Democracy and music education: themes and responses in a critical conversation

Democracy and music education: an introductory conversation

At first glance, democracy and music appear to be quite different cultural domains. Today, music is often experienced as something performed, played, listened to, appreciated, and consumed in the moment through live performance, high-fidelity reproduction, or digital media. A significant portion of the music we encounter is produced for rapid consumption as ready-made content, designed to be distributed on mp3 players, to accompany television and radio advertisements, or to fill the spaces of shopping malls. What does this immersion in pre-packaged music mean for us? Does constant exposure to public music disconnect listeners from the democratic dimensions of musical experience? With perhaps as much as seventy percent of all music heard appearing on television, we may be increasingly inclined to approach our daily listening as detached consumers, viewing music interaction as a product that lacks political or democratic meaning.

Despite this prospect, some segments of music education are showing growing interest in the democratic implications of musical activity. Among those involved in music study, theory, performance, and research, there is an increasing awareness that music is deeply intertwined with human affairs, with the aims and desires of cultural expression, and with instances of human power, freedom, dominance, control, and resistance. These potentially democratic concerns include attention to the musical activity of marginalized communities, as seen in the growth of movements like Community Music, where the inadequacies and undemocratic practices of institutional music education are called into question. Music education can also be connected to cultural and ethnic regeneration. In New Zealand, for example, music plays an integral educational role in the Maori cultural renaissance, the revival of the Maori language (Te Reo), and the aspirations for Maori cultural restoration and education following years of European colonization. Such examples remind us that music can act as a democratic force, an instrument of cultural resistance or change, and a vehicle for ethical concern and action.

Paul Woodford's recent book, Democracy and Music Education (2005), provides a focal point for this special issue of ACT. The theme of his work is both timely and significant, challenging us to renew our engagement with the politics of music education. Taking John Dewey's ideas on democracy and education as a reference, Woodford discusses the current state of the music education field amid a multitude of competing theories, philosophies, methodologies, and teaching practices. The book covers considerable ground and offers much material for commentary, review, and further discussion. It highlights the current need for democratic conversations in music education, urging musicians and teachers to consider the individual, social, and ethical implications of their musical work in light of changing cultural circumstances, political directions, and competing desires and needs. The authors in this issue of ACT were encouraged not only to comment specifically on Woodford's text but also to use it—along with other sources—to stimulate their own reflections on democracy and music education. Some contributors chose to discuss important concerns about democracy and music education in their own terms, using Woodford's work as a backdrop for their own analyses. Others reviewed and critiqued specific aspects of Woodford's book to foster renewed scholarship and communication. This is certainly not the final word on democracy and music education; the conversation must continue.

Dewey's foundational text, Democracy and Education (1966, originally 1916), is considered by some to be his most important book, as it establishes key concepts in educational philosophy. Dewey outlines a basis for understanding education as an essential component of democratic society, preparing the young—and not so young—for active engagement and critical participation in society. The school is intimately connected with the aspirations of a democratic society and holds a vital role in cultivating democratic citizens. In developing his argument, Dewey discusses the complex yet fundamental interrelatedness of society, the vital need for communication, and the significant role formal education plays in addressing such complexity in the interests of democracy. Formal education, or schooling, performs a recognized role alongside more informal societal learning, which Dewey acknowledges as profound and far-reaching. While informal education is often difficult to bring under critical scrutiny, formal education offers some hope for deepening democracy, serving as a site where educational decisions and actions can be carefully considered in response to broader, less controlled societal trends. The school, then, is a site of educational intention and action, a valuable component in a healthy democracy. Dewey's recognition that education exists both inside and outside institutions is a critical insight, as is his acknowledgment of the importance of schooling as a place that can help deepen democracy. Schools themselves are not unproblematic entities. Democratic society is full of difference, and as some writers in this issue suggest, both formal and informal education are—and will remain—contested sites of political power, conflict, difference, and resistance.

