Kari Holdhus, Senior Researcher, Western Norway University of Applied Sciences
keywords: local sustainability, relational music education, SDG 10, outsiderness
This presentation addresses social inclusion/exclusion - specifically, the kind of exclusion we describe as outsiderness – in relation to sustainable development and music education. In 2023, Torill Vist and myself published the article “We cannot afford outsiderness:’ Inclusion, sustainable development and arts education” (Vist & Holdhus, 2023). My presentation is grounded in this article, as I will discuss music education’s connection to the social part of the sustainability goals. Taking sustainability goal no. 10 as my point of department, I discuss how music education can be one (out of many) vehicles towards trans/inclusion as necessary democratic means. Inspired by “The Ethical Turn of Aesthetics and Politics” (Rancière, 2010), I argue for the necessity of counter-voices and diversity when researching social sustainability. Rancière criticizes consensus as the reduction of various ‘peoples’ into one single ‘people:’ “The political community thus tends to be transformed into an ethical community, into a community that gathers together a single people in which everyone is supposed to be counted (2010, p. 189). Biesta’s (2013) view of plurality as a prerequisite for a functioning democracy is another source I reflect with. Music education can contribute to plurality and be one (out of many) vehicles to prevent inequality in a society. That is if music education manages to develop and maintain itself towards striving for health, care, trust and diversity. This calls for a relational, dialogical and decolonizing approach to music teaching.
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Kari Holdhus, PhD, is professor of music education at Western Norway University of Applied Sciences. Research interests: Relational pedagogy, creative teaching and learning, and performative research approaches in music education. As a researcher, Holdhus recently has been engaged in the projects Improvisation in teacher education (IMTE), School and concert – from transmission to dialogue and Music teacher education for the Future (FUTURED). She chaired the Nordic Network for Music Education Research (NNRME) 2019-2023 and co-hosted the conference Narrative Inquiry in Music Education in Bergen, 2022. Kari’s teaches history of science for art pedagogy master students and supervises master and PhD theses.