Does music education have a memory problem?

Individuals with memory problems – either an overabundance of memory or a paucity of memory – have difficulty navigating daily life. This presentation asks the question whether it is possible for the idea of memory problems to offer means for interrogating music education. By traversing recent research in memory that take individual, social, and systemic perspectives, the presentation aims to sketch a complex and multifaceted perspective on the manifestations of memory within music education. First, it briefly considers the essential interplay of memory and forgetting in individuals; as a counter to the global trend of ever-increasing remembering it insists that forgetting ‘exists within remembering like yeast in dough’ (Draaisma, 2015, p. 4). Second, it traces the same interplay of memory and forgetting in social or collective memory. These counter-intuitive understandings of memory refer to the ways that, for instance, societies can be said to remember, either through the combined memories of the individuals in a society, or through artifacts, spaces, rituals, or behaviours that transcend individual memories (Olick, 1999). Finally, arguing from the premise that society consists not of people but of communication (Luhmann, 2012, 2013) the presentation considers the systemic functions of memory to explicate the painfulness of change in music education institutions. These three perspectives form the basis for interrogating whether music education can be said to have memory problems, evidenced both in an overabundance of memory regarding certain traditions and practices and a paucity of memory regarding others. The presentation argues that memory lies at the very core of who we are and want to be as a profession, that memory problems in our profession inexorably lead to existential problems, and that, therefore, interrogating memory from a range of perspectives is essential for the future existence of music education.

References:

Draaisma, D. (2015). Forgetting: Myths, perils and compensations (L. Waters, Trans.). Yale University Press.

Luhmann, N. (2012). Theory of society, Volume 1 (R. Barrett, Trans.). Stanford University Press.

Luhmann, N. (2013). Theory of society, Volume 2 (R. Barrett, Trans.). Stanford University Press.

Olick, J. K. (1999). Collective memory: The two cultures. Sociological Theory, 17(3), 333–348.