tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6269517467199769062024-03-14T11:20:00.219-07:00Craig Robertson-Music and Conflict TransformationCraig Robertson - Music and Conflict TransformationUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger54125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-626951746719976906.post-10199518102451601922019-02-08T02:58:00.000-08:002019-02-08T02:58:09.995-08:00<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Interesting article that looks at music therapy in a Palestinian refugee camp:<br />
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Hope and Recognition. A Music Project among Youth in a Palestinian Refugee Camp</h1>
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By Vegar Storsve , Inger Anne Westby, Even Ruud</div>
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<span style="font-size: 14.4px;">Storsve, V., Westbye, I. A., & Ruud, E. (2010). Hope and recognition: A Music Project among Youth in a Palestinian Refugee Camp. </span><i style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 14.4px;">Voices: A World Forum for Music Therapy</i><span style="font-size: 14.4px;">, </span><i style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 14.4px;">10</i><span style="font-size: 14.4px;">(1). <a href="https://doi.org/10.15845/voices.v10i1.158">https://doi.org/10.15845/voices.v10i1.158</a> </span></div>
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Abstract</h3>
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The questions raised in this report concern to what extent a music project can strengthen a sense of self and identity, the experience of belonging to own traditions among Palestinian youth. Further, how it is possible to organize a music project that gives possibilities for musical learning and personal growth? And how can such a project afford new role models and responsibilities that may give hope for a better future?</div>
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The strongest belief shared by all <br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />Palestinians, employed or not, young or old,<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />men or women, is the hope and insistence on<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />their right to return to their beloved homeland.<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" /><em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Nahla Ghandour</em></div>
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Introduction</h3>
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Hope and recognition are keywords that characterize the cultural and humanitarian aid The Norwegian Academy of Music together with <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">NORWAC</em><span class="notenumber" style="box-sizing: border-box;"><a href="https://www.blogger.com/null" name="1" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: inherit;"></a><a href="https://voices.no/index.php/voices/article/view/1853/1616#note1" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #0a818a; text-decoration-line: none;">[1]</a></span> and Forum for Culture and International Cooperation (<em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Forum for kultur og internasjonalt samarbeid</em><span class="notenumber" style="box-sizing: border-box;"><a href="https://www.blogger.com/null" name="2" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: inherit;"></a><a href="https://voices.no/index.php/voices/article/view/1853/1616#note2" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #0a818a; text-decoration-line: none;">[2]</a></span>) are doing in South-Lebanon. Since 2002, Norwegian music educator Vegar Storsve together with Petter Barg and Inger Anne Westby have conducted a music project in the Palestinian refugee camp Rashedie and in a Lebanese special school in the city of Tyr. They have organized a community music project for health and cultural cooperation across different religious and political groups in Lebanon. This article will describe parts of this work and discuss how such a music project may have consequences for development and health promotion among children and young people in refugee camps. The authors have their background in music education and music therapy. However, this project was conceived as a music educational project. With the growth of community music and community music therapy, we find reasons to discuss this project as a prototypical community music project. The explicit health aspect and the influence from community music therapy also opens a discussion about the borders between these areas of practice. What creates a strong link between the two approaches is the underlying theory of �community of practice�, which will be discussed below (see Wenger, 1998; Ansdell, 2010).</div>
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After the establishment of the state of Israel in 1948 a great proportion of a total of 700 000 Palestinian refugees fled to Lebanon. Ghandour (2001) writes that Lebanon today hosts 368 000 Palestinian refugees. This group constitutes 10% of the total population of Lebanon and the refugees are placed together in 12 official camps, without any rights to health care, education or possibilities for work within a whole range of professions within the Lebanese society. The support from UNRWA<span class="notenumber" style="box-sizing: border-box;"><a href="https://www.blogger.com/null" name="3" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: inherit;"></a><a href="https://voices.no/index.php/voices/article/view/1853/1616#note3" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #0a818a; text-decoration-line: none;">[3]</a></span> (United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East) secures a minimum of schooling and health services within the refugee camp. The situation for the young who grow up in the camps can be described as follows:</div>
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The Palestinian children, as a consequence of their parents� and their own adverse experiences, acquire the most negative elements of the tasks of Adult Development. First mistrust, then shame, which moves on to guilt, inferiority and identity diffusion (that is sustained separation from social, residential, economic and ideological dependency on family of origin) (Ghandour, 2001, p. 157).</blockquote>
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In other words, unemployment, social problems and mental health problems are usual. As a consequence of the negative experience that Palestinian children and their parents are exposed to, many develop a sense of mistrust, guilt, inferiority and a weakened sense of identity. Research also shows that 19.5% of Palestinian adolescents suffer from mental distress, and that 30,4 % of women in the same refugee camps reported the same (Sabatinelli, Pace-Shanklin, Riccardo & Shahin, 2009).</div>
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The young who grow up are met with great challenges in relation to hope for a better life as adult. The future is uncertain and their control of their own lives is endangered. Or, as Ghandour writes:</div>
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I believe that the two most critical aspects that affect the development of the Palestinian child in Lebanon are: the inevitable sense of a transitory and unstable life; theirs/ours is a future which is (as it has been) always unpredictable and we seem to have no control over it. The second is the impossibility for the parents to build a career or have a long-term job that minimizes their control of the future of their families, on both the economic and social fronts (Ghandour, 2001, p. 157).</blockquote>
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When health becomes the focus of humanitarian aid, cultural activities are often not discussed.<span class="notenumber" style="box-sizing: border-box;"><a href="https://www.blogger.com/null" name="4" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: inherit;"></a><a href="https://voices.no/index.php/voices/article/view/1853/1616#note4" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #0a818a; text-decoration-line: none;">[4]</a></span> We know, however, that our health is dependent upon cultural factors related to human rights issues, social status, belonging, identity, recognition and experienced dignity. Such an understanding of important health issues will allow for the use of cultural means, in this case music, to promote health. Health is thus more than physical health. The subjective factors linked to how health and quality of life are perceived play an important role in the interpretation of our health.</div>
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For the Palestinian young, their health situation will be closely related to their personal identity and feeling of continuity and belonging in relation to Palestinian history and identity. But it is a threatened identity, and Ghandour raises the following questions:</div>
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How can a Palestinian child become a Palestinian? From where can he or she acquire a strong belief in continuity? What will he or she believe in � poverty, abuse, trauma, and insecurity? Who serves as his or her role model � an unemployed father, an exhausted mother, an unjust rule, or a hostile neighbour? Barring such identification, shame and guilt seep easily into the formulation of Palestinian self-identity! (Ghandour, 2001, p. 157).</blockquote>
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The questions raised in this article concern to what extent a music project can strengthen a sense of self and identity, as well as the experience of belonging to one�s own traditions among Palestinian youth. Further, how is it possible to organize a music project that gives possibilities for musical learning and personal growth? And how can such a project afford new role models and responsibilities that may give hope for a better future?</div>
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The Music Project</h3>
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In 2002, the Norwegian health organization NORWAC arranged an exchange among youth in which a dance group from the refugee camp Rashedie made a visit to Algarheim school in Norway. NORWAC saw this meeting and especially the cultural activities as an important part in their mental health program in Lebanon (Storsve, 2008, p. 61). In 2003 NORWAC sent the Norwegian music educators Petter Barg and Vegar Storsve to Rashedie where they conducted music classes with groups of children in cooperation with local musicians and social workers.</div>
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Through these activities, the local musicians gradually became more involved in the teaching, and the social workers and leaders in the organization <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Beit Atfal Assumoud</em><span class="notenumber" style="box-sizing: border-box;"><a href="https://www.blogger.com/null" name="5" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: inherit;"></a><a href="https://voices.no/index.php/voices/article/view/1853/1616#note5" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #0a818a; text-decoration-line: none;">[5]</a></span> were inspired by these activities. The Norwegian music educators gained more experiences through repeated visits and they saw how the children became engaged, enjoyed the activities and showed a feeling of mastery through the activities (Storsve, 2008, p. 62-65). Music teaching then became a permanent activity within the centre and the local musicians adopted many of the methods that will be described further in this article. The local instructors now run these activities as a weekly activity throughout the whole year.</div>
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<img alt="Master, journeyman and apprentice" src="https://voices.no/index.php/voices/article/download/1853/1616/7701" style="border-style: none; box-sizing: border-box; vertical-align: middle;" width="500" /><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />Figure1: Master, journeyman and apprentice. Photo by Even Ruud.</div>
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From 2005 about fifty students and teachers from the Norwegian Academy of music have participated in the project. The teachers have represented different subjects and have contributed knowledge both from music education and music therapy.</div>
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Such a music educational, or rather community music project, will be met with many challenges. One has to do with how some Muslims have an ambivalent or negative attitude towards music education. In the same way as we know from some Christian traditions, Muslims may regard music as �sinful� � haram � because it takes focus away from God. Music is associated with sexuality and alcohol that fuel arguments that will keep the young away from God. �Music� then is a theme to be negotiated, not only within Islam generally, but also locally within western Diasporas traditions where Muslims live. For example, in Great Britain 1.5 million Muslim children will have to confront British music education in any state supported school (Harris, 2006). Such a perspective actualizes the experiences from this project in a debate about multi cultural music education.</div>
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When such a music project, conducted by Norwegian music educators among Palestinian Muslims in South-Lebanon becomes a reality, further complications may arise. Questions concerning goals, educational attitudes, curriculum or choice of repertoire becomes important. At the same time cultural preconditions and traditions will be challenged in relation to the local historical context, the contemporary situation and the Nordic cultural input. �Music� cannot be regarded as something independent of culture, situation and intentions and Norwegian values have to be negotiated in this new local context. There are strong restrictions concerning what girls are allowed to do and the project leader has often felt the resistance for example, when girls are invited to play electric guitar and drums. This is, however, quite popular among the young Palestinians. They have a strong relation to the rhythmic element in the music as many have been dancing debka since early childhood.</div>
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The music project seeks to reach as many children and young Palestinians as possible through common musicking, instrumental activity and dancing. Although there is no formal music teaching within the schools in the refugee camp, there are strong dance traditions in the Palestinian culture, and the dance musicians play the derbeka (drums). The oud and different flutes and violins are also present within this musical culture, and lately instruments like electric guitar and synthesizers with oriental scales have been used. Since music is so unusual both in schools for the Palestinians as well as for the Lebanese children, this project is quite unique and well appreciated by the children (and their parents) who is given the chance to participate.</div>
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As we know, general music education requires instruments, song- and music traditions, localities and continuity in teaching. How is it possible to maintain such an activity from week to week? All the support for this project is channelled through <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Beit Atfal Assumoud</em>, a religious and politically neutral organization that works among children with a difficult social situation. Throughout the years, the Norwegian participants have brought a lot of instruments from Norway. Today we find in the orchestra three synthesizers, microphones and sound systems, electric guitars, violins, guitars, saxophones, Orff-instruments, drum-sets, hand drums, accordion, melodicas. Of course, this blend of instruments creates a special challenge to any musical arrangements made for common performance.</div>
