacy of holistic education and suggest that she look at the model of special education to implement this ecology of music education. Boyce-Tillman's proposal evokes a number of responses, of which I will mention two.My first response is to her belief in the individual within the community. This is often problematic in current educational circles. States and countries are being held to standardized curricula. While in and of themselves standards are not bad because they set educational expectations, dictated curricula do not allow for individuality and creativity. Special education addresses this problem by the use of an individualized education plan (IEP). This plan is devised to meet the abilities and capabilities of each individual student. An IEP states the educational goals for the student with special needs for one academic year. Although the IEP contains year-long educational goals, it also contains the methods for how a student will meet those goals. No two students with special needs will have the same educational curriculum. This idea is supported by humanistic ideas in that the individual child is more important than a fixed curriculum. Furthermore, the IEP is developed by all teachers working with the child. For example, a child with Down syndrome normally works with a speech therapist, physical therapist, occupational therapist, general education teacher, and several other subject specific teachers (music, art, physical education, and so on). During the creation of the IEP, all therapists and teachers work together to devise the best educational plan for the student. This helps to ensure continuity between therapies and teaching methods.Currently, many music teachers are excluded from the process of devising the IEP. This also supports Boyce-Tillman's ideas on how national curricula often support the dominant value systems and reinforce the notion of subjugating other value systems. However, I propose that the inclusion of the music teacher in the IEP process because music class is one of the easiest ways to make the student with special needs feel part of a community. The music classroom supports the idea of working together to accomplish a common goal.My second response relates to the valuing of process. While Western culture has typically placed value on product, the converse is true in special education. Throughout the devising of the IEP, the process of learning is valued. Although special education teachers have an ultimate goal for what the student is to accomplish, it is more important to examine the process of how the student achieves that goal. Furthermore, students with special needs are not given rigid time-lines in which they have to accomplish a goal. Instead, a student is allowed to move at his or her own pace. [End Page 187]Moreover, while the students with special needs are moving at their own pace, they are also nurtured by the teacher. In the United States it is common for students with special needs to be educated in the classroom with their nondisabled peers. This is referred to as inclusion. For certain parts of the day, the students with special needs may leave the regular classroom and receive tutoring in certain subject areas by the special education teacher. Many teachers who do not have experience in teaching students with special needs have noticed how the students with special needs achieve more when they are with their special education... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:A View on the Future of an International Philosophy of Music Education:A Plea for a Comparative StrategyFrede V. NielsenIn the preface to the revised edition of my book, Almen musikdidaktik (The General Didaktik of Music) published in 1998, I wrote that the bibliography had been supplemented with a great deal of music education literature that had been published since the first edition of the (...) book came out in 1994. I drew attention in particular to, among other things, the journal Philosophy of Music Education Review, which began in 1993. I found that publication of this journal was significant and interesting not least because it continuously supplemented the approach to a theoretical and philosophic music pedagogical reflection with new English language literature. At the same time, it provided an opportunity to ask what sort of concepts and phenomena 'the philosophy of music education' and 'the philosophy of music teaching and learning' really are and what sort of functions they can have in relation to practice-oriented music education, including the education of music teachers. Therefore, the publication of PMER was a great step forward. But, like all such steps, it also revealed interesting issues and raised new questions. [End Page 7]In the Scandinavian countries too the research-based and theory-oriented music education literature has grown considerably since the early 1990s. This is the result of local initiatives in individual countries as well as Nordic cooperation in the form of the Nordic Network for Research in Music Education, which was formalized and institutionalized in 1992. The publication of the network's yearbooks, Nordic Research in Music Education–Yearbook, since 1995 is noteworthy in this context. In our part of the world this was another step forward, but one that also raised some challenging questions. In particular it gave rise to the question: What is the structure of the object of study for music education as a science and how can this object of study be delimited appropriately in relation to other disciplines? I think we have moved further toward giving reflected and well-founded answers to these questions, even though the answers are not unambiguous and may create problems