In the current world of education, politics and public opinion, musical experience is increasingly threatened. It is designated ever more as an expendable luxury. This kind of general trend has hardly left the thinking in the field of music and music education untouched. Inspiration comes from the technical rationality of our time. This…

In this article I will discuss the originally German term and concept of Bildung. The reason why I, as a Scandinavian, find such a discussion both interesting and important is that the trend of instrumentalism in modern educational politics and pedagogical thinking (at least in Scandinavian countries) is problematic; that is, looking on knowledge…

Oivind Varkoy discusses instrumentalism as a trend in educational politics and pedagogical thinking. Instrumentalism implies looking upon both school subjects and humans as instruments, as tools or means for reaching another goal or end. The discussion is related to philosophy of music education by focusing on aspects of philosophies of humankind,…