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It should also be added that since 2005, music students from the Norwegian Academy of Music are offered this project as part of the practicum, and every year a group of music students go to the refugee camp to teach the children and give concerts. Master students in music education and music therapy have also been involved to gain new experiences and to write about the project in their master thesis. The project leaders visit the camp five-six times a year to teach, organize, and give new musical inputs. In sum, the Norwegian instructors and students, together with the Palestinian children and adult instructors create a unique community of practice.</div>
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The Community of Practice � From Peripheral to Full Participation</h3>
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How is it possible to organize musical learning and instruction within such a large and heterogeneous group of children and adolescents when resources are limited? How do the children learn to play?</div>
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Continuity in instruction and learning is provided by the weekly rehearsals in the camp where the adult musical instructors are leading the group. In addition to this, since 2008 a group of assistant teachers selected among the older adolescents, those who have been with the project since it started in 2003, has been established. These young instructors have the responsibility to teach the different musical parts and instrumental skills to the younger participants.</div>
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<img alt="Girl with guitar" src="https://voices.no/index.php/voices/article/download/1853/1616/7702" style="border-style: none; box-sizing: border-box; vertical-align: middle;" width="276" /><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />Figure 2: Girl with guitar. Photo by Even Ruud.</div>
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Today, about forty children and adolescents participate in the project. Not all are strongly involved or committed to the project. Some may visit from time to time, others are permanent participants and there will always be someone quite new to the project. Of course, this situation creates a special challenge. Two of the adult local musicians have been granted functions as leaders. Especially Chadi Ibrahim on accordion keeps the rehearsals going from week to week. He knows all the participants; he has an overview of the musical material in such a way that he can organize groups and administer the older adolescents to take care of the younger. With the support from a group of 8-10 adolescents the structure of the inserted rehearsals then becomes good. When the Norwegian music educators are present, they will suggest new pieces to be performed, and new riffs and ostinatos to be learned. All the material is orally transmitted, and melodies, voices and rhythmic patters are repeated until it is mastered. The methodological principle behind the performances is developed by Storsve (1991) and conceptualized as the �multi-use arrangement�. This is an arrangement that makes use of everything from simple rhythmic figures, two-tone melodies, riffs or ostinatos with varying rhythmic complexity, as well as more challenging voices (see more below).</div>
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Throughout the years a musical community of practice has evolved and made musical learning and development possible. Etienne Wenger, who has developed theories about learning in a community of practice, relates such learning directly to the construction of identity (Wenger, 1998). The music project in the same way gives the participants possibilities to take different roles and positions within the community, to partake in a process toward increasing involvement, responsibility and possibilities to influences the interaction within the group. Wenger (ibid., p. 153-155) describes different forms of belonging through his concept of trajectories, which he divides into:</div>
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<li style="box-sizing: border-box;">Peripheral trajectories</li>
<li style="box-sizing: border-box;">Inbound trajectories</li>
<li style="box-sizing: border-box;">Insider trajectories</li>
<li style="box-sizing: border-box;">Boundary trajectories</li>
<li style="box-sizing: border-box;">Outbound trajectories</li>
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The forty children participating in the project have several possible trajectories. For instance, the <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">peripheral</em> trajectories may not lead to full participation, although it may become significant enough to influence the identity of the young. In the music project, the youngest children may exemplify this kind of participation. They do not always come every week, and the project is not dependant upon their participation. To the small children, this is an exciting activity that provides opportunities to participate from their own level of skills.</div>
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The inbound trajectories can be found in this project among those participants who are joining the community with the prospect of becoming full participants in its practice (ibid., p. 154). These children, from 8-14 years, identify with the project. They show an interest for a certain instrument or for some of the other participants. Such inbound trajectories are focussed upon their own learning and do not always involve creative input or negotiations about the common practice.</div>
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<img alt="Group work" src="https://voices.no/index.php/voices/article/download/1853/1616/7703" style="border-style: none; box-sizing: border-box; vertical-align: middle;" width="500" /><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />Figure 3: Group work. Photo by Even Ruud.</div>
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It is the insiders who bring the community of practice further. They contribute to change; they create �new events, new demands, new inventions; and new generations all create occasions for renegotiating one�s identity� (loc. cit.). In this project the adolescent group serving as assistant instructors are good examples of insiders, while the adult instructors and the Norwegian teachers and students are the main instructors and role models when it comes to responsibilities for other�s learning.</div>
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We find boundary trajectories when different communities of practice are linked and participants are sustaining identities across boundaries. The challenge here is to maintain the identity acquired in one community of practice faced with new challenges and expectations within other communities of practice. Some of the participants in this music project have met such challenges crossing boundaries between the musical community and the school, the family, the university, and other contexts.</div>
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Outbound trajectories lead out of a community and are replaced by others, as we can see when children change friends as they become involved in new interests. Some of the young participants, who have left the music project because of age, have returned to the community with new roles, for instance as social workers or activity leaders. They may serve as hosts for concerts or guides when teachers and students from Norway visit. In this way it becomes possible to perform their identity in several possible communities.</div>
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The theory about community of practice can be seen as a part of the tradition of learning through apprenticeship. According to Nielsen and Kvale (1999) we can understand this tradition both as a way to describe the institutional structures within traditional apprenticeship learning as well as a general metaphor to describe a relation where a newcomer is taught by a more experienced person (ibid., p. 20). Within the traditional apprenticeship learning, concepts such as master, journeyman and apprentice are more or less clear, to the extent that you will know which category you belong to and that you cannot yourself choose your own role. There is an asymmetric relation between the positions, and in order to move from one position to another, you are dependant upon the acceptance by the master.</div>
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There is also a split between person-centred and decentred master-apprenticeship learning. The person-centred is characterized through the master, who in practice reflects and makes the subject visible or apprehensible to the apprentice (ibid., p. 21). With the decentred approach, how the apprentice is part of a community of learning is the decisive factor for learning. Lave and Wenger (1991) describe the learning which happens through peripheral, legitimate participation in a community of practice as a major difference from the asymmetrical relation in the person-centred master-apprentice tradition. Or as Kvale and Nielsen write: �A decentred view upon the master-apprentice relation leads to an understanding of how mastery is not a quality within the master, but by the organization of the community of practice which the master takes part in� (p. 22).</div>
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The concept of �scaffolding� can be seen in relation to the person-centred master-apprenticeship tradition. This means that the master provides support in order to help the apprentice solve tasks he would not have managed on his own. And it is the master who has the ideas about what has to be provided in order for the apprentice to experience mastery and development (Nielsen & Kvale, 1999, p. 21).</div>
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So far we can see some particularities in this music project both in relation to theories concerning master learning, theories on scaffolding and the decentred community of practice. Through the use of adapted musical arrangements in the �multi-use arrangement� we demonstrate an extended use of scaffolding as witnessed in the organization of musical parts or voices, as well as in the different levels of difficulty. In this way, it is getting to know the possibilities inherent in the musical material that is decisive in the learning process, not the master alone. Both the masters and apprentices themselves can distribute these musical possibilities within the community of practice. Although there are several masters (represented by different instructors from Norway), parts of the master�s tasks are practiced in the community both by advanced apprentices or journey folk (students and local adult instructors), and those apprentices represented by the adolescents who have been given responsibilities as assistant instructors. In our opinion, to distribute learning tasks without weakening authority and responsibilities attached to different roles and position is an important quality in this project.</div>
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To Lave and Wenger (1991, p. 56) the importance of a diversified field of relations among old-timers and newcomers is underscored, as they write: �For example, in situations where learning-in-practice takes the form of apprenticeship, succeeding generations of participants give rise to what in its simplest form is a triadic set of relations: The community of practice encompasses apprentices, young masters with apprentices, and masters some of whose apprentices have themselves become masters. But there are other inflection points as well, where journey folk, not yet masters, are <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">relative</em> old-timers with respect to newcomers (p. 56-57). Lave and Wenger see the importance of this blend of roles in the circulation of knowledgeable skills and recommend against assimilating dyadic forms of conventional learning.</div>
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In this community music project, the positioning within different roles does not follow a fixed timeline, i.e. the participants do not have to have completed their apprenticeship before they can perform tasks as a journeyman. During the rehearsal day, some of the older adolescents will shift between roles from an apprentice (when they practice with a master) to a �local journeyman� (when they work together with students in groups), or to perform a �mini-master� role when they take on responsibilities to lead rehearsals with the younger children. This variation in roles creates a generous and multi-dimensional community of learning which also seems to function well in this encounter between different musical cultures, different educational traditions and between learners in different age groups and at different levels of skills.</div>
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Within all these roles and positions, the meaning of musical training is negotiated. Knowledge is possessed not only by the master and something that the others are missing. This perspective ensures that all the actions are integrated in the individual participant�s everyday, culture and understanding. It is through this connectedness that this project may offer possibilities for hope and recognition.</div>
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Learning and Identity</h3>
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Musical learning happens through the participation in a community of practice where the participants go through different trajectories of learning, from a peripheral participation to becoming an apprentice or journeyman � or full participation. In his theory, Wenger underlines how this participation leads to a process of learning where changes in identity happen simultaneously (Wenger, 1998).</div>
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<img alt="Learning from the older" src="https://voices.no/index.php/voices/article/download/1853/1616/7704" style="border-style: none; box-sizing: border-box; vertical-align: middle;" width="276" /><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />Figure 4: Learning from the older. Photo by Even Ruud.</div>
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The music project is flexibly organized and adapted to the needs of the children in such a way that activities are recognized from week to week. There are also surprises in the form of new challenges. The children are given access to a community of learning where content, ways of working and the organization are constantly negotiated and under development, and where there is room for different trajectories. This may be exactly what the Palestinian refugees are missing in other arenas or communities of practices.</div>
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At the same time, what happens in the music room at the centre is affected by a broader context. The project aims at giving possibilities for alternative ways of understanding one�s life. Or, as Wenger underscores � learning will change who we are, by changing our ways of participation, belonging and the way we negotiate meaning. It is within this perspective we may see how the music project affords a development of identity that has consequences for health.</div>
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The adult Palestinian leaders, who take responsibility for the continuity and progression in the musical work, work closely with the Norwegian instructors. In the performing community of practice, the Palestinian leaders are insiders, according to Wenger�s categories of trajectories. They deliver new ideas and musical material, ways of working and ideas for new projects. Storsve, as project leader (and master), has a unique possibility to prepare the Norwegian students, both with respect to the special competencies of these students as well as the needs of the music group in the camp. Thus, a rich performing community of practice grows out of a day of rehearsal when all the children, adolescents and instructors come together.</div>
