Musicking a different possible future: the role of music in imagination

ABSTRACT

Across the globe, many countries are at a nexus of multiple crises. The COVID-19 pandemic, structural racism, the climate crisis, and a severe economic downturn have all converged. These crises have wreaked havoc on minoritized communities in particular. This moment requires imagination to write a different future – to not return to the status quo. Imagination becomes crucial for fathoming a different world. Musicking – the different ways of making music that include listening, performing, creating, and beyond – may allow us to engage in such imagining. Musicking offers a vehicle for dreaming and provides a vision for the future. In this paper, I explore movements in education that inform this political moment including critical reconstructionism, abolitionism, and critical pedagogy from the perspectives of people who theorise these movements. Subsequently I consider the role the arts might play in imagining. I engage in particular the work of Bettina Love and Maxine Greene. Ultimately, I examine potential ways that different facets of musicking, including listening, performing, and creating may enable children and youth to engage in what I call the dual roles of imagination.

KEYWORDS:

• Music education
• imagination
• COVID-19
• racial injustice
• musicking

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 I use “we” deliberately in this article to invoke the collective, as I believe the current nexus of crises can only be addressed collectively. I mean this word inclusively and refer not only to music educators, but to all who inhabit this world, particularly those who carry significant privilege across multiple identities who have a greater responsibility.

2 I use first person in this article to consider my White body in relation to the material discussed. Consistent with critical race scholarship, my body, and the nature of it, matters to this content.

3 I use the word “minoritised” to point to the oppression that shaped the experiences of groups outside the dominant group. In this context, “multiply minoritised” refers to groups or individuals subject to oppression across multiple sites of identity—the Black, queer community, for example.

4 A Google search of “anti-Black racism” produces 279,000,000 results. The discourse is also evident when observing the number of organisations who released statements affirming that Black Lives Matter after George Floyd’s murder in late May, 2020. The statement from the National Association of Music Education is here: https://nafme.org/what-we-believe-black-lives-matter/?fbclid=IwAR1afXU_YoE_bKlJa-i1QkaW7mLN13Mbgv2UPL7mUdH9rezEmt9gQ4ZAAso.

5 The Biden administration has just announced that standardised tests will not be cancelled in 2021 (Smith 2021).

6 I propose that imagination is one way to engage the current crises. Significantly, imagining from within the neoliberal consensus may only lead to different versions of the same consensus. Imagining beyond that consensus will require 'inhabiting' alternative ideals, as well as imagining them.

7 The Abolitionist Teaching Network website is here: https://abolitionistteachingnetwork.org.

8 Love (2019) uses “folx” in her writing. Folx is a gender neutral term that deliberately includes the LGBTQ population and people who do not identify with the gender binary. See https://forfolxsake.com/what-does-the-term-folx-mean/?fbclid=IwAR3ZvagTX4yiGJuBpLOLyIGEXwQ9RMJjqPwYDgW9wpxzwtwLy85OG6ojSew.

9 BIPOC stands for Black, Indigenous, and People of Color.

10 Music, however, could also allow people to envision ways of strengthening established ideologies which privilege an elite and perpetuate inequality.

11 Considering three facets of musicking—listening, performing, and creating—overlaps with the National Arts Standards in the U.S. (responding, performing, and creating). (See https://www.nationalartsstandards.org.) These alignments with national arts requirements likely occur across multiple contexts.

12 The next section addresses original work.

13 See Bradley (2003) for the dangers of not contextualising. See Abril (2006) for positive outcomes of contextualising. See Hess (2014) for an argument for contextualising.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Juliet Hess

Juliet Hess is an assistant professor of music education at Michigan State University, having previously taught elementary and middle school music in Toronto. Her book, Music Education for Social Change: Constructing an Activist Music Education, explores the intersection of activism, critical pedagogy, and music education. Juliet received her Ph. D. in Sociology of Education from the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education at the University of Toronto. Her research interests include anti-oppression education, activism in music and music education, music education for social justice, and the question of ethics in world music study.