Critiquing the Critical: The Casualties and Paradoxes of Critical Pedagogy in Music

Education
Author(s): Juliet Hess
Source: Philosophy of Music Education Review , Vol. 25, No. 2 (Fall 2017), pp. 171-191
Published by: Indiana University Press
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CRITIQUING THE CRITICAL
THE CASUALTIES AND PARADOXES OF CRITICAL
PEDAGOGY IN MUSIC EDUCATION
Juliet Hess
College of Music, Michigan State University
[email protected]

Abstract
In the twenty-first century, many music education scholars seek to reconceptu-
alize music education toward social justice. Critical pedagogy is at the fore-
front of this shift. However, as teachers aim toward equity through employing
critical pedagogy, some undesired effects of using this teaching approach may
arise. In this paper, I consider the problematic side of critical pedagogy and ask
two important questions: Are there any restrictions or limits placed on who can
enact critical pedagogy in music education? And are there any so-called “casu-
alties” of critical pedagogy in music education or in education more generally?
To consider these questions philosophically, I employ a critical race lens to
explore tenets of critical pedagogy and their applications to music education,
as illustrated in the ideas and practices of four elementary music teachers who
strove to challenge dominant paradigms of music education. By examining
critical pedagogy in music education with a critical lens, I seek to illuminate
the philosophical complexities and paradoxes of engaging critical pedagogy in
the classroom.

Keywords: music education, critical pedagogy, anti-racism

Philosophy of Music Education Review 25, no. 2 (Fall 2017), pp. 171–191
Copyright © 2017, The Trustees of Indiana University • doi: 10.2979/philmusieducrevi.25.2.05

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172 philosophy of music education review 25:2

Critiquing the Critical: A Reflection

A few years ago, I had the opportunity to spend significant time in the class-
rooms of four remarkable elementary music educators. I put out a call for partic-
ipants for a project entitled Radical Musicking; indeed, I sought music educators
who believed they were enacting a music education praxis that challenged dom-
inant paradigms of music education. Their programs, while diverse from each
other, had several common threads. In many ways, these individuals embod-
ied critical pedagogy that one might find in the context of music education. In
interacting with them and observing their classroom praxis, I began to wonder
about the limits of critical pedagogy—the populations not served (or perhaps,
damaged) and the potential restrictions on who might enact it. These questions
remained with me. In this paper, I explore the possible limits of critical pedagogy
for music education at a time when our discipline has taken a critical turn. I draw
on the commentary and classroom practices of these four teachers to illuminate
this critical analysis.
Moving into the twenty-first century, it seems that many music education
scholars seek to reconceptualize music education toward social justice.1 Critical
pedagogy is at the forefront of this shift. Educators strive to encourage students
to critique the world around them and work to change it. However, as teachers
aim toward equity through critical pedagogy, it becomes apparent that teachers’
positionalities overdetermine the reaction to their work from both the students
and the greater community. It also appears that, on occasion, some undesired
effects of using this teaching approach arise.
In this paper, I investigate the problematic side of critical pedagogy and ask
two important questions: Are there any restrictions or limits placed on who can
enact critical pedagogy in music education? And, are there any so-called “casual-
ties” of critical pedagogy in music education or in education more generally? In
order to consider these questions, I offer a critical race analysis of critical peda-
gogy praxes in order to point to places where this pedagogy not only enables cer-
tain bodies to implement it more readily than others, but also does not necessarily
serve students well. The ideas, philosophies, and practices of four elementary
music teachers facilitate the examination of these philosophical complexities.2
Turning a critical focus on critical pedagogy raises some interesting questions for
the profession.

Conceptualizing Critical Pedagogy: Exploring

Education and Music Education
I conceptualize critical pedagogy drawing primarily on the work of Freire,3
hooks,4 and scholars who have responded to their work within the broader

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Juliet Hess 173

discipline of education.5 It is a pedagogy that encourages students to “name their

world” and work to change it—to identify hegemonic systems around them, resist
them, and make something new.
In his revolutionary work, Freire puts forward a pedagogy for the oppressed—a
critical pedagogy that aims to facilitate social change toward liberation. He chal-
lenges the oppressed to participate in their emancipation and advocates for a
“problem-posing education”—a dialogical, critical education in which students
and teachers work collaboratively. This problem-posing critical pedagogy engages
the oppressive situation as a problem, which can then be addressed by the group
toward liberatory ends. Freire connects critical pedagogy and emancipatory edu-
cation to revolutionary action. Conscientization—or developing critical insight
into one’s social reality through reflection and action—is a key concept that
encourages youth to name the world.
Black feminist scholar bell hooks also informs the discussion of critical peda-
gogy.6 In Teaching to Transgress,7 hooks challenges teacher-student collaborators
in education to engage in transgressive resistance together in a learning environ-
ment that values all voices. hooks puts forward a holistic, critical, transformative
pedagogy in order to teach ethically in a multicultural world. She raises issues
inherent in not acknowledging intersecting oppressions within gendered oppres-
sion. Indeed, understanding different subject positions through intersectionality
is essential to the work of Sherene Razack,8 Patricia Hill Collins,9 hooks,10 and
Chandra Talpade Mohanty.11 Ultimately hooks views education as transforma-
tive—a “practice of freedom.” If, as teachers, we invoke a critical, transformative
pedagogy, we teach to transgress.
Music education also has a rich tradition of critical pedagogy and critical
theory, dating back to the early 1990s. Critical pedagogy is fundamental to coun-
tering oppression in music education. A significant body of literature in music
education in the 1990s centered on tenets of Freirian pedagogy. The analytical
turn, in many ways, was led by feminists, and joined later by the critical race
theorists in the discipline.12 A number of journals and organizations facilitated
this turn. With the first issue in 1993, The Philosophy of Music Education Review
provided an early forum for critical conversations through philosophical frame-
works. The first issues of the journal brought feminist scholarship to the forefront
of the discourse in music education,13 analytical perspectives on religion in music
education,14 and challenges to methods and standards.15 Over the years, PMER
continued to challenge perspectives that are political in nature and critique the
discipline to move it forward. Gender Research in Music Education (GRIME),16
founded in 1991, also played a key role in the critical turn in music education.
GRIME’s journal, Gender, Education, Music, Society (GEMS) focuses on issues
at the intersections of gender, education, music, and society. Founded shortly

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174 philosophy of music education review 25:2

thereafter in 1993 by Thomas Regelski and J. Terry Gates, the MayDay Group17
invited music education theorists to reexamine the field through the use of criti-
cal theory. With this focus on critique and critical theory, a number of music edu-
cators turned to tenets of critical pedagogy. Music educators thus acknowledge
students’ histories and experiences and make room in the institution for students
not only to speak, but name the world, and dissent from dominant discourse.18
Critical theory in music education now encompasses not only feminism, and
critical race and class work, but has expanded to include disability studies19 and
queer theory.20 Such music education decenters the teacher as it fosters a polyph-
ony of voices and a politically-engaged music education.
Following Razack, Mohanty, and Collins, music educators point to the
importance of identifying positionality and its intersection with curriculum and
the larger social relations of reproduction.21 Cathy Benedict and Patrick Schmidt
elaborate that recognition of positionality raises issues of complicity, arguing “the
issue, then, is not simply to challenge reproductive practices, but rather to locate
ourselves within them, and in doing so de-naturalize these practices, and our-
selves.”22 Social responsibility and complicity are crucial as we turn a critical lens
on critical pedagogy itself.

