I studied the revival project that involved teaching and (re)learning of a nearly extinct music tradition of the Basoga people from Uganda, to find out what might be learnt about and from those learning processes, and insights that might be applicable in formal educational settings. The revival project activities were documented (with participants’ permission) and publicized through a large number of audio and audiovisual recordings, photographs, and reports from community and school settings. Treating this documentation as extant data, I engaged in a qualitative analysis of the social and musical interactions between and among the two surviving master musicians and the youths to understand the nature and meaning of these learning experiences. Emergent themes reflected that nurturing identity, agency, and joy-filled passion among the learners were the main contributing factors that facilitated a successful transfer of knowledge and skills from the elderly master musicians to multitudes of youths.
This autoethnographic study investigated possibility of incorporating indigenous pedagogies into Ugandan school music and, possibly, general education. School music education in Uganda currently occurs within a colonial-influenced system that does not connect with learners’ indigenous cultures. The colonial system fosters belief that “western” is modernity and “indigenous” is backwardness that should be erased. School music learning is currently experienced in a teacher-dominated, “banking” (Freire, 1970) school system that disempowers learners and produces graduates who cannot address the musical needs of their worlds. Ugandan government measures to improve music and general education have not improved the situation. Literature on the role that indigenous pedagogies could play in a contemporary music education is limited. Through this study, I sought to understand what might happen when indigenous education pedagogies are incorporated in a contemporary, formal school setting. Informed by relevant literature, I interrogated and analyzed my own learning and teaching experiences in Ugandan communities and schools and found that embedding indigenous learning and teaching processes in music classrooms fostered growth in learner leadership, ownership, agency, and identity in the context of mutually shared participatory experiences that learners found relevant and meaningful—experiences that engendered joyful, passionate, collaborative learning, and reification of reflective practice among learners.
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