in relation to the institutional affiliations of music pedagogy as a theoretical and scientific discipline.My first encounter with the initiators of the PME symposia took place in 2003 when I attended PME-5 in Lake Forest near Chicago. Even though there were participants from a number of different countries, including the Scandinavian countries (but none, for example, from Germany), it was clear that the event was dominated by North Americans. I contributed with a paper that was based on German and Nordic didactic (didactological) theory, which apparently was quite unfamiliar to most of the conference participants. To me this was a reminder of how important it is that a society that calls itself "international" should strive to embrace and include various traditions from several different points of view if it is to live up to the designation "international."The International Society for the Philosophy of Music Education (ISPME) was formally founded at the symposium in Lake Forest. For the past two years I have enjoyed the honor of being the society's co-chair together with Estelle Jorgensen. As those of you who attended the symposium in 2003 know, I accepted this task only after some hesitation and with some reservations. Since then I have had the opportunity to consider and experience what the task entails.I mentioned that my impression of PME-5 in Lake Forest was that it was dominated by North Americans. This was no wonder, since PME-5 took place in that part of the world. Moreover, the initiative behind the PME symposia originally came from the USA and Canada. Nonetheless, it gave impetus to a broader international orientation when the ISPME was founded two years ago.I come from a Scandinavian country. Scandinavia is a small language area situated in the northernmost region of Europe and has historically been very dependent on external cultural impulses. For centuries these have not least come from continental Europe and this is also true of the fields of education, philosophy, and music culture. The French and... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Response to Anthony J. Palmer, “Music Education for the Twenty-First Century: A Philosophical View of the General Education Core”Ana Lcuía FregaI would like to discuss three themes related to Tony Palmer's paper: (1) my agreement with the content of his paper in general, (2) some remarks on elements of what he deals with, including notions about the concept or a vision of what music (...) class='Hi'>education should be in the USA and in the rest of the world and an approach to training music teachers at university level in the USA and in the rest of the world, and (3) my personal conclusions.Music is a particular medium of expression, irreplaceable, not interchangeable with any other. It is also a natural medium of human communication. We do not think or propose that schools should create musicians, but that they should aid in the improvement of all humankind.1This quotation of mine allows me to introduce my general agreement with the main content of the first part of Palmer's paper. Neither of us argues against the importance of teaching music within the general system of education. We both promote this and work to make this a fact in our different parts of the world.We both view the tasks known as "music education" as a part of the teaching of the humanities as a way to maintain a certain level of civilization and of a culture; that is, to keep alive the rich tradition in each culture, to develop skills, to listen to, perform, and create music, and to become acquainted with the wealth of masterpieces.Also, as I have said,"I can only give what I have," and "a teacher does not teach what he/she knows but what he/she is."2 I agree with Palmer on the relevance and importance of the task of music educators. There should be a correlation between the school's mission and the quality of the training for prospective teachers for them. This is consistent with Palmer's thinking about the university task when training future music teachers.George Steiner articulated some of the difficulties, limitations, and new possibilities brought into university classrooms by the technology of the global village when he wrote:[Those artifacts] determine a new way to organize human knowledge and to connect contemporary research with previous books. All taxonomies are essentially [End Page 194] philosophical, any library... represents a formalized vision of how the world is structured, and what are the optimum views about both the human mind and the phenomenological whole.3He also adds, "We will not be able to avoid the illusion-and so it is when talking about Humanities-that knowledge is cumulative, that there is an improvement and an unavoidable teleology needed when expressing sentiments and ideas."4By introducing Steiner's ideas, I am opening a line of critical thinking about a kind of "universalization" of both Palmer's concept of whatmusiceducationmeans as well as whether and then how there should be a world-wide dissemination of the training model that he describes for music teachers. I have doubts about the underlying assumptions of these notions and their feasibility.The examples Palmer gives of listening would require an inordinate amount of time and effort. Although this may be a valuable expenditure of resources in some parts of the world, in other parts the focus would be better directed elsewhere. In some places many people do not complete their basic education, do not have access to good nutrition, and have not acquired basic language and communication skills. The big question is, "What should we really teach them?"My point here is that if Michael Murphy's model is indeed an inspiring framework, it may be useful for people belonging to a part of the so-called First World only. Palmer's work should be understood with that consideration in mind. Africa, Latin America, and the Arab world are certainly not looking for these kinds of skills from the music taught at the general level if there happens to be any music taught at all in schools.Multiculturalism is another significant issue in Palmer's paper. I understand the... