Polanyi and Instructional Method in Music

Abstract

Michael Polanyi drew much of the impetus for the formulation of his epistemology from an unpropitious state of affairs with which art educators are intimately familiar: a nagging suspicion (or, even more disturbing, an outright conviction) that facets of experience which defy logical articulation are less real or less important than the objective remainder. A corollary of reverence for things scientifically, explicitly, and systematically established is a pervasive skepticism regarding the validity or reliability of meanings which, for whatever reason, evade attempts to capture them propositionally, logically. Our world is thus radically dichotomized: on one side we encounter facts-indisputable knowledge generated by unwavering adherence to the scientific method; and on the other lie such ambiguous, evanescent, subjective meanings as those commonly attributed to aesthetic experiences-pleasant perhaps, interesting certainly, but hardly as significant as the meticulously scrutinized body of knowledge we hold to be objectively true. Educators in the arts know better than all this, of course. Or do we? We are quick to assert that the arts are basic to our students' development but often seem at a loss as to what form their contribution actually takes. Uneasy, we attempt to substantiate our endeavors by rendering them and the learnings they are to enhance more explicit: we defer to behavioral accounts of learning and instruction, compiling endless lists of competencies whose concreteness presumably testifies to their authenticity. This same reverence for the concrete and explicit disposes us to assign increasingly higher priority to specific technique rather than to abstract (and therefore more flexible) principle and to cram instructional time with a maximum of information-with facts-to the detriment of such indeterminate states as fascination or wonder or awe, which are so