Teaching to Transgress: The Importance of

Teacher Perspectives in Theorizing Music
Education
What might it mean, following hooks, to teach to transgress in music? If,
as noted above, critical pedagogy entails naming the world, participating in a
problem-posing education, critiquing lived conditions, and conscientization or
coming to consciousness in music education, music may provide an expressive
medium for youth to speak to their realities and critique their worlds. The contex-
tual nature of all musics also provides a significant sociohistorical and sociopolit-
ical reality for students to consider in light of their own experiences.
The four teachers I spent time with all “taught to transgress” to varying extents,
powerfully using music as their medium. I introduce the teachers throughout
this article, drawing on their ideas and elements of their programs to explore
the complexities of enacting critical pedagogy in music education, including a
consideration of the vital role teachers’ perspectives and stories play in theorizing
music education. Frede Nielsen asserts the important place of practitioners in
solving problems of a practical and musical nature. Indeed, Nielsen puts forward
an integrated model of teaching and research in which participants in education
and research engage in the same social process to answer questions important to
the field.23

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Juliet Hess 175

Teachers have unique perspectives on classroom triumphs and challenges;

centering their perspectives and experiences in philosophical inquiry of practice
creates the possibility for research and practice perspectives to merge, to speak
powerfully to pedagogical issues. Margaret Barrett and Sandra Stauffer remind
us that stories are not only a means of sense-making; they are also “a means by
which we might trouble certainty, and raise questions concerning the ‘taken-
for-granted.’”24 They later assert that “[s]ome stories confirm, [while] others
challenge.”25 Stories can interrupt master narratives powerfully.26 Because of the
teachers’ use of critical pedagogy and their varied alignments with anti-racism
principles, their perspectives, practices, and lived experiences carry significance
in exploring the lived paradoxes and possible casualties of employing critical
pedagogy in the classroom. As we delve into their experiences to explore the com-
plexities of enacting critical pedagogy as white, female elementary music edu-
cators, we recognize the importance of subjective experiences in philosophical
inquiry related to identity. Alexandra Kertz-Welzel’s assertion that “the tradition
of philosophy…implies an attempt to disturb”27 is salient in exploring philosoph-
ical questions that point to specific subjectivities.
The school contexts of these music educators are also significant. In prob-
lematizing the complexities of race and white subjectivity in critical pedagogy,
one must consider not simply the perspectives of white, female music educators,
but also their school demographics. These four teachers taught in very different
school environments—particularly in terms of race and socioeconomics. The
interplay between teachers’ and students’ subjectivities plays an important role
in problematizing critical pedagogy. As I discuss various ideas and elements of
programs throughout this article, I provide contextual information of the music
programs of each teacher.

Creating Unconventional Programs

What constitutes an “unconventional” program? What might it mean, in the
context of music education, to align with elements of critical pedagogy? Critical
pedagogy has its roots in literacy education.28 Outside of literacy, critical peda-
gogy may operationalize in different ways. In considering these questions, I put
forward ways that critical pedagogy may actualize in music education. In explor-
ing such a critical pedagogical praxis, we may be able to examine the limitations
of critical pedagogy in music education. To facilitate this philosophical inquiry,
I consider two commonalities in all four programs and a specific aspect of one
teacher’s program.
Eschewing the canon. Music education often relies on the Western classi-
cal canon of works. This paradigm typically privileges Western classical music

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176 philosophy of music education review 25:2

and reading notation above genres of music and types of music that do not use
Western standard notation. This privileging is a result of a cycle of education.
Bowman asserts that as music educators, we

(1) Start with an understanding of music derived from and well-suited to

one particular mode of musical engagement and practice. (2) Craft a defini-
tion of musicianship derived from its basic tenets and demonstrable primar-
ily on instruments that have evolved in its service. (3) Privilege curricula and
pedagogies that serve to nurture that kind of musicianship.29 (4) Select stu-
dents for advanced study on the basis of criteria well-suited to these modes
of practice. (5) Hire faculty to serve the needs and interests of such students.
And (6) assess success in terms of the extent to which the norms and values
of that tradition and its conventions are preserved.30

Standards in Canadian and U.S. music education often reflect this cycle; many
of the standards require notation, and examples of musics offered typically fea-
ture one classical music example and one “Other” example.31 A music educa-
tion program aligned with critical pedagogy may unsettle the canon to provide
a broader experience. Eschewing the canon in the classroom may openly chal-
lenge the ensemble paradigm of music education pervasive in Canadian and
U.S. music instruction. Teachers may push beyond the Western ensemble par-
adigm of music education by intentionally including a broad range of musics
and ways of engaging in musicking. Unsettling the canon may also diminish the
emphasis on the study of notation.
Considering the programs implemented by the four music teachers, one of
the most pronounced differences between these programs and ensemble-based
music education in the Canadian context was the content or repertoire in these
classrooms. The four teachers (whom I will call Amanda, Anne, Sarah, and
Susan) all placed less emphasis on Western-notated repertoire in their class-
rooms. They preferred to draw on popular music and world music32 and diversi-
fied what they offered to students. They deliberately focused on a wide variety of
musics and tended to perceive notation and the canon as more of a “key to the
door”33—an introduction to concepts and repertoire that students could pursue
further if it was of interest.
The teachers did not focus on Western standard notation, an unusual tactic
given that the Ontario Arts Curriculum34 privileges Western standard notation.
Instead, these teachers emphasized oral transmission over a focus on symbols,
encouraged students to “figure [music] out” aurally, and located the music in a
broader social context. Teachers also privileged “authentic” transmission prac-
tices for musics studied.