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We could ask what this opportunity and access to such a community would mean to the young Palestinian refugees, what characterizes their common history of learning that arises from the participation in the musical community of practice? One important element is how the social context surrounding the music project is significantly different from the social contexts the participants will meet outside the project. To meet with adults who encourage mastery and not only focus on achievement, is not usual in other cultures of learning the young will meet. From early on in the UNRWA school system they will meet clearly defined goals of achievement to be fulfilled in order to proceed to the next class.</div>
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In the music project, the Palestinian youth are offered a repertoire of roles which will partly challenge the limits they usually meet and which will open new possibilities and thus a hope about how to shape their own future: Girls are allowed to play the guitar, the adults can play and fool around, laughter and fun are important ingredients in the learning process. When the Palestinian youth meet in the music group, they also experience a free time with respect to the demands and responsibilities they have to deal with in everyday life: to take care of their younger siblings, relatives with ill-health and high demands on their contribution to the family. Feedback from the leaders of the cultural centre also confirms how the young participants over time will develop competencies of leadership and sense of responsibility through their engagement in the project. This competency is brought back into the family and larger community and the young become important carriers of the philosophy of leadership offered to newcomers. To the Palestinian, who is often deprived of many possibilities to take control of the development of their own life, this experience of meaning and hope for their own life may become a crucial factor determining their health status.</div>
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We may also see how the young Palestinian may experience many types of relations within this community of practice. They will meet with the Norwegian students, who are both music teachers and musicians, and thus imagine what it is like to become a performer. The Norwegian students are also role models as teachers, and we can see how the oldest Palestinian adolescents take over the same principles for instruction as they themselves have experienced as participants in the project.</div>
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The Multi-use Arrangement</h3>
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Playing together is a great motivation for musical learning among children and adolescents. To present music that engages, to create musical arrangements that offers challenges and possibilities for everyone, music that is endurable throughout countless repetitions and even suitable for a concert performance, becomes the very glue of the project work. As we know, however, to meet the needs of the children within the context of performance where musical parts are adapted to the skills of the individual is a great challenge. In this work with musical learning among the young in Rashedie, the music educators have sought to develop musical material which is adapted to the level of skills among the participants and which is also felt as a meaningful musical part of the performance.</div>
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<img alt="Three hands on a synth." src="https://voices.no/index.php/voices/article/download/1853/1616/7705" style="border-style: none; box-sizing: border-box; vertical-align: middle;" width="276" /><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />Figure 5: Three hands on a synth. Photo by Even Ruud.</div>
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The situation in this project, however, is not radically different from what we will find in a Norwegian classroom. When musical learning is an objective for everyone, music teachers and instructors in Norway have to teach many students at the same time. Characteristically groups with varying presuppositions and frames and conditions for teaching challenge the teachers. It is quite seldom instructors will meet with standard ensembles and can use prearranged music; more often they have to use those instruments available. If one wants to initiate a band or an orchestra in such groups, one has to think alternatively. Our experiences from Lebanon have raised our understanding of this. Often there is a need to systematize the organization of the musical material in the arrangements. With reference to the Orff method, translated to another set of instruments and type of music (Storsve, 1991), the project leaders have gained many experiences during the years.</div>
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The idea behind the multi-use arrangement is to give everyone an opportunity to take part in the performance and thus it is composed by many voices. The arrangement makes use of everything from simple rhythmic figures, two-tone melodies, riffs or ostinatos with varying rhythmic complexity as well as more challenging voices. Repetitions and variations may create a good flow and a changing musical texture. It also must be possible to perform the different voices on different instruments. This because, sometimes in a group, we may find a highly skilled trumpet player, while in another group we may find a good percussion player, or violinist. If we should meet with a group with many inexperienced players, the sum of what the individual can contribute musically may create a good supporting harmony.</div>
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Sometimes it is also an advantage to have many tasks for the percussion instruments. We may do this in a simple way, but of course it is possible if necessary to create a complex and challenging rhythmic input. Many simple rhythmic tasks may also transform into a refined arrangement when put together into a musical whole. Another important point is that when we have many voices with different degrees of difficulties we can offer the players new challenges as they develop. When the students have learned to master a simple two-tone melody, it could easily become boring. In this case, we need to offer more challenges, either more tones in the melody, an extended rhythmic pattern or sometimes a totally new part.</div>
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The challenges, however, should not become so great that the player loses the overview or the idea of the music. This means offering the possibility to communicate, listen and respond to fellow musicians during the performance. This is one of the main reasons that playing by ear or without a score is preferred.</div>
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The possibilities for variations are endless, and often we could even increase the number of students in the group. At the same time we must caution against making the arrangements too complex. It is important to make room for the individual part through variations such as promoting a sense of achievement among the players. They all have to feel that they make an important contribution to the performance.</div>
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In order to illustrate this multi-use arrangement, we can use the melody from the movie Fl�klypa, a melody that Chadi Ibrahim, one of the local musicians and leaders heard when he was in Norway. Storsve subsequently arranged the piece for the group.<span class="notenumber" style="box-sizing: border-box;"><a href="https://www.blogger.com/null" name="6" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: inherit;"></a><a href="https://voices.no/index.php/voices/article/view/1853/1616#note6" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #0a818a; text-decoration-line: none;">[6]</a></span> Fl�klypa, or Norwegian Sunset has been performed by the group at concerts and is one of the favourite arrangements.</div>
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The melody consists of eights bars, where the fifth and sixth bars are a repetition of bar one and two. This means you have done half of the job when you have learned two bars. A few simple voices based upon the harmony were added in different instruments, while the guitar players mastered a minor and E-major from before. The base played the root tone in the chord and the guitars doubled these on the chords F, G and C major. The percussions added rhythmic figures. Everyone played the first two bars, and the leaders played the next two together with the rhythm section. Then everybody joined in bars five and six, before the leaders and the rhythm group played the last two bars. This was repeated many times, which created a sense of familiarity with the melody. It also created a good sense of periodicity.</div>
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In the further process, the accompanying voices were given new challenges, for instance the guitar players learned the C-major chord. Storsve also arranged new voices for the four newcomers on saxophone, who could only play four tones. He adapted the voices after the fingering the players had learned and gave the saxophones their own melody based upon these notes. One of the girls, who had played the Orff-xylophone for many years, also got a new challenge through an arrangement where she had to use both hands at the same time. By adapting each voice to the skills of the individual, everyone could have some new challenge. In this way the participants could build a repertoire of musical formulas, fingerings, ostinatos, rhythmic figures and so on, which they later could apply in new musical contexts.</div>
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The Land Day Concert and Beyond</h3>
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During the years we have seen the development of a large repertoire of voices to be used in arrangements for many participants on different instruments and with varying degrees of performance abilities. Some of the children have learned only one part or voice, while others have learned more and thus may create variations from round to round. It is the responsibility of the leader to keep track of all the possibilities and to compose and carry out a good performance.</div>
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The project has also led to many concerts. For instance, in 2008, a concert was arranged in Tyr in connection with the manifestation of what the Palestinians call <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">The Land Day</em>. Present were groups from several Palestinian refugee camps both as audiences and as performers. In addition to our musicians from the project and contribution from students from the Norwegian Academy of Music, several dance groups, a scout band, a bagpipe orchestra and many speakers took part in the manifestation. Diplomas and awards were handed out for different types of activities, and fifteen of the musicians in Rashedie project were granted a diploma and a small present for five years of participation in the project.</div>
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The concert given by the Rashedie orchestra was met with a lot of attention; it seemed to be quite different from what the audience had heard before. A noticeable silence arose in the otherwise quite noisy room and a great applause followed. <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Norwegian Sunset</em> was performed by the Norwegian music students together with the journeymen Chadi Ibrahim and Nabil Alashkar and about fifteen apprentices and twenty newcomers. The music started with a bourdon on synth and chime bells. A soloist presented the theme on the melodica. This was followed by a tutti round where everyone played or accompanied. Then a solo round followed with the four saxophones playing their melody before a new tutti. Then the xylophone and piano had the lead and after the next tutti the guitars and glockenspiel had their solos. A final tutti created a marked ritardando finale.</div>
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The story about the <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Norwegian Sunset</em> arrangement did not end with this concert in Tyr. We found that this tune also had a B-theme (Bj�rnov, 2005, p. 60), which we could elaborate when ten of the young musicians visited Norway. These adolescents also were members of a traditional dance group and were invited to teach Norwegian children Palestinian folk dance. They were given a workshop at the Academy of Music and we then used the B-theme. A simple arrangement was produced, now for the ten musicians. It should be added that in Norway, the young dancers and musicians had many performances, workshops, they met with the Norwegian school, went bicycling, bathing and visited a famous sculpture park in Oslo. Their performance at a multi-cultural festival in Oslo, the Mela-festival, however, became a major event in the visit to Norway. For this occasion, the Rashedie-orchestra became <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Palestinian Roots</em>.</div>
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Cultural Work as Health Promotion</h3>
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This music educational or community music project at Rashedie has not only resulted in musical learning. As we have argued, learning and development of identity are closely connected. There are reasons to claim that the adolescents who participate in the project have gained experiences that have given positive effects upon their sense of mastery. They have gained new social experiences with many different roles, as for instance when they lead groups and teach the younger children. They have acquired new knowledge about and skills in musical traditions and they have felt a basic sense of recognition in their surroundings. Recent interviews (November 2009) with six of the participants, three girls and three boys (age 12-20) confirm in many ways our suppositions that taking part in this musical community of practice will give a sense of belonging, create pride in their own skills and mastery of instruments, give hope and ideas about the future, promote motivation for school, prevent boredom and meaningless leisure time, provide aesthetic experiences of flow and happiness, as well as install pride in bringing knowledge and skills to a younger generation and thus maintaining Palestinian values in a marginal situation. Thus we can support what the leader of the cultural centre Beit Atfal Assumoud, Mariam Sleiman claimed in an interview in January 2009 how �the young who take part in this music project are friendlier, more social and more curious that other youngsters in the camp.� Many of these youngsters are chosen to participate in leadership programs to become the new leaders in the local community, she also added.</div>
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As we stated in the introduction, many of the health challenges and problems young Palestinian refugees are faced with are connected with their political and social situation. A life in oppression and poverty, with a lack of health care, adequate housing, sanitary conditions and other determinants will in itself create health problems that are beyond the reach of a music project. The marginalization and lack of social recognition which stem from a life outside of the Lebanese society, without permission to own land, to buy a house, to have access to higher education or a lot of professions, will in itself have stigmatizing effects which may potentially lead to ill-health. Amnesty International states that even the Palestinian refugee problem has resulted from and only can be solved from a situation outside of Lebanon; it is to be recommended that all Lebanese laws, which discriminate against Palestinian refugees, must be avoided.<span class="notenumber" style="box-sizing: border-box;"><a href="https://www.blogger.com/null" name="7" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: inherit;"></a><a href="https://voices.no/index.php/voices/article/view/1853/1616#note7" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #0a818a; text-decoration-line: none;">[7]</a></span></div>
