| Volume 24 Number 17 | October 12, 2023 |
Music of the World’s Cultures and Feelings of Connectedness: Interpersonal and Social Aspects of Elementary School Children’s Participation in a Culturally Diverse Music Program
Panagiota Papageorgiou
National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Greece
Citation: Papageorgiou, P. (2023). Music of the world’s cultures and feelings of connectedness: Interpersonal and social aspects of elementary school children’s participation in a culturally diverse music program. International Journal of Education & the Arts, 24(17). http://doi.org/10.26209/ijea24n17
Abstract
This ethnographic study explores how elementary school children’s participation in a culturally diverse music program, which featured their active engagement in group music-making and their acquaintance with the cultural-historical context of the music, affected them on interpersonal, collective, and social levels. The study focuses on the feelings of connectedness that the children experienced with their classmates, with the teacher-researcher, and with the people whose musical cultures they studied. The research involved fifth- and sixth-graders from two Greek elementary schools. The data are derived from participant observation, interviews with the children, and the children’s written reflections. The analysis brings to view the many different nuances of the above feelings, the avenues through which they emerged, and the value they had for the children. The study shows that a meaningful engagement with the world’s diverse musical cultures has the power to positively transform relationships inside schools and the children’s feelings toward the cultural Other.