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Why music? The Foundations of Music Education from Plato until Today by Øivind VarkøyDaniela BartelsØivind Varkøy, Warum Musik? Zur Begründung des Musikunterrichts von Platon bis heute [Why music? The Foundations of Music Education from Plato until Today], Stefan Gies, trans. with the assistance of Hanne Fossum (Innsbruck, Esslingen, Bern-Belp: Helbling, 2016)Øivind Varkøy's book Why music? was first published in Norway in (...) 1993 and translated into Swedish three years later. In 2016, a newly revised edition was published in German. This review refers to the German edition and a special focus will be on the third chapter, because Varkøy's convincing interpretation of Kant's theory of aesthetic judgement presents a counter narrative to other interpretations of this theory that have been in circulation in North America for quite some time.In the introduction, Varkøy explains that it is his intention to present a diverse array of reasons for teaching music. He also explains why (future) music teachers should reflect on these reasons and the possible values of their professional actions: "A clear stance on the value of one's own work will have a positive effect on one's professional identity and the psychological and physical well-being."1 In the first chapter, he takes the readers back to the world of "the old Greeks"—an [End Page 224] expression that is often used in Europe—and he specifically addresses the values Plato and Aristotle have ascribed to music. The chapter starts with the mythos about mousiké as a gift from the gods and Varkøy explains that this term used to stand for much more than music. It included diverse forms of art such as language, poetry, and dance which were seen as means that can express order and beauty as well as a realization of harmonia which "holds the world together."2 As far as philosophies of music education are concerned, both Plato and Aristotle stress that music education serves the character formation of young people and both are quite strict concerning the way music should be taught to the young. To give an example, Plato rejects that the aulos is used in schools, because it is a woodwind instrument that served as a means of intoxication in rituals. Plato's point was that it would make the youth soft and therefore unable to contribute to the establishment of a 'good' state system. Varkøy stresses that Plato did not differentiate between the aesthetic and the ethical dimension of music, since the term kalokagathia stands for both 'the beautiful' and 'the good.' It almost seems as if Varkøy had the North American debate between the so-called 'aesthetic' and 'praxial educators' in mind when he wrote this chapter, and it is a pity that he does not go into more detail concerning the terms 'the beautiful' and 'the good.' On the other hand, he gives a clear summary of the different functions Aristotle has ascribed to music. He emphasizes that Aristotle mentions the three functions of music as a source of well-being and enjoyment, as a means of character formation, and as an intellectual activity that can lead to a "higher level" of experience.3 In Aristotle's thinking, all of these functions are of value. Concerning the functions and values of music that are discussed, Varkøy abstains from passing his own judgment which leaves a welcome space for one's own thinking.In the second chapter, Varkøy focuses on the functions of music between the time of early Christianity and the time of Comenius. He puts forward an intriguing argument when he states that the Church Father Augustine, who saw the fact that people can enjoy music just for pleasure as a danger, has already pointed to the notion of music as a phenomenon with its own, intrinsic value. At the end of this chapter, Varkøy asks the readers to reflect on Comenius' distinction between "useful" knowledge and knowledge that serves "the way of making one's living."4 He returns to this distinction later on in his book.In the chapter "Progress and Reason," the focus is on... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Response to Frede V. Nielsen, “Didactology as A Field of Theory and Research in Music Education”Marja HeimonenFrede Nielsen describes the two main aspects of music pedagogy as the normative (and prescriptive) and the descriptive (and analytical) aspects. As a precondition for his discussion, he explores some important concepts and terms such as Didaktik. He argues that it is impossible to translate and transfer certain concepts into (...) English. The German tradition, however, has influenced Scandinavian pedagogical discussion and the content of pedagogical terms and concepts in Denmark and Finland is usually congruent with German terminology. Therefore, Nielsen analyzes the German concepts carefully.An example from my own experience as a teacher of both pedagogy and didactics at the Helsinki Conservatory/Polytechnic may throw some light on this [End Page 98] matter from the Finnish perspective. The traditional title of the subject "piano pedagogy" (offered to students who aim to become instrumental teachers) was changed to "piano didactics" some years ago. The content of this course also changed in that alongside practical work (teaching) theoretical