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From a perspective of community psychology it is obvious how psychosocial problems, which may arise under such conditions, cannot be solved through initiatives aimed towards the individual (Nelson & Prilleltensky, 2005). A philosophy of recognition (Honneth, 2003) seems more adequate as a political and value-based frame for health promoting intervention. According to Honneth, recognition is not only fundamental to the primary relationship between the infant and the caretaker, but can be included in a critical perspective, where social inclusion and human rights play an important role. In order to fully accept and value ourselves, we also need to have our human rights recognized as citizens. If such needs are denied, we will not be able to experience the social solidarity and thus the common norms and values, which have to be shared in order to reach full recognition.</div>
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It is in such a context we may claim how such a music project gives experiences of change in learning and identity that may promote mental health. Such a claim is based upon a certain understanding of �health� (Ruud, 2006; 2010) which holds that our state of health encompasses more than just an absence of somatic and mental illness. From a salutogenetic perspective (Antonovsky, 1987), or as a subjectively experienced phenomenon, health has to do with our experience of meaning and continuity in life. In such an interpretative perspective, health refers to how we experience control and mastery, belongingness and a supportive relation to others, a sense of vitality and emotional flexibility with possibilities for emotional expression (Ruud, 2001). We should also add in this context that health includes political rights and possibilities to engage in social and political processes. At a societal level, we must also include rights to education and the acquisition of basic skills, rights to employment, income and housing (see also Nelson & Prilleltensky, 2005, p. 28).</div>
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The goals behind the development of this community of music practice are to be found in the ambition to develop musical resources, to create a network and supporting relations and to provide channels and arenas where the participants can become visible. By cultivating positive emotions and the belief in one�s own skills, the project may contribute to a development of identities where participants feel a sense of empowerment. Recent theories on hope also point to interconnections between the sense of one�s own mastery, of increased self-esteem and the ability to plan for and find solutions as core experiences in the development and maintenance of hope. To hope is in itself a health promoting process, which has to do with the belief to be able to reach our own goals and that there are routes to the realization of these goals. Or, as stated by Snyder, Rand and Sigmon 2002, p. 257): �(�) hopeful thought reflects the belief that one can find pathways to desired goals and become motivated to use those pathways.� To be able to create goals, short- or long term, to formulate possible strategies or routes to reach the goals, as well as to involve a motivational component, i.e. the belief in own agency, become central components in the process of hoping. In this complex psychological picture, aspects of meaning become crucial, especially that the experience of what we do makes a difference and creates continuity in life.</div>
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Finally, we want to conclude that this is probably a community music project rather than a strict music educational work, although the borders between disciplines are becoming blurred. Or we might say, our project is a cultural work with health promoting consequences. Such a project may also have been carried out as a music therapeutical (or rather a community music therapy) project (cf. Stige, Ansdell, Elefant, & Pavlicevic, 2010). It is reason to underscore, however, that this project first of all is centred on musical learning and performance, and thus will have possible consequences for health and quality of life. This insistence upon the project as a community music project or cultural work will prevent us from falling into a �treatment� trap which may arise when we seek individualistic explanations and solutions to collective problems, which in reality are resulting from oppression through the maintenance of asymmetrical relations of power. Through the development of a musical community of practice and building on the participants resources and through cooperation toward a common goal, we may avoid individualizing actions, which may lead to what community psychologists call �blaming the victim,� i.e. giving the victims the responsibility for the situation they have been forced upon. However, looking at what is called community music therapy, as well as community psychology, we may find examples of musical work, as well as theoretical models that show the value of this work. This community music project, in other words, is an example to explore if we want to demonstrate how cultural work and mental health promotion are linked.</div>
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Notes</h3>
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<a href="https://www.blogger.com/null" name="note1" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: inherit;"></a></div>
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<a href="https://voices.no/index.php/voices/article/view/1853/1616#1" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #0a818a; text-decoration-line: none;">[1]</a> <a href="http://www.norwac.no/" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #0a818a; text-decoration-line: none;">http://www.norwac.no</a></div>
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<a href="https://www.blogger.com/null" name="note2" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: inherit;"></a></div>
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<a href="https://voices.no/index.php/voices/article/view/1853/1616#2" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #0a818a; text-decoration-line: none;">[2]</a> <a href="http://www.interculture.no/" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #0a818a; text-decoration-line: none;">http://www.interculture.no</a></div>
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<a href="https://www.blogger.com/null" name="note3" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: inherit;"></a></div>
<div class="note" style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #333333; font-family: "Fira Sans", sans-serif; font-size: 16px; margin-bottom: 1rem;">
<a href="https://voices.no/index.php/voices/article/view/1853/1616#3" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #0a818a; text-decoration-line: none;">[3]</a> <a href="http://www.un.org/unrwa/refugees/lebanon.html" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #0a818a; text-decoration-line: none;">http://www.un.org/unrwa/refugees/lebanon.html</a></div>
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<a href="https://www.blogger.com/null" name="note4" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: inherit;"></a></div>
<div class="note" style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #333333; font-family: "Fira Sans", sans-serif; font-size: 16px; margin-bottom: 1rem;">
<a href="https://voices.no/index.php/voices/article/view/1853/1616#4" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #0a818a; text-decoration-line: none;">[4]</a> Medical journal The Lancet has in a series of articles documented the health situation among Palestinians � both in the ocupied areas and among those living in refugee camps in neighbouring countries. See for example The Lancet Vol 373, March 5, 2009, s. 837 � 49, The Lancet Vol 373, March 28, 2009. Also, Zabaneh, Watt og O�Donell 2008 and United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA). Annual Report of the Department of Health 2007.</div>
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<a href="https://www.blogger.com/null" name="note5" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: inherit;"></a></div>
<div class="note" style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #333333; font-family: "Fira Sans", sans-serif; font-size: 16px; margin-bottom: 1rem;">
<a href="https://voices.no/index.php/voices/article/view/1853/1616#5" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #0a818a; text-decoration-line: none;">[5]</a> <a href="http://www.socialcare.org/" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #0a818a; text-decoration-line: none;">http://www.socialcare.org/</a></div>
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<a href="https://www.blogger.com/null" name="note6" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: inherit;"></a></div>
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<a href="https://voices.no/index.php/voices/article/view/1853/1616#6" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #0a818a; text-decoration-line: none;">[6]</a> Also called Norwegian Sunset (Reodors ballade) in Bj�rnov 2005, p. 60.</div>
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<a href="https://www.blogger.com/null" name="note7" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: inherit;"></a></div>
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<a href="https://voices.no/index.php/voices/article/view/1853/1616#7" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #0a818a; text-decoration-line: none;">[7]</a> Palestinian refugees in Lebanon. Six decades of exile and suffering. <a href="http://www.amnestyusa.org/document.php?lang=e&id=ENGMDE180062007" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #0a818a; text-decoration-line: none;">http://www.amnestyusa.org/document.php?lang=e&id=ENGMDE180062007</a></div>
<h3 style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #333333; font-family: "Fira Sans", sans-serif; font-size: 1.2rem; font-weight: 500; line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0.5rem; margin-top: 0px;">
References</h3>
<div class="reference" style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #333333; font-family: "Fira Sans", sans-serif; font-size: 16px; margin-bottom: 1rem;">
Ansdell, G. (2010). Reflection. Belonging through musicing: Explorations of musical community. In: Stige, B., Ansdell, G., Elefant, C. & Pavlicevic, M. (2010). <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Where music helps. Community Music Therapy in action and reflection</em>. Farnham: Ashgate, p. 41-62.</div>
<div class="reference" style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #333333; font-family: "Fira Sans", sans-serif; font-size: 16px; margin-bottom: 1rem;">
Antonovsky, A. (1987). <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Unravelling the mystery of health. How people manage stress and stay well</em>. San Franscisco: Jossey-Bass Publishers.</div>
<div class="reference" style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #333333; font-family: "Fira Sans", sans-serif; font-size: 16px; margin-bottom: 1rem;">
Aruri, N. (Ed.) (2001). <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Palestinian refugees. The right of return</em>. London: Pluto Press.</div>
<div class="reference" style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #333333; font-family: "Fira Sans", sans-serif; font-size: 16px; margin-bottom: 1rem;">
Bj�rnov, I. (2005). <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Ingrid Bj�rnovs pianobok</em>. [Ingrid Bj�rnov�s piano book]. Oslo:Vega forlag.</div>
<div class="reference" style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #333333; font-family: "Fira Sans", sans-serif; font-size: 16px; margin-bottom: 1rem;">
Ghandour, N. (2001). Meeting the needs of Palestinian refugees in Lebanon. In: Aruri, N. (Ed.) <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Palestinian refugees</em>. The Right of Return. London: Pluto Press.</div>
<div class="reference" style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #333333; font-family: "Fira Sans", sans-serif; font-size: 16px; margin-bottom: 1rem;">
Harris, D. (2006). <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Music education and Muslims</em>. Stoke on Trent: Trenham Books.</div>
<div class="reference" style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #333333; font-family: "Fira Sans", sans-serif; font-size: 16px; margin-bottom: 1rem;">
Honneth, A. (2003). <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Behovet for anerkjennelse</em>. [The need for recognition] Copenhagen: Hans Reitzels forlag.</div>
<div class="reference" style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #333333; font-family: "Fira Sans", sans-serif; font-size: 16px; margin-bottom: 1rem;">
Lave, J. & Wenger, E. (1991). <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Situated learning � Legitimate peripheral participation</em>. New York: Cambridge University Press.</div>
<div class="reference" style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #333333; font-family: "Fira Sans", sans-serif; font-size: 16px; margin-bottom: 1rem;">
Nelson, G. & Prilleltensky, I. (2005). <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Community Psychology. In pursuit of liberation and well-being</em>. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.</div>
<div class="reference" style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #333333; font-family: "Fira Sans", sans-serif; font-size: 16px; margin-bottom: 1rem;">
Nielsen, K. & Kvale, S. (1999). <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Mesterl�re. L�ring som sosial praksis</em>. [Master learning. Learning as social practice]. Oslo: Ad Notam Gyldendal.</div>
<div class="reference" style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #333333; font-family: "Fira Sans", sans-serif; font-size: 16px; margin-bottom: 1rem;">
Ruud, E. (2001). Varme �yeblikk. <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Om musikk, helse og livsvalitet</em>. [Hot moments. On music, health and life quality]. Oslo: Unipub.</div>
<div class="reference" style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #333333; font-family: "Fira Sans", sans-serif; font-size: 16px; margin-bottom: 1rem;">
Ruud, E. (2006). Musikk gir helse [Music gives health]. In: Aasgaard, T. (ed.) <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Musikk og helse</em>[Music and Health]. Oslo: Cappelen akademisk.</div>
<div class="reference" style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #333333; font-family: "Fira Sans", sans-serif; font-size: 16px; margin-bottom: 1rem;">
Ruud, E. (2010). <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Music therapy � A perspective from the humanities</em>. Gilsum, NH: Barcelona Publishers.</div>
<div class="reference" style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #333333; font-family: "Fira Sans", sans-serif; font-size: 16px; margin-bottom: 1rem;">
Sabatinelli, G., Pace-Shankln, S., Riccardo, F. & Shahin, Y (2009). Palestinian refugees outside the occupied Palestinian territory. <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">The Lancet, Vol 373</em>, March 28.</div>
<div class="reference" style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #333333; font-family: "Fira Sans", sans-serif; font-size: 16px; margin-bottom: 1rem;">
Snyder, C. R. , Rand, K.L. & Sigmon, D. R. (2002). Hope theory. A member of the Positive Psychology family. In Snyder, C. R. & Lopez, S. J., <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Handbook of Positive Psychology</em>. New York: Oxford University Press.</div>
<div class="reference" style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #333333; font-family: "Fira Sans", sans-serif; font-size: 16px; margin-bottom: 1rem;">
Stige, B., Ansdell, G., Elefant, C. & Pavlicevic, M. (2010). <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Where music helps. Community Music Therapy in action and reflection</em>. Farnham: Ashgate.</div>
<div class="reference" style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #333333; font-family: "Fira Sans", sans-serif; font-size: 16px; margin-bottom: 1rem;">
Storsve, V. (1991). <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Pop/rock samspill. Et aksjonsforskningsprosjekt i ungdomsskolen</em> [Pop/rock - playing together. An action research project]. Oslo: Hovedoppgave ved Norges musikkh�gskole.</div>
