From the community development perspective of this unit, we have to think, why music in this context? How on Earth can music help? You might even find that notion inflated, since basic resources such as food, and water, and education are still critically unavailable in far too many communities on our planet. Certainly, Steven Pinker, a Canadian psychologist who famously described music as auditory cheesecake, had a fairly cynical perspective when he said, music is auditory cheesecake, an exquisite confection crafted to tickle the sensitive spots of at least six of our mental faculties. This was his blunt and provocative response to the question of why music is ubiquitous, which means that it's everywhere, present in every culture. He suggested that music serves no real function for survival. And actually, the only reason that music continues to exist in all cultures, is because it's particularly pleasant, like some kind of decadent treat that for some reason, he can't otherwise comprehend has held its place through many stages of human evolution. The experts contributing to this unit argue that enhancing connectedness is the missing evolutionary function of music to bring people together. And not just parents and babies as we discussed in unit four. And where it can be understood and seen very easily. But the function of music is that it can bring people together in a way that transcends diversity. Which means that it allows for difference and doesn't try to make everything the same. Rather it can bring people together in an organic, creative, dynamic, and cohesive whole. Ian Cross, who's a musician and an academic in England, uses the term floating intentionality to describe how, when we communicate in music, it doesn't have a specific referential meaning. In the way that language does, music can hold many meanings. And as we heard in unit three, these are often projected meanings. But regardless, music is able to hold multiple meanings at one time, and also pass through time so that people journey together in music. This is what both Andeline and her podcast and Gary in our interview described, when they talk about musicking with communities of people. It doesn't matter if we have different political views. It doesn't matter if we come from different racial backgrounds. It doesn't matter what our level of cognitive ability is. And it doesn't matter how we define our gender or sexual identity. We can music together without focusing on the structures that hold us apart in everyday life. However, as Elizabeth Scrine reminds us in her Critical Position article, which is available for you on the Voices website, we should not assume that using music frees us from being alert to the oppressive potentials of musical spaces. Whilst we can and should celebrate the ways that we can use music for transcending diversity. It remains critical to be conscious of the ways that music has also been used to maintain dominant hierarchies, particularly with relation to race and to gender. When we music together, we can recognise that it is possible to connect at a different level. Which means we can simultaneously disconnect from our strong belief that we're separate from one another. So the possibilities for peace and harmony and musicking are actually enormous, and that is why that music has such an enormous contribution to make to the achievement of equity in the world. But we shouldn't fantasise too easily about music bringing people together in love and peace. Because music has also been used throughout history to unite people in violent actions and for oppression. And you can see this is the piece that I've written with my colleague Andreas Wölfl from Germany in the Voices general website where the other pieces are also held. From this perspective, it's a choice that we can make to use music in service of harmony and to bring people together when we carefully tailor and design programs in collaboration with community members. When we are using music with communities, not in communities, what we do with music has to be decided in partnership with the people that we're working with. It's not for us to rush in and tell people how they could use music to improve, and motivate, and reflect, and foster. When we adopt this perspective, it is for us to go in and to listen in solidarity with people to how music is already being used as a resource within their lives. To understand the ways they communicate with one another and also to listen to what we can contribute through what we know as musicians and activists. Music has always fulfilled this function as we will also hear about in unit six, on music and expressing culture. What's important from this perspective is that we realise that this is not about music improving things. It's about listening, to hear how communities can use music as a resource to enhance connectedness. And to do that, they absolutely must have the power to make decisions about the ways in which they music. One Australian music therapist, Lucy Bolger, reminds us that this is not easy to do. Partly because, as Paulo Freire says, who was a great advocate for the use of the arts in addressing inequity in South America, oppression is a phenomenon that occurs through mutual acceptance between the oppressor and the oppressed. Lucy's research highlights the importance of taking time, to build relationships in a hangout period as an essential precursor on the road to real music making. This is also captured in Gary Ansdell’s video, where he talked about a community mental health facility in London where he musicked for over ten years. It might sound really obvious in some ways, but in fact, it takes enormous personal strength to wait and to listen, instead of pushing forward to the excitement of making music and to demonstrate the benefits of it. In teaching music therapy students, the development of this capacity to wait takes place over a number of years, and is one of the most challenging skills acquired during training. If you read the literature more broadly, you will see that people make commitments over a long period of time. In order to honour the fact that this is not a quick fix, that in order for communities to find their own solutions, we need to go in and offer the space and the safety for them to do that. So it cannot be rushed. It is not about efficiency. It is a commitment to peace in the world. This is illustrated throughout on-location footage for this unit, filmed in Norway. You'll see in this footage a rock band with musicians who have been playing together over many years after meeting in prison. They do so with the support of a music therapist who is now a band member, along with the other men who at that time, were imprisoned. So as you listen to all the components of this unit, I want you to listen for which theorist they reflect upon as being the most influential in how they think about the topic. And I want you to notice what they say about how they've designed programs with communities. I want you to think about the implications of adopting this approach to using music for change. And what I would really love is if you can become conscious that when we music with communities, in order to advocate for their rights to use music to flourish, it's actually very different from when we walk in to help an individual, and to fix them, as we described in units one and two. And it's very different from making beautiful relationships that lead to insight and intimacy, as we described in units three and four. It doesn't mean that we ignore those potentials, but our focus, when we are given the opportunity to work with communities, is absolutely about collaborating in partnership with people to discover from within their community how music may contribute to making the world a better place. And as Margaret Mead, the famous anthropologist reminds us, we should never doubt that a small group of people can change the world. Indeed, that is the only thing that ever has. And I would add that music is a wonderful way of taking action. [BLANK AUDIO]
