One-to-one teaching as cultural practice: two case studies from an academy of music

Abstract

This paper explores one-to-one teaching in an academy of music as culturally constituted. Taking Foucault's concept of discursive practice as a point of departure, the practice of two instrumental teachers is analysed and compared with regards to how the teachers adopt professional discourses to construct their teaching in quite distinct ways, and how the enacted discourses provide the students with different opportunities for learning. The data utilized derive from a multiple case study carried out at a Nordic Academy of Music. The study showed that strategies of teaching emerge from a complex network of discourses that form a certain logic through which the modes of thinking, learning and doing music are regulated. These mechanisms are, however, often taken for granted by the participants. Thus, the provision of various case studies of teaching may open reflexive thinking in a way that is significant for the professionalisation of music education.