Towards a justification for a philosophy of music education: a quodlibet for South Africa

[摘要] ABSTRACTWith the change of regime in 1994, South African education policies for thearts have been created without a conceptual base. Music is on the outskirtsof the present educational master plan that favours mathematics, scienceand literacy. The current situation of teacher shortages and emphasis on'basic’ subjects does not make posts possible for specialist music teachers inprimary schools. The generalist trained Arts and Culture teacher is tasked toteach drama, music, and the visual arts. The attempt by policy makers to blurthe outlines of individual art forms has created the generic Arts and Cultureteacher who is unsure of the art forms in which he/she has little or notraining. This lack is exposed and justification for the necessity of aphilosophy of music education for South Africa will be proposed.A philosophy of music education refers to a system of basic beliefs, whichunderlie the operation of musical enterprise in an educational setting,whether school, community centre, or tertiary institution. A philosophy ofmusic education would investigate and create an understanding of theunderlying assumptions and principles governing the teaching and learning ofmusic.Music is a modelling system for human thought and is a cognitive activity withforms of knowledge as important as any school subject. The 'out of school’influences of music are all-encompassing and ubiquitous to interculturalcommunication between peoples. Evidence is overwhelming that the politicalhistory in South Africa has interfered with and disrupted an enculturation of amusical life for children.The literature research shows that music education in South Africa was usedas a political tool to support apartheid doctrines and processes. Therestoration of a culture of co-operative musicing would help music teachers.Their active agency would positively affect policy in the arts. Furthermoremaking music or 'musicing’ in a collaborative manner would break downbarriers because musicing encourages inter-racial rapprochement in asociety where racial barriers are no longer dominant. Such harmoniouscommunicating will help to create a new and idiomatic South African musicculture.For this purpose I have proposed the adoption of the musical genre calledquodlibet, a technique of composing music for many voices which are playedsimultaneously. This provides a platform for the collaboration of musicians,teachers, policy makers, and parents, within the wider community from whichthe pupils come to from. The quodlibet becomes a guiding principle andmetaphor for the entire study.The central focus is to articulate the need for a philosophy of music educationand to propose and defend conditions that would facilitate the growth of aconceptual centre for music education.

[发布机构] University of the Witwatersrand