<div class="reference" style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #333333; font-family: "Fira Sans", sans-serif; font-size: 16px; margin-bottom: 1rem;">
Storsve, V. (2008). Kulturen som brobygger og arena for livsutfoldelse. Erfaringer fra et musikkprosjekt i en flyktningleir i Libanon [Culture as bridge and arena for life]. In: Rodin, S. & G. Gjestrud, G. (eds.) <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Flyktning i Libanon. Fra al-Nakba til Nahr el-Bared </em>[Refugee in Lebanon]. Oslo: Forum for kultur og internasjonalt samarbeid.</div>
<div class="reference" style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #333333; font-family: "Fira Sans", sans-serif; font-size: 16px; margin-bottom: 1rem;">
United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA). <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Annual report of the Department of Health 2007</em>.</div>
<div class="reference" style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #333333; font-family: "Fira Sans", sans-serif; font-size: 16px; margin-bottom: 1rem;">
Wenger, E. (1998). <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Communities of practice. Learning, meaning, and identity</em>. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.</div>
<div class="reference" style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #333333; font-family: "Fira Sans", sans-serif; font-size: 16px; margin-bottom: 1rem;">
Wenger, E. (1998/2004) <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Praksisf�llesskaber</em> [Communities of Practice] Copenhagen: Hans Reitzels forlag.</div>
<div class="reference" style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #333333; font-family: "Fira Sans", sans-serif; font-size: 16px; margin-bottom: 1rem;">
Zabaneh, J.E., Watt, G. C. M. & O�Donell, C.A. (2008). Living and health conditions of Palestinian refugees in an unofficial camp in the Lebanon: a cross-sectional survey. <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Journal of Epidemiological Community Health, 62</em>, 91-97.</div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-626951746719976906.post-76514629046684063402019-02-01T06:37:00.000-08:002019-02-01T06:37:15.310-08:00Lutfia Rabbani Foundation Sponsors Musicians Without Borders<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Interesting to come across the Lutfia Rabbani Foundation, which was founded by a Palestinian refugee who managed to study in the Netherlands. They promote the idea that<br />
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"<span style="background-color: white; color: #676767; font-family: "Open Sans"; font-size: 14px;">that dialogue is essential for people to be able to unlock their collective wisdom, passion and creativity. Politically, economically, and socially, the fate of people across Europe and the Arab region is intertwined. Both regions are facing challenges and opportunities as a result of the same root causes. It is our sincere belief that through facilitated dialogue, people can make full use of the potential of their diversity and will be able to find common ground: common solutions and common opportunities."</span><br />
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They are one of the sponsors for the Musicians Without Borders project in Palestine. Read about both here:<br />
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<a href="https://rabbanifoundation.org/about-us/the-foundation/">https://rabbanifoundation.org/about-us/the-foundation/</a><br />
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<a href="https://www.musicianswithoutborders.org/eng/our-work/programs/where-we-work/palestine/">https://www.musicianswithoutborders.org/eng/our-work/programs/where-we-work/palestine/</a></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-626951746719976906.post-64370971602961776762019-01-25T07:44:00.000-08:002019-01-25T07:44:51.328-08:00Keywords in Music and Peacebuilding<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<a class="cover" href="https://musicandartsinaction.net/index.php/maia/issue/view/keywords-for-music-in-peacebuilding-vol-1" style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #007ab2; display: block; float: left; font-family: "Noto Sans", -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, "Segoe UI", Roboto, Oxygen-Sans, Ubuntu, Cantarell, "Helvetica Neue", sans-serif; font-size: 14px; height: auto; margin-bottom: 30px; margin-right: 30px; max-height: none; width: 200px;"><img src="https://musicandartsinaction.net/public/journals/1/cover_issue_14_en_US.jpg" style="border-style: none; box-sizing: border-box; display: block; height: auto; max-height: none; max-width: 100%; width: auto;" /></a><br />
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Music in peacebuilding is an emergent field with interested scholars representing a variety of intertwined fields, from applied ethnomusicology to sociology, from peace and conflict studies to social movement studies. In addition to scholarly pursuits, there are numerous practitioners and activists who are involved in the work of music in peacebuilding, sometimes explicitly connected through their work to music and peacebuilding and sometimes implicitly. The Min-On Music Research Institute (MOMRI)<a href="https://musicandartsinaction.net/index.php/maia/issue/view/keywords-for-music-in-peacebuilding-vol-1#_ftn1" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #007ab2;">[1]</a>, based in Tokyo, Japan, is possibly the only research organisation in the world dedicated solely to music in peacebuilding. There is a growing interest in music in peacebuilding (and music, conflict and violence), but the one thing that became abundantly clear is that we did not share a collectively agreed upon vocabulary to effectively discuss matters of shared concern. After many discussions and break-out groups failed to develop consistent frameworks, MOMRI decided that we should attempt to find a common set of reference points and discourses to facilitate collaborative work in the future. This special issue of Music and the Arts in Action on Keywords for Music in peacebuilding is the result of this process.</div>
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<a href="https://musicandartsinaction.net/index.php/maia/issue/view/keywords-for-music-in-peacebuilding-vol-1" target="_blank"> https://musicandartsinaction.net/index.php/maia/issue/view/keywords-for-music-in-peacebuilding-vol-1</a></div>
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<a href="https://musicandartsinaction.net/index.php/maia/issue/view/keywords-for-music-in-peacebuilding-vol-1#_ftnref1" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #007ab2;">[1]</a> <a href="http://institute.min-on.org/" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; color: #007ab2;">http://institute.min-on.org/</a></div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-626951746719976906.post-15576007532815182322019-01-17T05:27:00.000-08:002019-01-17T05:27:01.881-08:00Palestinian Cultural Resilience Through Musicking under Israeli Military Rule 1948-1966<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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In June 2018, I met Marwan Darweish at a conference, he is a professor of peace studies at the University of Coventry. Marwan was researching Palestinian cultural resilience under Israeli military rule between 1948 and 1966 and he was surprised to discover how important music was to the core Palestinian group identity. I knew very little about this field at the time, but I was happy to help Marwan make sense of his data. He invited me to return to Israel/Palestine with him to collect further data, focusing on music, and for me to experience the place and what remains of military rule there, namely, the occupied territories. Gaza Strip was deemed too dangerous right now, so the occupied territory I focused on was West Bank.</div>
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The trip was very short (five days), but very illuminating and interesting. We met some fantastic people who were eager to share their stories of music and identity in this time period. Many of the people discussed have passed away but their children were happy to discuss their memories and artifacts at length. Marwan and I will be presenting at a Middle Eastern Studies conference in Leeds in June and, in turn, publishing one or two articles from this trip. I won’t go on at length here about it, other than to summarise a few things that I learned from the trip and post a few pictures. If you wish to more, please feel free to ask me in person. Or wait for the articles!</div>
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In short, the importance of traditional wedding singers for the maintenance of Palestinian identity during this period cannot be overstated. Palestinians were forbidden from publicly congregating at any other time than weddings. They possessed no public spaces in which to meet or share ideas. Weddings became sites not only of celebration, but also for the sharing of news and even coded political dissent. The melodies were largely from the Arabic diaspora, especially Lebanon, Jordan and Syria, while the wedding rituals themselves and improvised lyrics were very much Palestinian in nature. Palestinians are a much more diverse group than is widely reported, consisting of a variety of religious affiliations or even no religious affiliation. Politically, they had aligned themselves in the 1950s to the Communist Party, although most claimed that was only because the state had effectively dismantled the other opposition parties. Only one interviewee claimed to have any lasting affiliation with the Communist Party. While the military rule of Israel itself ended in 1968, military occupation of the occupied zones continues today, and many of the concerns from then likewise continue. In this era of internet and media access, however, the reliance on wedding singers for news and dissent has lessened considerably, although they still exist and are well-respected in their communities.</div>
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This work is not directly related to music therapy, although it is clear how therapeutic music has been in this case in terms of social and cultural integrity and identity maintenance. There is a strong case to be made for how music therapy could be of benefit to this population as well.</div>
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This is Habib, a 96 year old Palestinian Greek Orthodox Communist, proudly displaying his tree.</div>
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This is Badea, a traditional wedding singer and son of perhaps the most famous wedding singer in Palestine, Attallah.</div>
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Some of the border wall in Bethlehem. </div>
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A bit of Banksy in Bethlehem. </div>
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Soldiers guarding the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, where Jesus was supposed to have been born. This was Christmas Eve on the Orthodox calendar, and the Bishop of Palestine was in attendance. He had been accused of selling church property to illegal Jewish settlers in Jerusalem, and protesters were amassing for midnight mass. Merry Christmas!</div>
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It was also Coptic Christmas and there were a lot of Ethiopians who made the pilgrimage in clothing not suitable for the mountain winter.</div>
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The seventh station of Christ in Jerusalem, with soldiers with guns at the ready. No idea why.</div>
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One example of an illegal Jewish settlement, heavily defended, smack in the middle of the Muslim Quarter in Jerusalem. Cozy.</div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0Palestine31.952162 35.23315400000001330.226547500000002 32.651367000000015 33.6777765 37.814941000000012tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-626951746719976906.post-47374258432795462482017-08-18T03:43:00.001-07:002017-08-18T03:43:19.794-07:00The Relationship Between Wellbeing and Peacebuilding: A Musical Perspective<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
The UK Research landscape has in recent times become more and more focused on 'wellbeing.' This is not purely altruistic, it is, as most things, primarily economic. Despite social researchers attempts at challenging the dominant public discourse that wellbeing of the public was a leftwing or even communist agenda, it has been shown that a lack of social wellbeing directly correlates with an economic strain on the national health service. Early interventions to increase wellbeing are not medical in nature, because medical issues have not yet manifested theselves. These interventions need to be social and possibly artistic in nature. For the first time, the public discourse about the value of the arts is being taken seriously by policy makers and economists. But how does this increased focus on the arts and wellbeing relate, if at all, to peacebuilding?<br />
Within Peacebuilding, there have been many discussions about the connections with wellbeing, although the debates tend to be between psychological or sociological approaches, or top-down versus bottom-up approaches. There has not been much in the way of discussing wellbeing as a peacebuilding process; they are both on a continuum of violence reduction and improving human fulfillment. Music has been considered within peacebuilding as an add-on to highlight issues and/or raise funds for campaigns. My own research and others suggest that music can play a much larger role, given its ability to affect identity, memory, belief and emotions, and therefore, behaviour. this new focus on wellbeing shows how the personal can connect to the social as well.<br />
In other words, music and peacebuilding research needs to connect to music and wellbeing research in a more direct way. I am currently developing a network of music and wellbeing as well as a network of music and peacebuilding (through the Min-On Music Research Institute). I will post progress on these networks as they progress.<br />
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-626951746719976906.post-687845329917762662017-04-18T04:08:00.000-07:002017-04-18T04:08:14.574-07:00Music and Conflict Studies Growing in Popularity<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Music departments are starting to catch on to the concept of music and conflict and peacebuilding. For example, Keele has a module now entitled Music, Conflict and Social Change run by <span style="background-color: white; color: #312e25; font-family: "Open Sans", sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"><a href="https://www.keele.ac.uk/music/people/fiorellamonterodiaz/" target="_blank">Dr Fiorella Montero-Diaz</a>. This is part of the wider trend of engagement by applied ethnomusicologists such as <a href="http://ufrj.academia.edu/SamuelAraujo" target="_blank">Samuel Araujo</a>, especially from those scholars from the global south. </span></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-626951746719976906.post-80819396253095768572017-03-27T13:14:00.001-07:002017-03-27T13:14:56.944-07:00Peace, Empathy and Conciliation Through Music Event<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
This sounds like a very interesting <a href="http://www.historyofemotions.org.au/events/peace-empathy-and-conciliation-through-music-a-collaboratory/?page=2" target="_blank">event </a>in Australia in September. Featuring a keynote by Laura Hassler, the director of <a href="https://www.musicianswithoutborders.org/" target="_blank">Musicians Without Borders</a>, whom I met in Bogota last year.<br />