courses were also included. The reason for this change was expressed in the same terms that Nielsen presents in his paper: Didaktik (in Finnish didaktiikka) signifies both a theoretical and a practice-oriented approach to teaching.According to Nielsen, the principal question concerning Didaktik is What is the essential content in music education? This is a philosophical (as well as a legal) issue concerning the aims of education and the matter of who has the right to decide the content. These kinds of matters can also be drawn on a larger canvas: the education of human beings generally. Music education (especially in the context of general education) is not only concerned with the skills that will enable pupils to become competent musicians. On the contrary and more profoundly, it aims to broaden the mind and expand the possibilities of thought and feeling. According to several researchers (such as Estelle Jorgensen, Anthony E. Kemp, David Best, Matti Huttunen, and Heidi Westerlund) music teachers should cultivate a wide understanding of the meaning of education so that music education can relate to human experience and social practices.Nielsen has created four paradigms that might be used when the content of music teaching is formulated. The point of departure may be (a)the subject itself, music, (b)the pupil's culture (or the local culture); in other words, the micro-cultural level, (c)the social problems or conditions of democracy (the macro-cultural level), and/or (d)the fundamental existential condition of human beings. These paradigms do not exclude one another. I consider their function to resemble that of legal principles: they have to be weighed and balanced in a particular situation and context. One or several may, for some time, take priority and push the others into the background just as Nielsen argues. Legal principles are not used as legal rules, but they are "strong" as rules.Legal rules have been compared with rails: rules and regulations (just as rails) are either followed or not. This comparison to a train running on rails also clarifies the relationship between legal regulations and human behaviour: most of these rules are obeyed by habit without profound thinking about aims and principles (c.f. Nielsen's paradigms) behind the legal texts.The most important question Nielsen attempts to raise is the relationship between music and pedagogy (Didaktik). He points out that his aim is not to give normative regulations about what should or should not be taught. Raising questions is an important aim of philosophical research. However, this kind of research may also have normative implications. For instance, philosophical [End Page 99] questions regarding the aims and the content of a subject (such as music) are included in the planning of a National Curriculum (or the National Framework Curriculum formulated by the National Board of Education, as we used to have in Finland). This curriculum is normative: the regulations have to be obeyed when syllabi are formulated in schools at the local level. The Framework Curriculum includes several educational aims; for instance, "a good relationship to music" should be created between the pupil and music. The normative character of this kind of... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Chances and Choices: Exploring the Impact of Music Education by Stephanie PittsLeonard TanStephanie Pitts, Chances and Choices: Exploring the Impact of Music Education (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012)In Chances and Choices: Exploring the Impact of Music Education, Stephanie Pitts investigates the lifelong effects of music education by examining the place of music in the lives of more than a (...) hundred adults. Cast in seven chapters, this qualitative study includes six pairs of interludes inserted between the chapters as well as a concluding postlude. Following a brief summary of the book, I will offer my critical response.In Chapter One, Pitts lists the six primary aims of the study: to examine the impact of musical learning during childhood on lifelong engagement with music; to assess the role that school music plays in lifelong involvement in music and attitudes to music; to investigate the influence of various locations for learning; to discuss particular strengths of music education; to probe into the problems of music education systems; and to proffer ways in which knowing more about the long-term implications of music education can help inform practice. She then presents the life history methodology she employs to accomplish these aims, detailing how she gathers retrospective accounts of formative musical experiences by British classical musicians, supplemented by accounts from British popular musicians and Italian respondents. These accounts constitute the data that are [End Page 102] analyzed from different perspectives later in the book. A brief survey of international approaches to music education and outline of the chapters to follow conclude the chapter.In Chapter Two, Pitts sketches a brief overview of twentieth century British music education before analyzing trends in the formative musical experience of British respondents from the 1930s to the 1990s. In an attempt to determine generational trends, Pitts groups the written responses according to six categories of musical influences: classroom music, music outside the classroom, teacher attitudes, music in the home, parent attitudes, and lifelong involvement. For each decade, Pitts presents a rank ordering of the six musical influences, revealing the increasing importance of music outside the classroom through the decades. Pitts then examines the various locations where musical learning takes