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Juliet Hess 177

In putting aside Western standard notation and the canon, Amanda, Anne,
Sarah, and Susan favored an approach based on a broader perspective. I return
to these actions critically later in this paper. However, it is important to note at
this time the false dichotomy that this type of thinking constructs. Pitting the
Western art canon against Other music (popular music and non-Western music)
may exacerbate differences and cultural inequities already at a breaking point
in society. Instead, I draw on Randall Allsup’s reflection in his doctoral work on
students’ music listening tastes. Allsup observed that students loved a range of dis-
parate musics and that these musics could co-exist on the same plane—a “both/
and” perspective that speaks to the complexity of the times.35 More recently,
Allsup defined music teacher quality as

the ability to move skillfully and knowingly within and across traditional and
neoteric domains…This is a vision of music teacher expertise that is both
creative in character and respectful of traditional forms, a vision that can
be implemented in changing conditions, a vision with an unfinished and
on-going conception of what excellence means.36

His commitment to pairing what is traditional with what he terms “open forms”
speaks to the question of the canon. Dismissing Western classical music and
notational knowledge refuses to acknowledge their potential to reach across cul-
tures. To set up the relationship between classical music and “other” musics as
a binary limits the possibilities of all musics. Further, any collection of musics
studied includes some musics and excludes others, creating a new canon of sorts
that does not necessarily function less hegemonically than the traditional canon
when relationships between musics are left unexplored.
Accounting for positionalities. A critical approach to teaching understands
students are situated within what Collins terms a “matrix of domination.”37 The
matrix of domination considers individuals’ positionalities in relation to factors
such as race, gender, class, disability, sexual orientation, size, immigrant and ref-
ugee status, and religion and accounts for these elements in teaching. Enmeshed
in this matrix, systemic factors intermingle to influence what is sometimes under-
stood to be a student’s “merit” or “ability.” Teachers employing critical pedagogy
recognize that students have or lack privilege in relation to other students and that
recognition of the distribution of privilege is crucial to student-centered educa-
tion. They may adapt their programs or lessons to ensure that students of diverse
socioeconomic backgrounds, for example, all have access to the class material.
All four teachers centered students’ positionalities in their classrooms to push
toward a “pedagogy of social change.”38 Susan’s grade seven/eight guitar program
provides an example of this work in action.39 This program allowed students to

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178 philosophy of music education review 25:2

select one of at least two possible activities based on their level. Students could
also choose between performing their activity on guitar or on an Orff instrument.
The latter choice proved to be important, as the class disparity in the school was
extreme. The school was quite affluent and most students had many opportuni-
ties including the privilege of afterschool music lessons. A significant minority
of students, however, largely of color, lacked the socioeconomic security of their
classmates. By allowing students to choose their instrument, Susan found a way
to level an uneven playing field while accounting for the class disparity—an issue
I return to later in this paper.
Putting inequity on the table. Teachers who align with critical pedagogy also pri-
oritize the exploration of how inequitable and systemic power relations and struc-
tures came to be. In a critical music education program, questions of positionality
can comprise a significant part of the discussion. These four teachers engaged in
critical conversations with their students and interrogated the reinscription of the
status quo—particularly in terms of race, class, and gender. Amanda, for example,
taught in an affluent school with a predominantly white population. Her classes
examined Afro-Cuban music and the music of renowned salsa singer Celia Cruz.
Amanda led the following discussion with a third grade class:

Celia Cruz moved to the U.S. in the 1960s. Imagine for a second that this
was how life was. If you were a woman, you would have to stay home and
have babies and clean the house. Nobody really had a job outside of their
home. If you were black, you had to sit at the back of the bus, you had to
use a different water fountain, you couldn’t go to school with white kids. If
you were from another country, people frowned upon you for not speaking
English. Celia Cruz was black, she was a woman, and she spoke Spanish.
There were three strikes against Celia, and she still became the Queen of
Salsa.40

This classroom conversation provides a good example of a way teachers might

address equity in their teaching. Amanda used child-centered language to exam-
ine intersecting oppressions to facilitate among students, largely from privilege,
an understanding of the barriers Celia faced when she immigrated to the United
States. This type of discussion was common in her class. Music was the medium,
but the discussion was political. In Amanda’s and Susan’s predominantly white
and affluent schools, there were conversations of racism, blackface, the Civil
Rights Movement, blues artists, and discrimination against English language
learners. In these two schools, Amanda and Susan worked to make students’
privilege visible and counter it. At the opposite end of the socioeconomic spec-
trum, Sarah and Anne focused on building student confidence and opportunities
alongside critical discussions.

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Juliet Hess 179

Problematizing Critical Pedagogy:

Common Critiques
While there has been an enthusiastic if cautious response to such practices
of critical pedagogy, a number of scholars level critiques against it. Critical ped-
agogy in the tradition of Freire claims to make space for all voices in the effort
to undermine oppression.41 Naming the world is a key element of critical ped-
agogy—an activity in which marginalized individuals and groups identify the
forces that act upon them in the world and work to shift them. A number of fem-
inists and critical theorists assert, however, that this discourse actually privileges
some voices over others. Elizabeth Ellsworth, for example, found the abstract
language of critical pedagogy can mask the way these concepts reinscribe hege-
monic relations. She argues that

“empowerment,” “student voice,” “dialogue,” and even the term “critical”—

are repressive myths that perpetuate relations of domination…[W]hen par-
ticipants in our class attempted to put into practice prescriptions offered in
the literature concerning empowerment, student voice, and dialogue, we
produced results that were not only unhelpful, but actually exacerbated the
very conditions we were trying to work against, including Eurocentrism, rac-
ism, sexism, classism, and “banking education.”42

Ellsworth acknowledged the unequal power relations between students and

teacher that were further complicated by varying life experiences, positionalities,
and degrees of bias. Her critique raises the important question of whether the
concepts of critical pedagogy make room for all voices.43 Other scholars raise
similar critiques. hooks worries about the submergence of the voices of women
of color in mixed classroom spaces, pointing to the potential for the reinscription
of dominant voices.44 Razack offers a different dimension to this discussion in
her critique of Ellsworth. She worries that people of color are often asked to tell
stories for white people’s edification, which then reinscribe power dynamics. In
such cases, making room for all voices actually involves what hooks called “eat-
ing the Other.”45 Razack also argues that critical pedagogy does not necessarily
address the issue of complicity within oppression.46 It is important to consider
complicity and reinscription of dominance in examining critical pedagogy.
Further to these feminist and intersectional critiques, critical race scholar
Gloria Ladson-Billings47 and anti-racist scholars George Dei and Anita Sheth
offer critical race and anti-colonial critiques respectively to the discussion.
Ladson-Billings points to the failure of critical pedagogy to address the question
of race.48 Rather than looking to critical theory, she advocates for critical race the-
ory, putting forward a “culturally relevant pedagogy” for the classroom. Dei and