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<cufon alt="Peace, " class="cufon cufon-canvas" style="display: inline-block !important; font-size: 1px !important; height: 32px; line-height: 1px !important; position: relative !important; vertical-align: middle !important; width: 105px;"><cufontext style="display: inline-block !important; height: 0px !important; overflow: hidden !important; text-indent: -10000in !important; width: 0px !important;"></cufontext></cufon><img src="http://www.historyofemotions.org.au/media/258906/2013-emerge-west_146.jpg?width=500&height=332.421875" /><cufon alt="Empathy " class="cufon cufon-canvas" style="display: inline-block !important; font-size: 1px !important; height: 32px; line-height: 1px !important; position: relative !important; vertical-align: middle !important; width: 132px;"><canvas height="38" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; height: 38px; left: -2px; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; position: relative !important; top: -5px; vertical-align: baseline; width: 162px;" width="162"></canvas><cufontext style="display: inline-block !important; height: 0px !important; overflow: hidden !important; text-indent: -10000in !important; width: 0px !important;"></cufontext></cufon><cufon alt="and " class="cufon cufon-canvas" style="display: inline-block !important; font-size: 1px !important; height: 32px; line-height: 1px !important; position: relative !important; vertical-align: middle !important; width: 62px;"><canvas height="38" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; height: 38px; left: -2px; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; position: relative !important; top: -5px; vertical-align: baseline; width: 92px;" width="92"></canvas><cufontext style="display: inline-block !important; height: 0px !important; overflow: hidden !important; text-indent: -10000in !important; width: 0px !important;"></cufontext></cufon><cufon alt="Conciliation " class="cufon cufon-canvas" style="display: inline-block !important; font-size: 1px !important; height: 32px; line-height: 1px !important; position: relative !important; vertical-align: middle !important; width: 169px;"><canvas height="38" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; height: 38px; left: -2px; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; position: relative !important; top: -5px; vertical-align: baseline; width: 199px;" width="199"></canvas><cufontext style="display: inline-block !important; height: 0px !important; overflow: hidden !important; text-indent: -10000in !important; width: 0px !important;"></cufontext></cufon><cufon alt="through " class="cufon cufon-canvas" style="display: inline-block !important; font-size: 1px !important; height: 32px; line-height: 1px !important; position: relative !important; vertical-align: middle !important; width: 116px;"><canvas height="38" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; height: 38px; left: -2px; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; position: relative !important; top: -5px; vertical-align: baseline; width: 147px;" width="147"></canvas><cufontext style="display: inline-block !important; height: 0px !important; overflow: hidden !important; text-indent: -10000in !important; width: 0px !important;"></cufontext></cufon><cufon alt="Music: " class="cufon cufon-canvas" style="display: inline-block !important; font-size: 1px !important; height: 32px; line-height: 1px !important; position: relative !important; vertical-align: middle !important; width: 100px;"><canvas height="38" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; height: 38px; left: -2px; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; position: relative !important; top: -5px; vertical-align: baseline; width: 131px;" width="131"></canvas><cufontext style="display: inline-block !important; height: 0px !important; overflow: hidden !important; text-indent: -10000in !important; width: 0px !important;"></cufontext></cufon><cufon alt="A " class="cufon cufon-canvas" style="display: inline-block !important; font-size: 1px !important; height: 32px; line-height: 1px !important; position: relative !important; vertical-align: middle !important; width: 30px;"><canvas height="38" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; height: 38px; left: -2px; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; position: relative !important; top: -5px; vertical-align: baseline; width: 60px;" width="60"></canvas><cufontext style="display: inline-block !important; height: 0px !important; overflow: hidden !important; text-indent: -10000in !important; width: 0px !important;"></cufontext></cufon><cufon alt="Collaboratory" class="cufon cufon-canvas" style="display: inline-block !important; font-size: 1px !important; height: 32px; line-height: 1px !important; position: relative !important; vertical-align: middle !important; width: 185px;"><canvas height="38" style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; height: 38px; left: -2px; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; position: relative !important; top: -5px; vertical-align: baseline; width: 210px;" width="210"></canvas><cufontext style="display: inline-block !important; height: 0px !important; overflow: hidden !important; text-indent: -10000in !important; width: 0px !important;"></cufontext></cufon></h1>
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<strong style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Date: </strong>21-22 September 2017<br />
<strong style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Venue:</strong> The University of Melbourne, Parkville VIC 3052<br />
<strong style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Submission Deadline:</strong> Thursday 1 June 2017<br />
<strong style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Event Registration Deadline: </strong>Saturday 1 July 2017<br />
<strong style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Enquiries:</strong> Samantha Dieckmann (<a href="mailto:samantha.dieckmann@unimelb.edu.au" style="border: 0px; color: #0869a1; font-family: inherit; font-size: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">samantha.dieckmann@unimelb.edu.au</a>)</div>
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Organised by the ARC Centre of Excellence for the History of Emotions, The University of Melbourne, in collaboration with the Faculty of the Victorian College of the Arts & Melbourne Conservatorium of Music, and Multicultural Arts Victoria, this collaboratory will bring together researchers, practitioners (musicians including performers, community musicians, music educators, music therapists; community development workers; social service workers; arts organisation delegates), and arts and community policymakers to share ideas around the ways that music is used to develop peace, empathy and conciliation. We invite submissions from local, national and international researchers and practitioners, and hope that the symposium will produce thought-provoking discussion and fruitful partnerships between industry, community and education sectors.<br />
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Organised around the United Nations International Day of Peace, this collaboratory will include a keynote address by Laura Hassler, founder and director of ‘Musicians Without Borders’.</div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-626951746719976906.post-71567428535046739702017-03-02T01:21:00.002-08:002017-03-02T01:21:45.390-08:00ISA Conference, Baltimore - Part 1<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
I have just returned from the International Studies Association annual conference in Baltimore. This was a massive event with over six thousand delegates. The scope was staggering: it included everything from peace studies to coercion studies and everything in between. Enlightening to sit in on intelligence gathering strategy panels. I had been invited to participate on the Emerging Canadian Scholars panel that focused on arts-based approaches to IR. I will give a full review of this event later, but it was very fruitful, making links between the ISA itself, especially the Canadian branch, MOMRI, the Centre for Trust, Peace and Social Relations in Coventry and Leuven University. Finally, I met Lesley Pruitt from the University of Melbourne who has written about music and peacebuilding in the below book, which I am now reading. I will give a review of this book later.<br />
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<img src="http://www.sunypress.edu/images/Product/large/62733_cov.jpg" /><br />
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0Baltimore, MD, USA39.2903848 -76.61218930000001139.0937408 -76.9349128 39.4870288 -76.289465800000016tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-626951746719976906.post-84313540693946928512017-02-08T12:51:00.000-08:002017-02-08T12:51:17.478-08:00The Society for Ethnomusicology's Music and Social Justice Resources Project<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
This is very interesting and hopefully a point of renewed contact between the music and peacebuilding researchers and the applied ethnomusicologists:<br />
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<a href="https://ethnomusicology.site-ym.com/page/Resources_Social" target="_blank">https://ethnomusicology.site-ym.com/page/Resources_Social</a><br />
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They are looking to develop a repository of projects worldwide that use music for social justice, conflict and inclusion. This is similar to an idea that Min-On Music Research Institute has been developing. Watch this space...</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-626951746719976906.post-4940269588315160522017-01-19T07:49:00.000-08:002017-01-19T07:49:52.102-08:00Idara Baraye Taleem-o-Taraqi (IBT)<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
I have only just discovered Idara Baraye Taleem-o-Taraqi (IBT), a peace and development organisation that operates in Bahrain. They attempt to promote cooperation and reduce conflict through inclusive development. They claim to reduce tensions between clans, tribes and communities by engaging with music, dance, traditional lore and crafts, poems and games. They have been in operation for about ten years and for five years they have also been hosting a music and arts festival that ends with a conference about cultural development that includes academics, communities and civil society. I have not as yet been able to find out much detail or any evidence of their success, but I will post it here when I do. Their website is occupied by a cosmetics company.<br />
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-626951746719976906.post-57773278541563521332016-11-30T07:36:00.002-08:002016-11-30T07:37:33.418-08:00Music and Beyond Intractability<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
I have long used the excellent <a href="http://www.beyondintractability.org/" target="_blank">Beyond Intractability</a> resource on peacebuilding. It has informed my understanding of conflict and peace processes and it is organised so effectively that I have been thinking about this format for the <a href="http://institute.min-on.org/" target="_blank">Min-On Music Research Institute</a> website. So I was surprised that I missed the article <a href="http://www.beyondintractability.org/library/processes-music-and-peacebuilding" target="_blank">The Processes of Music and Peacebuilding </a>by Allie Adelman from 2011 on this very site.<br />
Adelman refers to many of the available writings on the subject, which were not many at that time.She draws heavily upon Urbain's first edited volume on the subject, <a href="http://www.ibtauris.com/en/Books/Society%20%20social%20sciences/Politics%20%20government/International%20relations/Geopolitics/Music%20and%20Conflict%20Transformation%20Harmonies%20and%20Dissonances%20in%20Geopolitics?menuitem=%7BA00C79DF-A4F2-4EC4-82AD-EBE63B30DF4C%7D" target="_blank">Music and Conflict Transformation</a>. As many of you know, this was not only the subject of my PhD thesis, I now work closely with Olivier Urbain at the Min-On Music Research Institute and we have since published a follow up book <a href="http://www.ibtauris.com/Books/Humanities/History/History%20specific%20events%20%20topics/Social%20%20cultural%20history/Music%20Power%20and%20Liberty%20Sound%20Song%20and%20Melody%20as%20Instruments%20of%20Change.aspx?menuitem=%7BDFF51E2F-C0BA-4928-ACC4-415188DCDEE8%7D" target="_blank">Music, Power and Liberty.</a> While she does briefly mention that music can just as easily (or more easily) be used for destructive purposes, she focuses on the positive potentials. To this effect, there is an over-reliance on either anecdotes from famous people, like Nelson Mandela, or broad sweeping statements attesting to the power of music with very little evidence provided. Adelman even refers to <a href="https://bs.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pontanima" target="_blank">Pontanima</a>, the choir that I researched and took part in during my PhD. She does not go very far to explain what was really happening within the musical experience itself or what specifically these experiences changed and how.<br />
Adelman concludes with another broad claim for the power of music, referring to Lederach's influential <a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/Moral-Imagination-Soul-Building-Peace/dp/019974758X" target="_blank">The Moral Imagination</a>. This book, and Lederarch, was an inspiration for myself as well, but even within that book there are broad unsubstantiated claims made on the behalf of the power of music. This article is a useful introduction to some of original writings on the subject of music and peacebuilding, but considering how useful the rest of the site is, I strongly believe that this needs some serious updating with more current scholarship and a much more thorough empirical approach. In addition, more practical applications and models would also be useful, as would methods of evaluation. Otherwise, music might will continue to be believed to function powerfully in peacebuilding projects with no ability to back these beliefs up to stakeholders or measure the outcomes. This, in turn, could damage the whole concept and prevent future projects from ever being realised.<br />
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-626951746719976906.post-84052726753487572012016-11-18T04:31:00.003-08:002016-11-18T04:34:46.863-08:00Musicological ethnography and peacebuilding<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
I've published this article recently in the Journal of Peace Education <a href="http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/17400201.2016.1234618?journalCode=cjpe20" target="_blank">here</a>:<br />
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Based on my PhD research with an inter-religious choir in Sarajevo, Bosnia Herzegovina, this paper discusses my interdisciplinary methodologies and suggests how this approach might be applied to future peacebuilding efforts. The use of ethnographic methods in research is an attempt to comprehend a social scene in a way that is as close as possible to the understanding of those within the scene. Normally, the data collected is linguistic in nature, although the visual and gestural, embodied data are increasingly included. There is very little consideration of the aural in this form of research. Even when the audio is considered, it is often described in written language rather than considered it to be data in and of itself, thereby creating a translation issue. In my own research in Sarajevo, I have made the case for sound and music as ethnographic data, since it is a means of experiencing and expressing tacit cultural understanding within and without a particular social group. This paper examines the commonalities between this approach and the peacebuilding strategies of Lederach et al. (<a href="http://www.beyondintractability.org/" style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #10147e; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">http://www.beyondintractability.org/</a>) and proposes how musicological ethnography might be useful as a tool for increased intercultural understanding in peacebuilding activities.</div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-626951746719976906.post-26923339463507259302016-11-18T04:31:00.002-08:002016-11-18T04:33:09.280-08:00Music, Power and Liberty: Book is out now!<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Olivier Urbain and I edited this book which came out of a conference on music and peacebuilding in Paris a few years ago. Here is the abstract and a link:<br />
