Good Vibrations is a charity that runs gamelan projects with offenders in prison and on probation. A recent Birmingham City University study investigating the short-, medium-and long-term impact of the project found that participation in a Good Vibrations project acted as a catalyst for positive change. The research found that not only did participants feel more able to communicate with other offenders within the project, they found confidence in their own voice so as to continue to develop their communication and coping skills within prison and as ex-offenders in the community. Furthermore, the project contributed to the development of anger management skills and provided an outlet for selfexpression leading to a feeling of 'being normal'. This article presents the findings of the study, and considers why Good Vibrations inspires positive change. Using a three-dimensional model of Activity Theory, the concept of learning through social music-making is explored in terms of how the individual interacts with the social environment in order to develop skills and how participation in a musical learning activity can lead to a positive change of identity.
This paper discusses new empirical evidence for a positive relationship between musical learning and desistance from crime. On investigating the learning processes occurring within a Javanese gamelan project in a young offender's institution, parallels between musical learning processes and the development of certain attributes linked to desistance from crime emerged. The desistance paradigm centres on changing a criminal identity through the development of social and personal attributes, which resonate with recent research on the transformative effects of music and how musical identity can be changed positively through active and successful music-making. The research was carried out in a UK Young Offender's Institution involving 19 young people between the ages of 18 and 24 over a period of eight weeks. Participant observation was used as the main research tool. This paper presents two participant stories to illustrate the personal development and the social development that can be gained as a result of the project. These are discussed in the context of successful musical learning and the suggestion is made that musical learning and developing the attributes essential for inspiring desistance from crime arise from shared learning processes. The Good Vibrations Javanese gamelan projectGood Vibrations is a charity that works with prisons, young offenders' institutions, secure hospitals and ex-offenders in the community to develop life and work skills (www.goodvibrations.org.uk). A Good Vibrations project typically lasts for one week, offering an intensive musical experience for between 15 and 20 people. During the project, participants engage in creative activities, through improvisation and composition, as well as performance activities related to learning traditional Javanese gamelan pieces and exploring dance, puppetry and wider Javanese culture. The Good Vibrations curriculum is carefully designed so that participants gradually build their music-making skills through the week, whilst fostering social development through team-building and group-work activities. A typical Good Vibrations module plan is shown in Appendix 1. As the week progresses, the module plan becomes more flexible to allow for choice as to what the participants work on and participants are fully involved in the decisions made during the week as to the content of the sessions. *
The relationship between music and mathematics has often been the subject of discussion, both inside and outside the field of education. As part of an exciting project on a European scale, the paper explores the changing contexts in Catalonia (Spain) and England (UK) in relation to the integrated approach to the teaching of music and mathematics. We analyse three areas: academic literature, the curriculum frameworks, and publications and resources prepared by and for teachers. Our findings suggest that due to the more favourable attitude towards cross-curricular approaches in education, more progress has been made in England, in terms of developing resources to support an integrated approach to the teaching of music and mathematics, than in Catalonia. Nonetheless, teachers in both locations are very interested in developing these approaches. Although there is a need for further teacher training and support, there is evidence of progress already being made in schools.
This paper draws on three different research projects to demonstrate the use of an expanded model of Cultural Historical Activity Theory (CHAT), developed as part of a doctoral research study. The first project is an evaluation of the impacts of a Music Partnership Project within Primary and Secondary schools. The second project is an evaluation of the Good Vibrations Javanese Gamelan project in male and female prisons. The third project is an exploration of the learning processes within a Good Vibrations Javanese Gamelan Project in a young offenders' institution. CHAT provides a lens for analysing activity, placing the interactions between the individual, individual cognition and the socio-cultural environment at the heart of the analytical framework. Although a useful way of looking at activity in order to understand the individual and social processes occurring in a learning activity, criticisms of CHAT include the rigidity of the unit of analysis, its inability to view progression and transformation and the focus on one individual without taking into account the labour power that a group offers.
Using theoretical concepts taken from the field of human geography to analyse the conflictual elements within music programmes, this paper presents new empirical research that unpacks the complex pedagogy employed by community musicians with the aim of beginning to address two recent criticisms of community music scholarship: a) community musicians only report positive outcomes and b) community musicians are not interested in scholarly analyses of their work.We begin with a review of literature presenting positive findings and discuss the methodological challenges of community music research. We introduce the key geographical concepts used to analyse the empirical data. After a presentation and discussion of facilitation pedagogy, we finish by suggesting that understanding the work of the community musician through geographical concepts provides a new way to analyse and theorize how a community music facilitator works, thus acknowledging the conflictual element of such work that is often tacit in research.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.
hi@scite.ai
10624 S. Eastern Ave., Ste. A-614
Henderson, NV 89052, USA
Copyright © 2024 scite LLC. All rights reserved.
Made with 💙 for researchers
Part of the Research Solutions Family.