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180 philosophy of music education review 25:2

Sheth also critique the nature of the dominant voices in the discourse of critical
pedagogy—a conversation that often consists of white men speaking for Others.
Dei and Sheth wonder if critical pedagogy may actually silence marginalized
voices. It is necessary then for teachers to work against the possible privileging of
certain voices and the desire to consume the Other.49

A Paradox in Critical Pedagogy

We must consider accusations against critical pedagogy when engaging in
anti-oppressive work in education. Thinking through possibilities for a critical
music education praxis analytically reveals a profound paradox. Importantly, not
all teachers have the same freedom of movement. In the improvisatory teaching
act,50 teachers with greater privilege can pursue conversations and issues more
freely than teachers who lack privilege. As Harris argues, whiteness, for exam-
ple, is a significant form of capital.51 Unlike educators of color, white teachers
are rarely “presumed incompetent.”52 Their expertise is trusted and any discus-
sion of race and privilege is understood as disinterested; following discourses
of colorblindness, society views white teachers as neutral.53 Teachers of color,
conversely, often face resistance when centering issues of race in the classroom.
Métis scholar Emma Larocque54 contends that “when peoples around the world
speak out against racism in a manner stronger than I or other Native persons have
done, they have been accorded heroic stature; we, on the other hand, are often
maligned and censured.”55
Society routinely applauds White anti-racist allies for their efforts, and reads
them as “neutral.” When White individuals do anti-racist work and receive praise
for it while activists of color receive criticism, resistance, or even violence for sim-
ilar work, a paradox emerges. With this dynamic in mind, when teachers practice
critical pedagogy in music, it seems important to consider that the very power
relations critical pedagogues aim to disrupt are those same relations that allow
white teachers to do this work while teachers of color often face opposition. The
four white, female teachers I observed worked to dismantle structural inequity
through anti-racism. Paradoxically, however, it is their race that allows them to do
this work without facing opposition. It is, thus, a double bind. Not only do white
teachers have more freedom to engage in a radical pedagogy, but their resistance
to inequity works through their race. All four teachers questioned the limits of
their knowing, were self-reflexive, and situated themselves as learners. In consider-
ing institutional racism, however, it is important to think about who may disrupt it.
To consider the complexity of these issues, I look to Gada Mahrouse.56
Mahrouse’s doctoral work explored the actions of predominantly white activ-
ists who deployed their whiteness in accompaniment/observer/human shield
roles in organizations mainly based in the Middle East (most were in Palestine,

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Juliet Hess 181

specifically). In these precarious situations, peacekeeping organizations requested

the presence of Western (white) activists because of their whiteness. The work
the Westerners did in these areas was thus intricately tied to their race. In many
ways, their efforts to counter injustice and racism worked precisely because of
their whiteness. As such, their activism ultimately reinscribed racial hierarchies
at the moment it worked to undo them.
When white teachers do anti-racist work in schools without facing the kind of
opposition that teachers of color often face for doing the same work, whiteness is
reinscribed.57 At the beginning of her ninth chapter, Mahrouse offers the reader
an epigraph: “What difference does it make where the antirace is performed, by
whom, and in whose company?”58 She then argues “that ‘the who,’ makes anti-
racist practice possible, while paradoxically and simultaneously limiting its very
possibility.”59 As educators, it is important to understand that anti-racist work can
reinscribe racism. After questioning whether or not activists simply should not go
to areas of conflict, however, she concludes the opposite, but with a caveat. She
asks insightfully:

[W]hat might be gained if those who participate in this activism “go in” with
the clear but difficult understanding that their encounters will unequivo-
cally be over-determined by whiteness? Or, put differently, how might the
activists narrate their experiences and their self perceptions differently if
they entered into the solidarity relationship fully knowing that it is a colonial
encounter? Might an unwavering conscious grasp of our colonial histories
bring with it the possibility that the encounter will someday take a new
form?60

Mahrouse thus concludes on a hopeful note. The work that these four music
educators undertook was exemplary in its efforts to subvert inequity. Together,
they put forward a possible radical music education. Paradoxically, however,
because teachers of color often face opposition and dismissal when doing similar
work, these anti-racist efforts may reinscribe racial inequities. Currently, it seems
that white teachers have more freedom to engage in “radical pedagogy.” If, how-
ever, as Mahrouse suggests, teachers use this freedom with the explicit under-
standing that their race can overdetermine the teaching relationship (and all
relationships), then a different encounter may become possible. If white teachers
continually engage in pedagogy toward dismantling privilege, this approach may
play a role in shifting power relations.
Issues of race have become part of the discourse in music education. Deborah
Bradley61 and Juliet Hess62 both argue for the use of anti-racism as a theoretical
framework for music education. Bradley’s extensive work challenges us to break
the silence about race and music education.63 Indeed, Bradley,64 Julia Koza,65

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182 philosophy of music education review 25:2

and Hess66 all call us to unsettle whiteness as a dominant ideology at pedagogical

and institutional levels. What this critique of critical pedagogy adds to the cur-
rent discourse is the imperative to remain hyper-vigilant in efforts to engage in
anti-racist work both inside and outside of the classroom.

