Social and Cultural Contexts of Music Teaching and Learning: An Introduction

Abstract

Abstract Consideration of social and cultural influences has always been important to understanding the music teaching and learning process. During the first half of the 20th century, education scholars John Dewey and Lev Vygotsky and music educators James Mursell, Paul Farnsworth, and Charles Seeger brought distinctive social and cultural perspectives to bear on this complex phenomenon. Paradigm shifts in the mid- and late-20th century have further expanded awareness of the interdependence of social, cultural, and cognitive factors in human development and, thus, in music teaching and learning. This broadening of horizons is now beginning to penetrate the philosophies and theories that underlie practices of music education, and it is quite evident in the diversity of topics included in this part of the Handbook. A complex array of factors has historically diminished the importance of sociology as a conceptual lens for understanding music education, giving it less prominence than philosophy, history, and psychology. Thus, a research tradition with a clearly delineated sociological focus is underdeveloped in the profession, although studies investigating the role of motivation in music learning and the development of musical preferences stand as notable exceptions. Certain developments in the last 10 to 15 years, however, have nurtured and facilitated the completion and dissemination of research focused on music education as a social and cultural phenomenon. First and foremost has been the move toward a more democratic curriculum and pedagogy that embodies the diversity of students’ social, cultural, and musical values. Second, music education philosophers are increasingly coming to view music as social action and to consider music teaching and learning as a process that is embedded in social and cultural values and meanings. Third, theoretical perspectives originating in social constructivism, social transmission and transformation theories, critical theory, and situated cognition, among others, are providing new lenses to investigate life in classrooms and other music education settings.