place, such as the school, the home, and the church, in Chapter Three. Here, she surveys the characteristics of supportive musical environments, examines extracurricular music making, and discusses self-learning in music. Pitts concludes the chapter by analyzing findings from the Italian participants, drawing attention to the fact that in its emphasis on specialist training, the Italian music education system differs from the generalist approaches of its British counterpart.Pithily titled “Inspiring, Affirming, Challenging,” Chapter Four explores the characteristics of memorable and significant music teachers and role models. Among the many themes considered, Pitts notes that inspiring teachers are those who provide constant support to their students and possess advanced musical skills; teachers who were recollected negatively, on the other hand, were associated with being negligent, incompetent, dismissive, or fearsome. In addition, Pitts also explores the role of parents, siblings, extended family, and friends as musical mentors, role models, and sources of musical learning. With these foundations for musical learning established, Pitts analyzes the life history accounts of the respondents by musical outcome in Chapter Five. She discusses how adults make music in community settings, educational settings, worship settings, self-directed groups, and private homes, and describes how adults learn music and attend concerts as a form of lifelong musical involvement. From the data, Pitts surmises that even after leaving school, the participants often desire to improve musically; they frequently concentrate their efforts not only on participating in musical activities, but also on developing their musical skills further.In Chapter Six, “Rhetoric and Reality,” Pitts assesses the degree to which the participants’ experiences corroborate contemporary claims for the value and effects of musical learning. Drawing on the rich data of life history accounts, Pitts concludes that there is “compelling evidence for the lifelong impact of musical education” (p. 173), further arguing that the musical skills, attitudes, and values acquired during school years do have a long-term influence on musical engagement [End Page 103] in later years. Chapter Seven, aptly titled “Chances, Choices, and Conclusion... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Policy and the Political Life of Music Education ed. by Patrick Schmidt and Richard ColwellHung-Pai ChenPatrick Schmidt and Richard Colwell, eds., Policy and the Political Life of Music Education (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017)Policy and the Political Life of Music Education is a collection of discourses regarding music education policy and its practice across a wide range of perspectives and (...) geographical background. The book, edited by Patrick Schmidt and Richard Colwell, not only provides the general readership with a well-rounded basis for comprehending music education policy in various regions, but it also offers music education stakeholders’ perspectives regarding the meaning, value, and the importance of participating in policy development and its implementation.This book discusses various policy-related issues among music education systems in terms of education levels from kindergarten to higher education and institutional music education systems. It explores both general music learning and professional musician training. Further, the scope of its observations cover issues outside of the campus; for instance, the work of musicians/teachers at the community level (Chapter 11) and the hardships associated with performing organizations such as orchestras (Chapter 13). Besides, the editors survey policy implementation at national, state, local, and organizational levels in different countries and circumstances in the Anglo-American educational world as well [End Page 217] as other contexts including Brazil (Chapter 7), Taiwan (Chapter 8), and Norway (Chapter 12).The crucial issues raised in the book are also within the focus of global education; for example, multicultural education, assessment of policy/curriculum, social inclusion, and equality of access to music education. These all accord with the notion of current trends in education and provide directions for future development. Such comprehensive discussions indeed offer readers extensive information through the three sections of policy foundation, international perspectives on policy, and policy in context.The prerequisite of the overall practice of policy is to translate an education philosophy into comprehensive terms while convincing the public.1 However, many consider that policy development is the business of government, authorities, and politicians; some music educators even believe that the discourse of policy and political issues concerning music education is far beyond their control. My ongoing study also shows that a number of music educators, including school teachers, studio instructors, and student teachers, lack the understanding of and are ignorant in the interpretation of policy.2 Policy documents such as statutes, blueprints, and even curriculum guidelines/standards are often strictly followed as compelling legislation or mandates, despite the fact that public hearings, dialogues, and on-line forums are available for all stakeholders to contribute their thoughts and experiences in their on-going development and interpretation. In this book, the authors provide a clear range of views to explain the complexity of policy development and its future implementation, embracing factors such as social context, economic condition, political evolution, assessment, and research, as well as diverse populations