The quest for authenticity in the music classroom. Sinking or swimming?

Abstract

ABSTRACT In an increasingly globalized world, characterized by diversity and change, the relevance of authenticity in classroom contexts has been questioned in recent multicultural music education scholarship. This article examines the academic discourses of authenticity in music education, and explores the epistemic issues and knowledge-related discourses of the authenticity movement that have perhaps been sidelined due to ethical demands of attending to the Other in the music classroom. Inspired by the writings of Christopher Small, and against the contextual backdrop of liquid modernity as described by Zygmunt Bauman, we here offer an alternative to the established approaches of ‘school music’ and ‘music in schools’. We suggest that rather than viewing authenticity as a fixed ideal that follows principles imported from outside of schools, it may be found in educational and social processes within the school, that is, in Small’s notion of musicking. Considerations of authenticity are thus refocused from the distant Other to the question of how to make music education practices and knowledge meaningful for students in situ. Keywords: authenticity, music education, liquid modernity, musical knowledge, musicking, school music