Casualties of Critical Pedagogy

Another question emerges in considering critiques of critical pedagogy: are
there any “casualties” of critical pedagogy? While eschewing the canon is not
necessarily intrinsic to critical pedagogy, Amanda, Anne, Sarah, and Susan all
intentionally decentered the canon in their classrooms—a point that raises com-
plex questions for music educators. There is a long tradition in music education
of reconsidering what the canon entails. Feminist efforts in the 1990s advocated
for the place of women composers among the white, male composers who tradi-
tionally dominated the canon.67 Howe’s work also advocated for the presence of
African American musical traditions in music education.68 However, the current
trend in music education to engage popular and world musics in the classroom69
may have consequences.
What is the impact on the students when the canon is dismissed? Does it limit
them later in life, perhaps even in high school, if they do not have knowledge
of the canon or specific technical knowledge? I argued earlier in this paper that
Susan’s guitar program acted as an equalizer for her student population; it can,
however, be viewed another way. There were many students in her guitar pro-
gram who did not learn guitar. Rather, they played Orff instruments. In reflecting
on this practice, I wonder if perhaps by differentiating the classroom activities
in this manner, she actually created uneven future positioning. Students who
elected to play Orff instruments would likely be streamed into beginner music
classes in high school—or would simply choose to bypass music altogether, not-
ing that this “choice” would be predetermined by their lack of knowledge. Lisa
Delpit argues that students all enter the classroom with their own cultural litera-
cies. She charges teachers with the responsibility of educating students of color,
in particular, in the cultural codes they must acquire to be successful in a world
dominated by white cultural literacies.70 In music education, notational literacy
and technical knowledge represent the currency required for further education
in music. When teachers decenter these skills and knowledge, students may not
acquire the currency they require to continue their music education.
Koza argues that institutions in higher education place value on musics from
the canon and “fund” this knowledge through admission to music education pro-
grams.71 She finds that audition committees actively listen for whiteness through
funding a specific narrow definition of Western training deemed worthy of further
study, but ultimately advocates for this listening—not to fund or validate it, but

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Juliet Hess 183

“to recognize its institutional presence, understand its technologies, and thereby
work toward defunding it.”72 She identifies that institutions value some musical
knowledges more than others. If, as music educators, we engage in critical peda-
gogy, we need to think about steps to put in place to ensure that students are not
at a disadvantage later. In a world that functions largely on cultural capital, it may
in fact be possible that choosing a diversity of musics could actually place students
of color at a disadvantage. To dismiss notation and Western classical music can
potentially close a door to higher education and a career in music.
Mahrouse’s suggestion cited previously, in conjunction with the work of Koza
and Delpit, provides a suggestion to this end as well. What happens if, as crit-
ical pedagogues, we go into the classroom and our critical work with the full
knowledge that educating critically could potentially place students of color at a
disadvantage through the negation of specific content in school music programs?
How do we educate differently? If throwing out the canon limits students, as
well as eliminating a wonderful repertoire of music from the classroom, perhaps
we need to think about different ways to engage it, drawing perhaps on Allsup’s
“both/and” approach rooted in Estelle Jorgensen’s “this with that.”73
Given these challenges, we might, as music educators, consider how to
engage the canon critically. Susan, for example, described a classroom activity
based on a Mandarin song called Mo Li Hua. It was a folk melody that Puccini
used in his opera Turandot. He harmonized the melody and the composer of
the film Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Tan Dun, utilized Puccini’s harmo-
nization for his arrangement of the song for the Beijing Olympics. Susan’s class
traced the song from East to West and back again, following the connections
and examining the changes. They explored how the same melody appeared in
different ways across different countries over time. An interesting extension might
explore the power dynamics, colonial implications, and economic impact of the
‘borrowing’ of eight Chinese melodies for use in a Western opera. This extension
provides a way to engage the canon critically.
In putting forward a contextual music education, music educators might
constantly consider ways to draw relationships between musics, whether through
examining organizing principles of the music, tracing musics through multiple
iterations, or building on contextual knowledge from past years of music class.
Moreover, in contextualizing musics in relation to other musics, we might also
examine with students the ways that certain musics are privileged and the means
through which this status was granted. Adding the economic or material ele-
ment to the consideration of different musics allows students to think about rela-
tionships between musics with an understanding of global hierarchies. Studying
music (or other subjects) in this manner can potentially open possibilities for
subversion of such hierarchies.

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184 philosophy of music education review 25:2

This manner of studying music of the canon—Puccini’s Turandot in this

case—is significantly different when students consider the power relations
involved. Most contextual engagement in Western classical music rarely extends
further than a discussion of the life of the composer and his/her74 context. It is not
usually a relational contextualization to other musics and world events. A critical
pedagogy that engages and challenges power relations does not ignore the canon,
but rather creates a possibility for a recognition of the hierarchies and structural
inequities that shape our everyday realities. Music, in this case, is a manifesta-
tion of a larger hierarchical relation. Employing critical pedagogy without mind-
fulness can produce hegemonic effects quite different from the anti-oppressive
intent. If we combine the awareness of this possibility with Koza’s suggestion of
recognizing these hierarchies in order to “defund” them, we may be able to travel
a significantly different path from the one on which we began.
This argument, however, is now reminiscent of instrumentalism. To argue
that the use of classical music is to consider structural power relations is limited.
Engaging in all musics with critical eyes is a valuable exercise. To limit any music
to what it might offer to critical thinking is to limit its inherently musical quali-
ties. To employ a both/and approach, I advocate for viewing all musics with criti-
cal eyes in addition to thoroughly exploring the musical elements of each music
studied. Music is multi-faceted and the context of music is crucial to understand-
ing the manner and motivation for its production. To dismiss the music aspect of
musicking,75 however, is to ignore the very reasons this art form is so fundamental
to the human condition.
What Now? Applying These Ideas to Education
While the discussion up until this point focused on music education,
there are broader applications. The fundamental idea is that anti-racist or
anti-oppressive work does not necessarily produce its intended effect. In this
paper, I identified two primary ways critical pedagogy can potentially fall short
and reinscribe oppression. I argued that certain bodies may enact critical ped-
agogy more easily than others and that it may, in fact, limit students’ future
possibilities by encouraging particular pedagogical decisions. It is clear that
positionality over-determines what is possible; the “who” in anti-racist work
matters greatly. These four critical pedagogues did not face opposition in their
work, despite often making race the focus of the discussion. The resistance and
dismissal teachers of color may face for doing the same or similar work points
to a major paradox in anti-racist work. The fact that there are also casualties of
critical pedagogy—ways in which students, particularly students of color, are
disadvantaged when the Western European oeuvre is cast aside—a decision
not necessarily intrinsic to critical pedagogy itself, but employed by all four

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Juliet Hess 185

teachers—is also an important lesson. Anti-oppressive work does not always do

what its proponents intend.
Entering into critical pedagogy with open eyes and the full knowledge that
it could potentially reinscribe oppression creates a necessary shift in our ped-
agogy.76 When the explicit knowledge of the power of positionality is coupled
with the knowledge that critical pedagogy can cause casualties, practitioners can
engage in anti-oppressive work with a critical eye on their every action and its
consequences, to vigilantly guard against reinscription of the very conditions we
seek to undo. As music educators, we can continually consider the role that our
positionality plays in what we are able to do in our classrooms. We can then
actively work to defund the power inherent in such positionalities77 and take
social responsibility78 for such defunding. We can also consider the consequences
of our pedagogical decisions. When we choose musics for the classroom, we
might ask whether our selected material serves all individuals in our classes.
More importantly, we might ask if our selected material and pedagogy disadvan-
tages some students. Depending on the answers to these questions, we may need
to reconsider our program content and pedagogy and, perhaps, our philosophy of
music education. Critical pedagogy, as many others argue,79 can be problematic.
In adding my voice to theirs, it is my hope that what we know as critical pedagogy
may be continually reexamined and problematized toward a truly anti-oppressive
education.