Dewey observes that our assimilation of the experiences of others through communication resembles art. Thus, his notion of the educative is closely linked to the artistic—education is stimulating, expansive, thought-provoking, and above all social. Like art, this sense of education does not rely primarily on mechanical or routine processes but rather depends on the vitality of everyday experiences. It seems fitting, then, to explore the ideas of democracy and education through the lens of music, for music has specific qualities of vitality in performance and presence, while engaging people in acts of communication that cannot be easily captured or expressed in everyday words or routines. Intentionally performed music could be said to invite a certain kind of democracy—creating in the moment an expectation of response and rearticulation. In music education we can choose to focus on preparing democratic musical experiences, recognize that the path forward may involve difficulty and conflict alongside the pleasure of musical insight and development.

In recent decades, school music education has undergone rapid change. In many Western educational institutions, this change has moved from a liberal-humanist ethos toward a more economically driven neoliberal global orientation. These developments have, in some cases, exposed the vulnerability of music as a core subject area in general education. One observer notes that current neoliberal policies in education emphasize performativity, conformity, and maintenance of the status quo in a system where skills and competencies are sought in students to help them function more effectively in the modern economic world. Many teachers in neoliberal democracies work within cultures of technicism characterized by stringent accountability and an expectation to produce learning outcomes strictly in line with the directives of educational authorities. Under pressure to remain compliant, some music teachers may find themselves less able to follow Dewey's ideals for a full and liberal education. In some regions, time devoted to music training in general teacher education programs is rapidly shrinking, and many schools must reconsider how they provide music education due to a limited supply of well-trained teachers. In countries like the United Kingdom and New Zealand, schools increasingly contract private and community practitioners—musicians both trained and untrained—to work in school music programs. In these shifting circumstances, music teachers of all kinds can lose their sense of criticality as they struggle to make sense of what is possible given curriculum constraints, personnel, music resources, and timetabling pressures.

Another pressing concern is whether institutional music education offers learning and teacher preparation that resonate with the musical ethos of contemporary society. Institutional music education is facing a crisis: its modernist and traditional pedagogical values are becoming increasingly disconnected from contemporary education and society at large, with perhaps a few notable exceptions. The twentieth century's anti-modernist musical legacy has not been seriously incorporated into music education programs—at least not to any significant degree. This anti-modernist legacy refers to those music worlds outside universities and schools—worlds that have captured commercial interest, public imagination, and daily habits but have failed to effectively influence music learning provision. While popular music studies have been discussed extensively in music education, for example, the extent and manner of their teaching and integration into music programs remain problematic. The exponential growth of music engagement through mass media formats—including popular television, cinema, advertising, personalized iPod digital music players, ethno-corporate world music, gaming music, and other forms—has profoundly shaped personal and collective musical identities and influenced how the public approaches, listens to, and values music. Woodford's book addresses these issues, and it is important they do not remain confined to that discussion. Contemporary music media carry enormous implications for music education institutions and teachers as they consider who is eligible for music study, what kinds of programs to offer, and what kind of music teaching they can and should implement.

Essays in this issue

Patrick Schmidt, author of the first essay, commends Woodford for bringing music education into the political sphere and sees his contribution as important for the field's maturity and ongoing health. Schmidt's essay seeks to expand Woodford's concept of democracy beyond ideals of public intelligence or abstract reason in order to highlight and engage with the difficulty and conflict that are also inherent in democratic action. He reminds us that everyday questions of democracy in music education are tied to manifestations of inequality and marginalization. Schmidt warns of the dangers of uncritically accepting democratic thinking and practices in the field, where what is considered rational or common sense may actually be misplaced or even ignorant. Moving beyond rationality, order, and consensus, Schmidt proposes that we seriously consider disorder and dissensus as vital components of our democratic thinking and exchanges. He is cautious about the self-deceptions often found in music education, particularly in relation to what is prescribed or certain, and encourages teachers to consider the problematic notion of the other in music practice: what music can be and is for those outside institutionalized methodological or value systems.

