This article traces the formation of community music through professional and scholarly articles over the last century in North America, and argues that community music has been discursively formed through social rationales, although the specific rationales have shifted. The author employs an archaeological framework inspired by Michel Foucault to…

In this essay, the author commends Paul Woodford for bringing music education into the political area and sees his contribution as important for the field's maturity and ongoing health. This essay seeks to expand Woodford's notion of democracy beyond the ideals of public intelligence or abstract reason so as to to highlight and engage with…

In this essay, the author builds on Val Plumwood's (1993, p. 192) notion of "devouring the other" to address fundamental problems of social justice and difference in liberal democracies and music education. The problem with liberal democracies is that they assimilate (devour) difference; consensual treatment of its citizens is predicated on the…

In this article, the author engages in a lively interactive discussion with Paul Woodford's text, "Democracy and Music Education." He questions Woodford's criticism of Praxial Music Education (PME)--particularly his dismissal of PME as a "performance alone" notion. PME, this author asserts, is fundamentally multidimensional, contextually reflexive…

In his book "Democracy and Music Education: Liberalism, Ethics, and the Politics of Practice," Paul Woodford issues an invitation for shared dialogue and debate regarding the state of music education in developed countries. Through an appropriation of John Dewey's thoughts regarding a democratic society, Woodford sees great hope for the position…

This article presents the author's critique on Paul G. Woodford's positions with regard to music education and the notion of liberal democracy. The author seeks to broaden the contextual/historical scholarship around John Dewey and makes it clear that liberalism is a contested concept, as is democracy. He calls for contemporary responses to…

This article presents the author's response to the contributions and discussion initiated by his book "Democracy and Music Education" (2005). The book raises a number of important concerns pertaining to the field of music education, concerns that will continue to be critically important to many music teachers as they grapple with the musical,…

In this paper, the authors discuss the influence of democracy and law on music education in Sweden and Finland, and the potential for music education as training in democracy. The latter consideration can be instructive regardless of the nation, or its laws and paradigms of music education. The theoretical background is based on Jurgen Habermas'…

A basic premise of this essay is that music education practice is a form of--a broadly conceived notion of--political practice insofar as it creates situations where specific meanings are produced, attitudes built, identities shaped, and hierarchies of musical and social values constructed. Every music education practice expresses, and at the same…

The winning of an artist representing the lowest level of Finnish musical taste during the 2006 Eurovision song contest marks not only the rebellious attitude towards the over-sanitized contest, but it was the result of a new practice--voting by text message. Recently, music-biased schools that were once selective of the music they teach are now…