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Music is a complex and multi-faceted art form. Yet too often it is regarded as discrete and self-contained. The chapters in this groundbreaking book explore different aspects of how music may shape society and culture, yet go much further in viewing musical activity as a mode of power that can transform the lives of communities and individuals. The contributors (who include sociologists, musicologists and performers) focus above all on the relationship between music and the political upheavals of the Arab Spring. They examine key topics like music and revolution in Tunisia; the Egyptian musical tradition of the Revolutionary Song; and the ambivalent social status of the Arab musician, revered by the public when performing but also facing suspicion in a society where music is rightly seen as dangerous and subversive. In showing how music has been used to challenge the status quo, as well as enforce it, the ambiguity of music is fully revealed: it can be used to bolster both regime power and popular liberty, often simultaneously. This is a vital contribution to more nuanced understandings of music and politics.</div>
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<span style="font-family: "myriad" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12.8px;">https://www.amazon.co.uk/Music-Power-Liberty-Instruments-Institute/dp/1784534447</span></span></div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-626951746719976906.post-28486557312388792012015-05-21T06:37:00.003-07:002015-05-21T06:39:18.867-07:00New Article in African Conflict and Peacebuilding Review<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
The latest African Conflict and Peacebuilding Review contains an article by myself. You can access it <a href="http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.2979/africonfpeacrevi.5.1.66?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents" target="_blank">here </a>through JSTOR:<br />
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Here is the abstract:</div>
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<italic style="box-sizing: border-box;">Whose Music, Whose Country?</italic> Music, Mobilization, and Social Change in North Africa</h1>
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ABSTRACT Social change began to rapidly emerge in many North African states in 2011 and 2012, and this process continues today. Music has been embedded within this process from the beginning and has been a key feature in street protests and expressing group identity that opposed the status quo at the time. The situation has since become extremely complex as group identities have split and merged, but in the early days of social change in Egypt, Tunisia, and Libya, music was used by professional and amateur musicians as well as non-musicians for several purposes, namely, to express a more generalized group identity, to capture the moment of the protests, and to propagate information about the situation to a wider Arab diaspora and gain support from them. Conversely, the state also used music at this time as a form of social control by promoting music that was uncritical to marginalize the challenging music.</div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-626951746719976906.post-44973863111139224272015-05-21T06:34:00.001-07:002015-05-21T06:38:30.396-07:00New Music and Conflict Transformation PhD<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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A new PhD programme has been started up at Queens University, Belfast. The details are below. Olivier Urbain of the Toda Institute will be guest lecturing there this autumn. Who knows, maybe I'll get to do something there sometime soon!</div>
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<em>"Musical Crossings: Music Mediation in Conflict Transformation"</em></h3>
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<strong>Supervisors:</strong></div>
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<strong>Professor Fiona Magowan (School of History and Anthropology and ISCTSJ Research Fellow); Professor Pedro Rebelo (Creative Arts, Music)</strong></div>
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This project considers the ways in which music mediation has developed as a means of supporting and engaging the experiences of those who have lost relatives or who have been the victims of traumatic events in post-conflict regions. This doctoral research invites applicants to explore how musical practices facilitate new kinds of exchange, dialogue and relationships between communities and individuals who may not otherwise meet. Through analyses of music mediation processes with non-governmental and community-based organisations in Europe or South America, the project considers how music facilitates physical, emotional and psychological change among those who have experienced political conflict and violence.</div>
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Extending recent scholarship around the effects of music in conflict resolution, applicants are asked to consider the following questions:</div>
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<li>How do community-facilitated music mediation programmes empower individuals and communities to support and effect interpersonal change?</li>
<li>How do different musical repertoires shape participants’ memories, narratives and experiences of conflict?</li>
<li>To what extent do communally-organised musical experiences mediate attitudes and behaviours in everyday socio-political decision-making?</li>
<li>In what ways is music mediation creating a legacy of conflict transformation in post-conflict regions?</li>
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Research on music and peacebuilding has considered how the interpersonal aesthetics of musical practice can enhance dialogue and strengthen relationships by increasing empathy, mutuality and creativity in participation. Further research is needed to understand how post-conflict musical mediation can change victims’ attitudes towards conflict and the specificities of local politics, as musical facilitators seek to empower communities and create sustainable peacebuilding activities among the next generation.</div>
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<strong>Closing Date for Applications: 27 February 2015</strong></div>
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For further information on the PhD project, please contact: Prof. Fiona Magowan (<a href="mailto:f.magowan@qub.ac.uk" style="color: #336699;">f.magowan@qub.ac.uk</a>). For advice on the application process and eligibity for funding, please contact Susan Templeton (<a href="mailto:s.templeton@qub.ac.uk" style="color: #336699;">s.templeton@qub.ac.uk</a>). Additional information is available at:</div>
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<a href="http://www.qub.ac.uk/schools/SchoolofHistoryandAnthropology/ProspectiveStudents/PostgraduateFeesandFunding/SchoolPostgraduateFunding/" style="color: #336699; font-size: 14.3999996185303px; line-height: 20.1599998474121px; text-align: left;">http://www.qub.ac.uk/schools/SchoolofHistoryandAnthropology/ProspectiveStudents/PostgraduateFeesandFunding/SchoolPostgraduateFunding/</a></div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-626951746719976906.post-59024245473748482342014-05-07T02:27:00.001-07:002014-05-07T02:30:57.814-07:00Witness - Dr Sarmast's Music School<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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This is a very interesting documentary about the establishment of the Afghani National Institute of Music after the Taliban effectively destroyed music culture in Afghanistan. Media outlets such as <a href="http://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/witness/2013/01/201311412401920574.html" target="_blank">Al Jazeera</a> have reported positively about the school and the documentary, but I'm curious as to why John Baily from Goldsmiths College was not mentioned, since I believed that he was rather crucial in the resurrection of Afghani musical culture after the fall of the Taliban, as expressed in this <a href="http://www.gold.ac.uk/research-enterprise/impactstories/casestudypages/baily/" target="_blank">article</a>. I am also disappointed, but not surprised, that there was little debate about the pros and cons of official musical institutions, their role in state-sanctioned identity-building and there relationship and responsibility to the average citizen.</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-626951746719976906.post-46385137411657656372014-05-06T12:59:00.000-07:002014-05-07T02:30:28.046-07:00Conflict Map<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Here's a useful website that keeps tabs on the current open conflicts around the world, with a news aggregate that details the level of severity, the new volume and the volume trend.<br />
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<a href="http://www.conflictmap.org/">http://www.conflictmap.org/</a></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-626951746719976906.post-18410177456125752462014-05-06T12:54:00.001-07:002014-05-07T02:30:10.477-07:00Music Intervention<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
I've just come across this wonderful blog by <span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 23.799999237060547px;">Shoshana Gottesman, a musician activist and educator, called Music Intervention: </span><span style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, Bitstream Charter, serif;"><span style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 23.799999237060547px;"><a href="http://musicintervention.wordpress.com/">http://musicintervention.wordpress.com</a>. It's is a great resource for exactly the kinds of things I've been discussing on this blog. Shoshana has been quite a bit more active on her blog, however. She does have a link to this blog, which is nice. She focuses on 'glocal' music interventions, which as it sounds, entails local grassroots activism organised on a global network. There are links to other relevant blogs, many useful posts and a list of some existent music intervention projects. </span></span></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-626951746719976906.post-53333109789566453322014-05-05T07:46:00.000-07:002014-05-05T07:47:07.697-07:00Music and Conflict Resolution Talk by Ian Ritchie<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Ian Ritchie, the director of the City of London Festival, gave a talk on my subject it seems last year. Ritchie read Law and Music at Cambridge, which certainly gave him a solid basis for the topic of music conflict resolution. I have copied here the transcript of the talk held at Barnard's Inn Hall in April 2013:<br />
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<span style="font-family: "Garamond","serif";">I am talking
today about music and conflict resolution.
Although there is considerable evidence available concerning the power
of music and its effective application to the damaging human consequences of
conflict, much less has been spoken or written about its potential role in
resolving conflict or addressing its causes.
Without redressing the balance completely, I hope to provide one or two
pointers in the wider context of music and its longstanding relationship with
conflict.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Garamond","serif";">There are a
number of ideas that are worth exploring – separate subjects as well as
variations upon the same – and I propose to say something about the power of
music and to define some of the different facets of its relationship with
conflict. I hope that this will provide
an overture of ideas: the full symphony has yet to be written. In fact, we have only begun to scratch the
surface of what is to be learned about the effects of music upon human
emotions, behaviour and well-being, both mental and physical.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Garamond","serif";">I have
chosen the following themes and variations: conflict resolution at the heart of
musical expression itself; the use of music to avert conflict, to resolve
conflict, to heal the trauma caused by conflict and to rebuild broken
communities, not just damaged minds; and finally music’s response to the
experience of conflict, for example inspired by war, which incidentally can be
part of the healing process or ‘resolution’ achieved through the creative process. With the importance of ‘resolution’ uppermost
in my mind, I have avoided the subject of music’s use throughout history as
propaganda in support of conflict and as a weapon on the battlefield itself.<span style="color: red;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Garamond","serif";">By way of
introduction, I should explain how I came to be involved in this whole area of
discussion. In the first place my whole
professional life has involved making and working with music, and over time I
have gained a deepening awareness of the nature and power of music itself. But then, around 20 years ago, I was drawn
into the events and consequences of the war in the Balkans, especially in
Bosnia-Herzegovina. Some of you will
remember the extraordinary courage of the cellist in Sarajevo, Vedran
Smailović, who night after night donned his tails and played in the city’s main
marketplace, at the site of the murderous mortar attack by the Serbian forces;
it was freezing as well as dangerous but he survived, albeit with frostbite
which damaged his cello playing. I knew some of the composers who wrote music
specially for him and one in particular, Nigel Osborne, who was renting my flat
in Edinburgh at the time: he visited Sarajevo in the midst of the siege and
arranged to get the cellist out; he finally succeeded in bringing Vedran to
Scotland where my flat became his home for a while! At the end of the war I spent time in Mostar
with Nigel Osborne setting up the Pavarotti Music Centre and its unique Music
Therapy clinic for children suffering trauma as a result of the conflict: it
was also a music school, recording studio, performance space and a centre for
musical outreach into the schools and communities throughout the region; I also
set up a cross-community orchestra, the Mostar Sinfonietta, which comprised not
only Muslims and Catholics from the two parts of the divided city but also
musicians of all standards and from all the confessions of this one-time mixed
and integrated society.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Garamond","serif";">Conflict
resolution has lived at the heart of musical expression. It is generally true to say that every artist
is on a quest for beauty, though the 20<sup>th</sup> century threw up some
exceptions to this rule. In music,
beauty stems from the creation of dissonance and its resolution into harmony,
the struggle being required to create the conditions necessary for the greater expressive
impact. This seems to offer a parallel with human nature itself which appears
to require contradiction and disagreement en route to achieving the clarity of
consensus and agreement – or, worse still, needs conflict to be waged in order
properly to comprehend the peace that might ensue. It is therefore unsurprising that music, a
basic human impulse which predates even any form of speech in an individual’s
development, is a potentially powerful medium in the area of conflict and a
tool for its resolution. The nature of
music can be described as an interdependent triangular relationship between
inventing, performing and listening – three cornerstones of a creative
triangle. There are illustrations which
I can give of conflict being averted, resolved and its traumatic consequences
repaired through all three modes of musical engagement: simply listening,
performing with a voice or an instrument, or creating either in pure musical
terms or harnessed to other forms of expression, such as words in the making of
song.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Garamond","serif";">There is one
very public and increasingly widespread example of music being used to avert
conflict: I am sure that many of you, like me, will have emerged from a London
underground station or entered a shopping centre to the sound of classical music
being played through loudspeakers. The
purpose of these installations is<span style="color: red;"> </span>to discourage
the build-up of restless individuals, to break-up the congregation of rowdy
gangs and to prevent anti-social behaviour.
