A cosmopolitan culture-bearer as activist: Striving for gender inclusion in Nepali music education

Abstract

Although music education scholars have increasingly advised teachers to take heed of values, principles, and strategies of musical practices outside of school, very little has been written in music education regarding the ideological underpinnings of musical practices in these contexts. This article argues that musical practices outside of school do not necessarily provide ideal models to be directly applied in the music classroom, but need to be critically examined and transformed to better align with global imperatives such as inclusiveness. In addressing the imbalance between "inauthentic" learning in school and "authentic" learning outside of school, this article shows how working toward the global ideal of gender inclusion may require radical activism and a cosmopolitan approach countering the right of an ethnic group to practice and preserve their own distinctive culture. The life story of a Newar musician from the Kathmandu Valley is used to illustrate this argument by demonstrating what it takes for a "culture-bearer" to initiate radical processes of social change and transformation. In this qualitative narrative case study, we asked what kind of context-specific, socio-cultural negotiation was required to overcome the challenges the musician faced in including girls and women in musical learning in a Newar community.

Visions for intercultural music teacher education in complex societies

“…(Figure 6). Such enhanced reflexivity was also witnessed in an activist culture-bearer's work in Nepal for enhancing girls' participation in music education (Westerlund & Partti, 2018) and in an all-female Ultra-Orthodox Jewish music teacher education programs in Israel . The reflexive work in these studies does not fall into the category of content knowledge, but is more related to devising sustainable and ethical strategies in changing community attitudes as well as navigating through and against established exclusive traditions.…”

Expanding Professionalism in Music and Higher Music Education

“…The theoretical background for this study is found in new opera studies (see Johnson, 2007;Levin, 2007;Till, 2012;Novak, 2015), which underlines theoretical and methodological interdisciplinarity, and follows Till's perspective (2012, p. 2): "To study opera we have to study more than opera". Having interdisciplinarity as my Leitmotiv, I will utilise three theoretical approaches: narrative research (Atkinson, 1998;Leavy, 2011;Westerlund & Partti, 2018), professionalism studies , and sociology of music (DeNora, 2002(DeNora, , 2011.…”

“Because I’m a girl”: Troubling shared visions for music education

“…Henderson, 2003; Moisala, 1999; Stirr, 2010, 2018; Tingey, 1992, 1993; Widdess, Wegner, Tingey, & Moisala, 2001), while studies of music education in Nepal have highlighted activist practices aimed at increasing female access and participation (e.g. Shah, 2018; Tuladhar, 2018; Westerlund & Partti, 2018). During my first visits to the Kathmandu Valley in 2014, the school administrators, teachers and musician-teachers I encountered were almost exclusively male.…”