In the second essay, Elizabeth Gould builds on Plumwood's concept of devouring the other to address fundamental issues of social justice and difference in liberal democracies and music education. The problem with liberal democracies, she argues, is that they assimilate—devour—difference; consensual treatment of citizens is based on the assumption that majority decisions benefit minority concerns. So-called democratic practices in music education are largely symbolic, as they do not alter power relations in classrooms. Violence—symbolic or otherwise—occurs when difference is subsumed through democratic processes that appear rational, normal, and justified. Gould links this problem to dualistic thinking in Western culture, through which the other is colonized by processes that devour difference. In music education, these dynamics are as real as in any other educational sphere. Drawing from feminist and other literatures, Gould aims to uncover the processes that devour the other, presenting a vivid and contrasting perspective on democracy and music education.

David Elliott engages in a lively interactive discussion with Woodford's text. He questions Woodford's criticism of Praxial Music Education (PME) in Democracy and Music Education—particularly Woodford's dismissal of PME as a performance-alone concept. Elliott asserts that PME is fundamentally multidimensional, contextually reflexive, and contingent on a range of modes of musicing, including the important role of listening. Elliott's essay then comprehensively discusses various connections and resonances between music education and democracy. In response to Woodford, he raises issues around children's music learning, their induction into musical styles and traditions, and the ethical nature of these processes. He concedes that teachers and students need to foreground ethical, historical, and other contextual aspects of music and engage in meaningful conversations about the musical and social consequences of their own musicing. This calls for the music teacher to serve as coach, advisor, and informed critic rather than simply playing the role of know-it-all authority. One of Elliott's more interesting suggestions is his insistence that music educators embrace emotion and passion as important facets of their teaching styles—as the fusion of feeling and reason is pivotal in music teaching and learning. Elliott's call for emotion in music teaching is offered in reaction to Woodford's emphasis on abstract reason in Democracy and Music Education.

Kirsten Locke, author of the fourth essay, seeks to bring clarity to the question of complexity, diversity, and confusion in the postmodern world as advanced by Woodford. Locke builds her discussion around the notions of the postmodern condition, performativity, and ethical judgment, drawing on the work of French theorist Jean-François Lyotard. The crisis of grand narratives, Locke argues, extends to the postmodern condition of music education: narratives such as the maintenance of serious music as the legitimate field in music education are in crisis, as they can no longer sustain the absolute certainty on which they were promoted. Locke also asserts that a more insidious grand narrative—performativity—brings together notions of efficiency, reason, and instrumentality and helps explain the dominance of technical rationalism in contemporary education. In the context of the postmodern condition, Locke believes ethical judgment is critical, with her views paralleling Woodford's call for a form of ethical encounter that is both musically and socially democratic. Since music is both open-ended and indeterminate, Locke suggests, music teaching methods and approaches need to be ethically indeterminate, remaining critically responsive to changing musical and political circumstances and actions.

In the fifth essay, Michael Peters seeks to broaden the contextual and historical scholarship around Dewey and to question Woodford's positions regarding music education and the notion of liberal democracy. Peters makes clear that liberalism is a contested concept, as is democracy, and he calls for contemporary responses to Dewey's thought in relation to both music education and the emerging political economy of neoliberalism. Peters takes issue with Woodford's treatment of postmodernists and asserts that Woodford's broad generalizations about postmodern positions lack textual detail. Similarly, Peters finds Woodford's notion of abstract reason confusing. He suggests that a better approach would be to problematize Dewey's political and democratic theory in relation to contemporary problems in postindustrial societies. Peters also argues that a more robust theory of music education and democracy must include a more carefully constructed consideration of political expression in music as a necessary part of music education.

Woodford's response to the contributions and discussion initiated by his book brings this issue to a close. Woodford's book, his reply, and the essays in this special issue raise important concerns for the field of music education—concerns that will remain critically relevant to many music teachers as they grapple with the musical, educational, and political consequences of their work. It is hoped that the threads of music education theory and practice presented here will stimulate further democratic discussions in music education, including contributions from the many other voices that can and should be heard.

Bloomington: Indiana University Press.

David Lines (PhD) serves as Associate Head of Music (Research) at the School of Music, University of Auckland, New Zealand. His research engages with critical perspectives on music education, music in mass media, community music, instrumental pedagogy, and challenges in music teacher development. Dr. Lines oversees the book review issues for ACT.