Notes
This article draws on my doctoral study to explore the paradoxes and casualties of
critical pedagogy. See Juliet Hess, “Radical Musicking: Challenging Dominant Paradigms
in Elementary Music Education,” doc. diss., Ontario Institute for Studies in Education,
University of Toronto, 2013, for a more complete description of the study.
1
Conferences such as the First International Conference on Equity and Social Justice
in Music Education at Teachers College, Columbia University in 2006, musica ficta/Lived
Realities: Engagements and Exclusions in Music, Education, and the Arts at the University of
Toronto in 2008, Race, Erasure, and Equity in Music Education Conference at the University
of Wisconsin, Madison in 2010, and the Symposia on LGBT Studies and Music Education
at the University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign bring issues of social justice and music
education to the table, as do special issues in journals such as Music Education Research,
Gender, Education, Music, Society, and Action, Theory, and Criticism for Music Education.
2
In this study, I employed a multiple case study (See Sharan B. Merriam, Qualitative
Research and Case Study Applications in Education, (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1998);
Robert K. Yin, Case Study Research: Design and Methods (4th ed., Vol 5), (Thousand
Oaks: SAGE Publications, 2009) for further detail on this methodology.) The study
examined the discourses, practices, and philosophies of these four elementary music
educators. I observed in each school two days a week over eight weeks and conducted
semi-structured interviews three times during each observation period. At each school,

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186 philosophy of music education review 25:2

I followed a detailed observation protocol and kept a journal. In this work, I mobilized a
tri-faceted lens that combined the theoretical frameworks of anti-colonialism, anti-racism,
and anti-racist feminism toward counterhegemonic goals.
3
Paulo Freire, Pedagogy of the Oppressed: 30th Anniversary Edition, trans. M. Bergman
Ramos, (New York: Continuum, [1970] 2000).
4
bell hooks, Teaching to Transgress: Education as the Practice of Freedom (New York:
Routledge, 1994).
5
See for example: George J. S. Dei and Anita Sheth. “Limiting the Academics of
Possibilities: A Self-Reflective Exercise in Freirian Politics,” In Paulo Freire, James
W. Fraser, Donaldo Macedo, Tanya McKinnon, and William T. Stokes, eds., Mentoring
the Mentor: A Critical Dialogue with Paulo Freire (New York: Peter Lang, 1997), 143–173.
See also: Elizabeth Ellsworth, “Why Doesn’t This Feel Empowering: Working through
the Repressive Myths of Critical Pedagogy,” Harvard Education Review 59, no. 3 (1989):
297–324. See also Gloria Ladson-Billings, “I Know Why this Doesn’t Feel Empowering:
A Critical Race Analysis of Critical Pedagogy,” In Paulo Freire, James W. Fraser, Donaldo
Macedo, Tanya McKinnon, and William T. Stokes, eds., Mentoring the Mentor: A Critical
Dialogue with Paulo Freire (New York: Peter Lang, 1997), 127–141.
6
Freire is a major influence on hooks’ work and on her pedagogy.
7
hooks, Teaching to Transgress.
8
Sherene Razack, Looking White People in the Eye: Gender, Race, and Culture in
Courtrooms and Classrooms (Toronto, University of Toronto Press, 1998).
9
Patricia Hill Collins, Black Feminist Thought: Knowledge, Consciousness, and the
Politics of Empowerment, 2nd ed. (New York: Routledge, 2000).
10
hooks, Teaching to Transgress.
11
Chandra Talpade Mohanty, Feminism Without Borders: Decolonizing Theory,
Practicing Solidarity (London: Duke University Press, 2003).
12
See for example: Deborah Bradley. “Education, Multiculturalism, and Anti-
Racism—Can We Talk?” Action, Criticism and Theory for Music Education 5, no. 2 (2006):
1–30; Deborah Bradley, “Oh That Magic Feeling! Multicultural Human Subjectivity,
Community, and Fascism’s Footprints,” Philosophy of Music Education Review 17, no.
1 (2007): 56–74; Elizabeth Gould, “Feminist Theory in Music Education Research:
Grrl-Illa Games as Nomadic Practice (or How Music Education Fell from Grace),”
Music Education Research 6, no. 1 (2004): 67–80; Julia Eklund Koza, “Aesthetic
Music Education Revisited: Discourses of Exclusion and Oppression,” Philosophy of
Music Education Review 2, no. 2 (1994): 75–91; Koza, “Getting a Word in Edgewise: A
Feminist Critique of Choral Methods Texts,” The Quarterly Journal of Music Teaching
and Learning V, no. 3 (1994): 68–77; Koza, “Listening for Whiteness: Hearing Racial
Politics in Undergraduate School Music,” Philosophy of Music Education Review 16, no.
2 (2008): 145–55; Roberta Lamb, “Aria Senza Accompagnamento: A Woman Behind the
Theory,” The Quarterly Journal of Music Teaching and Learning IV/V, no. 4, 1 (1994):
5–20; Lamb, “Feminism as Critique in Philosophy of Music Education,” Philosophy of
Music Education Review 2, no. 2 (Fall 1994 1994): 59–74; Lamb, Lori-Anne Dolloff,
and Sondra Wieland Howe, “Feminism, Feminist Research, and Gender Research in
Music Education,” Chap. 35, In The New Handbook of Research on Music Teaching and