including academics, principals, school teachers, parents, and students. Throughout the collection, cases are raised for stressing the significance of participating in policy development and implementation and, as such, nobody is a bystander.Further, this book advocates that the awareness and understanding of policy issues should be included in teacher preparation programs for better participation in and implementation of policy by teachers, while policy related masters and doctoral studies should be encouraged. This suggests that policy relevant courses in university curriculum, either at the undergraduate or post-graduate level, should be evaluated in view of cultivating students’ political literacy and, consequently, enabling them to participate more fully in their future career. This view links to Katherine Zeserson and Graham Welch’s argument (Chapter 14) that research, policy, and practice are the spinning triangle which could make music more inspiring for the next generation. Policy should not be alienated from music and its teaching; it has the ability to improve and change both. [End Page 218]David Elliott claims that all musicians, including students, are part of the artistic citizenship and therefore should develop a social-political identity and a commitment toward social change.3 Paul Woodford further expresses that children should be prepared to develop their voice for shaping the society.4 Margaret Barrett (Chapter 10... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Music Teacher Education in Japan:Structure, Problems, and PerspectivesMasafumi OgawaSchool music education in Japan is in a less than ideal situation. In April 2002, the new course of study was implemented by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT).1 The total number of music classes in the new curriculum was reduced to 33% of what it had been by the end (...) of 2002. The reduction went from two hours of music classes every week in grades one through nine to one hour in grades five through nine. This inevitably caused many problems. First, it became very difficult to teach music sequentially and instead music classes tended to be fragments of introductory experiences taught as disconnected activities. In this situation, it has been difficult for students to develop musical knowledge and skills. Second, the number of full-time music teachers was reduced greatly. It became common for a music teacher to teach at more than two schools in order to fill a full-time assignment. In some scenarios, many full-time music teachers were replaced with part-time teachers or teachers of other subjects. Music teachers have become disposable.Many music teachers are losing their effectiveness in the classroom. Students consider school music classes as a time to relax compared with other "intellectual subjects."2 They sometimes question music as an essential subject because they [End Page 139] do not value the developing skills that music requires or studying the theory of music. They believe that they can enjoy music outside of school anyway. Consequently, they are quite reluctant to participate in music classes and so behavioral problems arise and classroom management becomes more difficult. Some teachers attempt to force students to obey and force them to order; other teachers totally give up and let students behave as they like in class.3 In either case, teachers and students do not relate well to each other. It is not an exaggeration to say that school music in Japan is at risk of collapsing altogether and disappearing from the curriculum.One of the reasons for this, I believe, is that we have not wrestled with the fundamental problems of school music education until today. We might have intentionally avoided reviewing and criticizing the curriculum, expectations, and purposes of music education because it has been taboo to discuss the national standards, particularly for public school teachers to do so. Social and environmental conditions have changed greatly since the current system of Japanese education was established in 1947. It is obvious that the existing system does not match the new conditions.I strongly feel that it is time to review and reexamine what our pioneers of music education and the government had achieved in the field of music education. If we continue to avoid doing so, music in the schools will face serious consequences. In this paper, I discuss some of the fundamental issues of music teacher education in Japan. There are two reasons for focusing on music teacher education. First, starting with music teacher education is most important because music teachers have the most significant roles in school music education. Second, I have been engaged in music teacher education for seventeen years, and this is not only my research area but also an area in which, as an insider, I can offer direct insights. I will limit this essay to looking at the preparation of teachers in music for elementary and middle schools (grades 7 to 9).StructureThe course of study (COS) is a set of national curriculum standards for kindergarten, elementary, middle, and high school, and schools for the handicapped and is issued by the MEXT.4 All schools, public or private, are required to follow these standards. No other curriculum is allowed. Therefore, in Japan, the COS is law through which the government controls all educational actions. The COS was first issued in 1947 and has been revised seven times.5 The most recent revision was announced in December 1998 for kindergarten, elementary, and middle schools, and in March 1999 for the other levels. All schools in Japan were required to implement the revised COS by April 2002. [End Page 140]The COS of... (shrink)