From Nowhere to Somewhere

Creating to Join Conversations on Music, Inclusion, and "Jargonalisationism"

Authors

  • Heather Strohschein Bowling Green State University, USA
  • Margaret Smith Good Vibrations, UK
  • Linda Yates Good Vibrations, UK

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.15845/voices.v22i3.3394

Keywords:

accessibility, inclusion, gamelan, music, academic language

Abstract

In August 2020, two colleagues and I began an ongoing conversation on music, consent, power, language/jargon, accessibility, and inclusivity. We are not music therapists, but each of us, from our own professional and personal perspectives, is interested in the therapeutic nature of music. One colleague is a community musician in Glasgow, Scotland. She works for Good Vibrations and the Resonate Project which facilitate inclusive musical workshops and experiences. The other colleague is an amateur musician, participant advisor for one of her music groups, and a representative of people with additional support needs. I am an ethnomusicologist who specializes in Javanese and Balinese gamelan outside of Indonesia particularly as they pertain to community music making. We met through playing gamelan and through the Resonate workshops. Our conversations were a doorway for each of us into community music, musical academia, and the musical life of a woman with special needs. In our conversations, the question of accessibility as it is tied to language and power arose several times. In April 2021, we offered an edited video presentation of our conversations at the 2021 Mid- Atlantic Chapter of the Society of Ethnomusicology (MACSEM) virtual conference. In fall 2021, we hosted an event in collaboration with Good Vibrations at which we used our MACSEM video to facilitate an open conversation among academics, community musicians, music therapists, people with additional support needs, and members of the general public. One goal of this work is to provide unheard voices a place to speak. Our submission to Voices is a video reflection on our experiences beginning with our three-person, off-the-cuff conversations that originated over a year ago. Through this video, we will (literally) share our voices with your readership as we discuss our experiences of language, power, and whose voices are heard. We also reflect back on previous conversations by including our collaborative editing of the video itself. During our overall discussions, we came up with the title, “From nowhere to somewhere: Creating to Join a conversation.” This really helped focus our shared idea of what this is all about: three people from different life experiences and opportunities finding ways of speaking together and creating a format to have a voice in this arena. 

Author Biographies

Heather Strohschein, Bowling Green State University, USA

Dr. Heather Strohschein is an ethnomusicologist currently working at Bowling Green State University and Owens Community College in Ohio, USA. Her work centers on Javanese and Balinese gamelan outside of Indonesia and community music making.

Margaret Smith, Good Vibrations, UK

Margaret Smith is a community musician in Glasgow, Scotland who works for Good Vibrations and the Resonate project which facilitate inclusive musical workshops and experiences.

Linda Yates, Good Vibrations, UK

Linda Yates is an amateur musician, also from Glasgow. She is a participant-advisor for Good Vibrations, and representative of people with additional support needs.

Photo of authors Heather Strohschein, Margaret Smith, and Linda Yates

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Published

2022-11-01

How to Cite

Strohschein, H., Smith, M., & Yates, L. (2022). From Nowhere to Somewhere: Creating to Join Conversations on Music, Inclusion, and "Jargonalisationism". Voices: A World Forum for Music Therapy, 22(3). https://doi.org/10.15845/voices.v22i3.3394