Sustainable futures for music practices: Opportunities for music education (original) (raw)

2024, Finnish Journal of Music Education

About fifty years ago, American folklorist and ethnographer Alan Lomax published an impassioned “appeal for cultural equity” (1972), prompted by the rapid and widespread extinction of musical and other cultural expressions. Cultural homogenisation, endangerment, and loss were not only leaving the world culturally and intellectually impoverished, Lomax argued, but also diminishing people’s capacity to enjoy rich and fulfilling cultural and social lives. Three decades later, UNESCO’s 2003 Convention for the Urgent Safeguarding of Intangible Cultural Heritage urged educators, researchers, governments, policymakers, and cultural organisations anew to urgently implement measures supporting the sustainable futures of musical and other cultural practices. Another twenty years on, music sustainability concerns remain largely peripheral to policies and practices in music education, although various tools now exist to help music teachers and their institutions make informed decisions and act in support of music sustainability. In this presentation, I present one such tool—the twelve-factor Music Endangerment and Vitality Framework (Grant 2014), based on a UNESCO model—and illustrate how it has been (and could be) employed by music education institutions to better support “small”, local music practices, especially those of minority and Indigenous peoples. I suggest that music education institutions more actively engage with music sustainability endeavours, for two main reasons: first, the moral imperative to support the continued rich diversity of musical expressions around the world, for the sake of cultural equity and cultural sustainability; and second, the considerable educational, cultural, and social benefits that may thereby accrue.