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Juliet Hess 187

Learning, e Richard Colwell and C. Richardson, eds. (New York, NY: Oxford University
Press, 2002), 648–74.
13
See Philosophy of Music Education Review 2, no. 2 (Fall, 1994) for critical feminist
scholarship.
14
See Philosophy of Music Education Review 3 no. 2 (Fall, 1995) in particular for ana-
lytical perspectives on religion.
15
See Philosophy of Music Education Review 4, no 2 (Fall, 1996) for an example of
early challenges to methods and standards.
16
See http://genderresearchinmusiceducation.org for further information.
17
See http://maydaygroup.org for further information.
18
Elizabeth Gould, “Social Justice in Music Education: The Problematic of
Democracy,” Music Education Research 9, no. 2 (2007): 229–40; Patrick K. Schmidt,
“Democracy and Dissensus: Constructing Conflict in Music Education,” Action, Criticism
and Theory for Music Education 7, no. 1 (2008): 10–28.
19
See for example: Teryl L. Dobbs, “A Critical Analysis of Disabilities Discourse in the
Journal of Research in Music Education, 1990–2011,” Bulletin of the Council for Research
in Music Education 194 (2012): 7–30; Alex Lubet, “Disability, Music Education and
the Epistemology of Interdisciplinarity,” International Journal of Qualitative Studies in
Education 22, no. 1 (2009): 119–32.
20
See for example: Gould, “Companion-Able Species: A Queer Pedagogy for Music
Education,” Bulletin of the Council for Research in Music Education 197 (2013): 63–76;
Bruce Carter, “Intersectionalities: Exploring Qualitative Research, Music Education, and
Diversity,” In The Oxford Handbook of Qualitative Research in American Music Education,
Colleen M. Conway, ed. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014), 538–52.
21
See for example: Luisa Sotomayor and Isabelle Kim, “Initiating Social Change in
a Conservatory of Music: Possibilities and Limitations of Community Outreach Work,”
Chap. 15, Exploring Social Justice: How Music Education Might Matter, Gould, June
Countryman, Charlene Morton, and Leslie Stewart Rose, eds. (Toronto, ON: Canadian
Music Educators’ Association, 2009), Research to Practice, 225–39.
22
Cathy Benedict and Patrick K. Schmidt. “From Whence Justice?: Interrogating the
Improbable in Music Education.” Action, Criticism & Theory for Music Education 6, no. 4
(2007): 32.
23
Frede V. Nielsen, “What Is the Significance of Research for Music Education in
Practice? On Relations between the Practice of and the Scientific Approach to Music
Education,” Philosophy of Music Education Review 17, no. 1 (2009): 27–28.
24
Margaret S. Barrett and Sandra L. Stauffer, eds. Narrative Soundings: An Anthology
of Narrative Inquiry in Music Education (New York: Springer, 2012), 1.
25
Ibid, 97.
26
This theme is the focus of Part II of their edited collection.
27
Alexandra Kertz-Welzel, “Philosophy of Music Education and the Burnout
Syndrome: Female Viewpoints on a Male School World,” Philosophy of Music Education
Review 17, no. 2 (2009): 151.
28
Freire’s work was based in the context of literacy education.

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188 philosophy of music education review 25:2

29
Wang and Humphreys provide an interesting insight into the course content of
initial teacher education programs. In their study on a music school in the southwest-
ern United States, they found the curriculum consisted of 92.83% Western art music,
6.94% Western non-art music, 0.23% non-Western music traditions, and 0.54% popu-
lar music. Jui-Ching Wang and Jere T. Humphreys, “Multicultural and Popular Music
Content in an American Music Teacher Education Program,” International Journal of
Music Education 27, no. 1 (2009): 19–36.
30
Wayne D. Bowman, “Who is the ‘We’? Rethinking Professionalism in Music
Education,” Action, Criticism and Theory for Music Education 6, no. 4 (2007): 116.
31
See Juliet Hess, “Decolonizing Music Education: Moving Beyond Tokenism,”
International Journal of Music Education 33, no. 3 (2015): 336–47, for further discussion.
32
I note here the problematic nature of the term “world music.” World music should
encompass all musics of the world. Failing that, the word “music” should encompass
all musics of the world. However, when the words “world music” are employed, what is
usually meant is music “Other than” Western (and often Western classical) music. This
point is further complicated by the fact that when I use the term here, it is that “Other”
music to which I refer.
33
These were Susan’s words.
34
Government of Ontario, The Ontario Curriculum Grades 1–8: The Arts (Revised)
(Ontario: Ministry of Education and Training, 2009).
35
Randall E. Allsup, “Imagining possibilities in a Global World: Music, Learning and
Rapid Change,” Music Education Research 6, no. 2 (2004): 179–190.
36
Allsup, “Music Teacher Quality and the Problem of Routine Expertise,” Philosophy
of Music Education Review 23, no. 1 (2015): 6.
37
Collins, Black Feminist Thought.
38
Hess, “Radical Musicking: Challenging Dominant Paradigms in Elementary Music
Education.”
39
In Canada, students in grade seven and eight range from age twelve to fourteen.
See Hess, “Radical Musicking: Towards a Pedagogy of Social Change,” Music Education
Research 16, no. 3 (2014): 229–250 for further information about this particular class.
40
Excerpt from observations, February 2012.
41
The discourses of critical pedagogy and of critical reconstructionism share multiple
elements that include a fight against oppression, a work toward ideals, and the firm belief
in education as a tool for change. See Freire, Pedagogy of the Oppressed, Schubert,
William H. Curriculum: Perspective, Paradigm, and Possibility. (New York: Macmillan
Publishing Company, 1986), and Stanley, William B. Curriculum for Utopia: Social
Reconstructionism and Critical Pedagogy in the Postmodern Era. (New York: State
University of New York Press, 1992) for a discussion. Schubert and Stanley both connect
the discourse of social reconstructionism to critical pedagogy.
42
Ellsworth, “Why Doesn’t this Feel Empowering: Working through the Repressive
Myths of Critical Pedagogy,” 298.
43
Ibid., 314–315.
44
hooks, Teaching to Transgress: Education as the Practice of Freedom.

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Juliet Hess 189

45
hooks, Black Looks: Race and Representation (Boston: South End Press, 1992),
Chapter 2.
46
Razack, Looking White People in the Eye: Gender, Race, and Culture in Courtrooms
and Classrooms, Chapter 2.
47
Ladson-Billings, “I Know Why this Doesn’t Feel Empowering: A Critical Race
Analysis of Critical Pedagogy,” 1997.
48
Ibid, 127.
49
See hooks, Black Looks; Sara Ahmed, Strange Encounters: Embodied Others in
Post-Coloniality (New York, Routledge, 2000).
50
See Hess, “Radical Musicking: Towards a Pedagogy of Social Change,” for further
discussion of this improvisation.
51
Cheryl I. Harris, “Whiteness as Property,” In Critical Race Theory: The Key Writings
That Formed the Movement, edited by Kimberlé Crenshaw, Neil Gotanda, Gary Peller,
and Kendall Thomas (New York, NY: The New Press, 1995), 276–91.
52
Gabriella Gutiérrez y Muhs, Yolanda Flores Niemann, Carmen G. González, and
Angela P. Harris, eds., Presumed Incompetent: The Intersections of Race and Class for
Women in Academia (Boulder, Colorado: The University Press of Colorado, 2012).
53
George Dei views whiteness as intricately connected with what he terms “ethical
neutrality.” George J. Sefa Dei, “Towards an Anti-Racism Discursive Framework,” Chap.
1, In Power, Knowledge and Anti-Racism Education, George J. Sefa Dei and Agnes Calliste,
eds.(Halifax, NS: Fernwood Publishing, 2000), 28.
54
Emma Larorcque, “Racism Runs through Canadian Society,” In Ormond
K. McKague, ed. Racism in Canada (Saskatoon: Fifth House Publishers, 1991), 73–76.
55
Ibid, 75, as cited in Carol Schick and Verna St. Denis, “Troubling National
Discourses in Anti-Racist Curricular Planning,” Canadian Journal of Education 28, no. 3
(2005): 306–307.
56
Gada Mahrouse, “Deploying White/Western Privilege in Accompaniment, Observer,
and Human Shield Transnational Solidarity Activism: A Critical Race, Feminist Analysis,”
doc. diss., Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, University of Toronto, 2007. See
chapter 9 of my doctoral thesis (footnote 1) for more analysis of her work.
57
In making this argument, it is not my intent to minimize the agency of teachers of
color in any way. There is no question that teachers of color have been on the front lines
of critical pedagogy and anti-racism despite opposition they have faced for their efforts.
Ladson-Billings’ book The Dream Keepers, for example, reminds us that despite the para-
dox I identify in this section that occurs when white teachers are able to do anti-racist work
because of their skin color, that teachers of color regularly employ their agency to do this
work. The paradox lies in the lack of opposition. The four teachers in this study largely
ignored the canon without challenge. A teacher of color engaging in similar strategies is
perhaps more likely to be challenged by the community. A black, female teacher who
makes race the center of the discussion in the manner that Amanda did, for example,
could face dismissal or resistance from students or parents for simply being “angry” or
“having an agenda.” Gloria Ladson-Billings, The Dream Keepers: Successful Teachers of
African American Children (2nd ed.) (San Francisco: Joosey-Bass, 2009).

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190 philosophy of music education review 25:2

58
Vron Ware and Les Back, eds., Out of Whiteness: Color, Politics, and Culture (Chicago:
University of Chicago Press, 2002) as cited in Mahrouse, “Deploying White/Western
Privilege in Accompaniment, Observer, and Human Shield Transnational Solidarity
Activism: A Critical Race, Feminist Analysis,” 202.
59
Mahrouse, “Deploying White/Western Privilege in Accompaniment, Observer, and
Human Shield Transnational Solidarity Activism,” 225.
60
Ibid, 267–268.
61
Bradley, “Education, Multiculturalism, and Anti-Racism—Can We Talk?” Action,
Criticism and Theory for Music Education 5, no. 2 (2006): 1–30.
62
Hess, “Upping the “Anti-”: The Value of an Anti-Racist Theoretical Framework in
Music Education,” Action, Criticism and Theory for Music Education 14, no. 1 (2015):
66–92.
63
Bradley, “Education, Multiculturalism, and Anti-Racism; Bradley, “The Sounds
of Silence: Talking Race in Music Education,” Action, Criticism and Theory for Music
Education 6, no. 4 (2007): 132–62.
64
Bradley, Ronald Golner, and Sarah Hanson, “Unlearning Whiteness, Rethinking
Race Issues in Graduate Music Education,” Music Education Research 9, no. 2 (2007):
293–304.
65
Koza, “Listening for Whiteness: Hearing Racial Politics in Undergraduate School
Music,” Philosophy of Music Education Review 16, no. 2 (Fall 2008): 145–55.
66
Hess, “Troubling Whiteness: Navigating White Subjectivity in Music Education.”
International Journal of Music Education OnlineFirst (2017): 1–17.
67
Sondra Wieland Howe, “Reconstructing the History of Music Education from a
Feminist Perspective,” Philosophy of Music Education Review 6, no. 2 (1998): 96–106.
Marcia Citron, Gender and the Musical Canon (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University
Press, 1993); Lamb, “Including Women Composers in Music Curricula: Development of
Creative Strategies for the General Music Classes, Gr. 5–8,” doc. diss., Teachers’ College,
Columbia University, 1987.
68
Howe “Reconstructing the History of Music Education from a Feminist Perspective.”
69
Lucy Green, Music, Informal Learning and the School: A New Classroom Pedagogy
(London, UK: Ashgate, 2008); Patricia Shehan Campbell, John Drummond, Peter
Dunbar-Hall, Keith Howard, Huib Schippers, and Trevor Wiggins, eds., Cultural Diversity
in Music Education: Directions and Challenges for the 21st Century (Brisbane: Australian
Academic Press, 20050; Huib Schippers, Facing the Music: Shaping Music Education
from a Global Perspective (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2010).
70
Lisa Delpit, Other People’s Children: Cultural Conflict in the Classroom (New York,
NY: The New Press, 1995/2006).
71
Koza, “Listening for Whiteness: Hearing Racial Politics in Undergraduate School
Music,” Philosophy of Music Education Review 16, no. 2 (2008): 145–155. By “funding,”
she considers the cultural capital ascribed to whiteness within the audition process.
72
Ibid, 154.
73
Allsup, “Imagining possibilities in a Global World: Music, Learning and Rapid
Change”; Allsup, “Music Teacher Quality and the Problem of Routine Expertise;”

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Juliet Hess 191

Estelle Jorgensen, Transforming Music Education. (Bloomington & Indianapolis: Indiana

University Press, 2003).
74
The composers discussed in music history are generally male—an issue addressed by
multiple feminist scholars.
75
Christopher Small, Musicking: The Meanings of Performing and Listening (Hanover,
NG: Wesleyan University Press, University Press of New England, 1998).
76
Mahrouse, “Deploying White/Western Privilege in Accompaniment, Observer, and
Human Shield Transnational Solidarity Activism: A Critical Race, Feminist Analysis.”
77
Koza, “Listening for Whiteness: Hearing Racial Politics in Undergraduate School
Music.”
78
Barbara Applebaum, Being White, Being Good: White Complicity, White Moral
Responsibility, and Social Justice Pedagogy (New York: Lexington Books, 2010).
79
See Dei and Sheth, “Limiting the Academics of Possibilities”; Ellsworth, “Why
Doesn’t this Feel Empowering”; and Ladson-Billings, “I Know Why this Doesn’t Feel
Empowering.”

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