As a music lover, one is bound to feel slightly queasy at the thought of
this instrumental function of a much-loved art form as a kind of subliminal
wallpaper as opposed to food for the soul; and it is ironic that something
beautiful should be deliberately off-putting rather than encouraging for people. But it has the desired effect. The potential of music to wind people up and
foment conflict is well known and has been the bread and butter of military
musicians for thousands of years – raising morale on the part of both attacker
and defender, inspiring teamwork but also individual and collective
aggression. It follows that the exact
opposite can also be achieved, with music that can inspire peace and dissolve
aggression. There is considerable
potential for the Armed Forces to engage in this approach as part of the role
of the very many military musicians deployed in the theatres of war and not
merely on the parade grounds. The role
of army bandsmen in relation to medical care has existed for centuries and now
goes well beyond the stretcher-bearing duties of the musicians, as was the case
in both the World Wars for example, to embrace working in field hospitals
alongside the doctors. And now there are
even graduates with formal music therapy qualifications who have started to
enter the Army as serving musicians.
This is an optimistic sign of music being applied potentially more
systematically as a cure to the trauma of military engagement, even though it
does not yet foretell the possibility of music as prevention – and we must
remember that prevention is better than cure, as the saying goes.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Garamond","serif";">Although
music and the resolution of conflict is the declared subject of my short talk,
this is perhaps the most elusive aspect of music’s role in this context. There is no doubt that it can have a calming
influence. Neuroscientists – and I am
not equipped or prepared to speak with any pretence of expertise in this area –
have demonstrated the actual patterns of brain activity in response to
different kinds of music that can induce different emotional responses. Indeed the physics and the chemistry induced
by music within the human brain are becoming increasingly the subject of expert
treatise and actual treatment in the fields of neuroscience, psychiatry and the
growing profession of music therapy. But
these applications of music have tended to prove their cases in the aftermath
of conflict rather than in the midst, addressing the traumatic effects or
social damage within communities that have been divided through conflict. One illustration that I shall give, one of a
number of examples that I experienced during my many visits to Bosnia in the
aftermath of the Balkan conflict, when I was engaged with the composer Nigel
Osborne to set up and build a Music Therapy clinic in Mostar specifically to
treat war-damaged children, is a social and political one. After we had built and opened the Pavarotti
Music Centre, complete with its Music Therapy clinic, a number of us continued
to volunteer in delivering music projects for the children of Mostar as well as
for the adults and for the specific goal of healing the society as well as the
individual: this meant bringing people together from across the very strong
divide between East Mostar and West Mostar – essentially the Moslem Bosniaks
and the Catholic Croats who made up (and still comprise) the most substantial
proportions of the city’s population; at the conclusion of a major songwriting
and choral singing project involving children from both halves of the city, we
presented a concert in the courtyard of the Music Centre to which the two
Mayors of Mostar were invited to attend (officially there was only one Mayor
and a deputy Mayor for the municipality, but the community division required
the artifice of recognising two mayors to support the separate education systems
and civic governance of the place); the Mayors sat at the opposite ends of the
front row, surrounded by their respective weighty officials, but during the
course of the evening they increasingly recognised their people, their families
and their heritage in the faces, songs and behaviour of the children performing
in front of them – by the end of the evening the two Mayors were sitting
together and speaking animatedly for the first time since hostilities had
ended. Although the Serbo-Croat language
is shared and spoken by the divided parties, it provided no medium for real
understanding: it was the music that achieved that.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Garamond","serif";">I can offer
countless examples of music as a means of healing trauma caused by conflict,
and the work in Bosnia is just one of these.
Colleagues of mine in various NGOs or working as individuals have found
themselves working effectively as artists applying their gifts in ways that are
therapeutic – in ex-Yugoslavia, the Caucasus, the Middle East and parts of
Africa, for example, that have been torn apart by war – but the medically
accredited clinical discipline of Music Therapy, now functioning all over the
world, has been applied systematically to trauma in rather more isolated
conflict situations. Apart from the
Bosnian example, another centre for this work has been Northern Ireland both
during and in the aftermath of the troubles there. From these and other sources have emerged
conferences, publications and studies which have already been shared
internationally and continue to show the way in which music can actually heal
post-traumatic stress disorders. This
approach has massive untapped potential in relation to the Armed Forces,
particularly as they return from the Afghanistan and Iraq theatres of war with
many suffering from diagnosed post-traumatic stress disorders which, in earlier
generations, were described as shell shock and consigned traumatised soldiers
to forbidding asylums around the country.
In recent years there has been substantial work undertaken – in Northern
Ireland once again – among civilians and the widespread incidence of trauma
that people have experienced. This has
shown not only the individual benefits from this being treated, using Music
Therapy as a powerful means, but also the collective consequences upon the
wider community. In short, the
proposition now is that sustainable peace can be achieved far more readily
through addressing and healing trauma within individuals, families, and their
wider circles.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Garamond","serif";">I have
already alluded to how music can rebuild broken or divided communities and not
just repair individually damaged minds.
During my time spent in Bosnia over the years, one particular model
which I helped to develop and support was that of the Mostar Sinfonietta, which
drew together once more the small number of musicians who remained in the city
by the time the conflict was over. This
was not as straightforward as it sounds, because of the divided nature of the
city: once upon a time this held a happily united and intermarried mixture of
people of all confessions and national backgrounds, but 15 years ago it was
(and to some extent still is today) a place of ghettos and political divisions,
principally between the Moslem and Catholic communities. The small mixed-ability ensemble of musicians
symbolised a unity that could be achieved through a shared purpose and a common
language – a harmonious resolution to the dissonant conflict which went
before. Daniel Barenboim, through his
West Eastern Divan Orchestra made up mainly of young Israeli and Palestinian
musicians, achieved a worldwide profile for this way of working together. Less visibly, another organisation I am
involved in, Musicians without Borders, has for several years been running a
Rock School in Mitrovića, a town in Kosovo which has remained resolutely
divided between its Albanian and Serbian citizens on opposite sides of the
river running through. The only way to
bring the young people together was to take them on summer courses to Skopje in
neighbouring Macedonia where they happily made music together, whilst back in
Kosovo their School existed in two separate buildings on either bank of the
river. Soon they started to walk across
the bridge and begin the process of their families and communities getting to
know each other once again. Closer to home, Musicians without Borders, through
its UK office in Manchester, has brought together refugees and asylum seekers,
not only from different areas of conflict around the world but also those
remaining separated in spite of coming from the same country: the effective
medium for this has been music, leading to the creation of an inspiring
multinational ensemble, <i>Beating Wing
Orchestra</i>, and project involving victims of torture called <i>Stone Flowers</i>.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Garamond","serif";">As I
approach the conclusion of my words, it would be remiss of me not to refer to
the huge amount of music and, indeed, of poetry which through song has become
music that has been inspired by or created in response to conflict. Perhaps more than in any other time of war,
some remarkable soldier-composers emerged during the First World War, such as
Butterworth, Gurney, Ravel and Vaughan Williams, alongside poets, painters and
other famous artists. Even music created
by those who avoided taking part in wars, such as Second World War pacifists
like Benjamin Britten or Samuel Barber, or composers who were too old to fight
like Richard Strauss, responded to the pity of war in a way which could offer
resolution, or a musical pathway to peace, at least in their own minds and
routinely affecting those of the performers and the audiences of such
music. This summer I shall be presenting
an experiment, hopefully a first which will be much imitated in the future, by
commissioning special arrangements of some of this music, created by those
involved in and influenced by conflict, so that it can be performed by military
band. In this instance, it will be the
Band of the Royal Artillery who are of course trained and deployed in making
music for ceremonial occasions and raising public morale: indeed, on the morning
of their concert which happens to be on Armed Forces Day, 29<sup>th</sup> June,
they will have changed the guard at Buckingham Palace; that evening, however,
they will be performing a new and totally different repertory that includes the
reflective and profoundly moving songs which Ivor Gurney wrote while in the
trenches on the Somme. This concert concludes the <i>Worlds in Collision</i> conference which the City of London Festival is
presenting in partnership with The Musical Brain.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Garamond","serif";">In
conclusion, I should tell you a little bit about this conference that looks at <i>Music and the Trauma of War. </i>We are
putting it on in the Mansion House, symbolising the very heart of our capital
City and bringing together musicians, music therapists, arts practitioners,
psychologists, psychiatrists, neuroscientists, historians and soldiers to share
their knowledge and experience. The
first day looks at the application of music to the trauma of war and the second
at the response of music to the experience of conflict, ending with the unusual
concert. This event will hopefully offer
some continuity – at least one of the potential directions forward – from this
important seminar in which it has been a privilege to have the chance to
participate and say a few words. As I
said at the start and have done little to disprove in my words which followed,
we are only now scratching the surface of a huge subject and just beginning to
understand the extent of music’s usefulness and its power to make a difference
to individual lives and to humanity as a whole.<span style="color: red;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-626951746719976906.post-7029086933943679192013-10-22T13:54:00.001-07:002013-10-22T13:55:47.659-07:00Trust me, I'm a doctor...<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Yes, I can now call myself Dr. Robertson! I passed my viva on August 16, with <a href="https://www.sps.ed.ac.uk/staff/sociology/prior_nick" target="_blank">Nick Prior</a> from Edinburgh University as my external examiner and <a href="http://socialsciences.exeter.ac.uk/sociology/staff/inglis/" target="_blank">David Inglis</a> as my internal. It is pending minor revisions, but that is to be expected. Here is a picture of me with my lovely doctor-cake, made in the Norwegian-style by the amazing <a href="http://socialsciences.exeter.ac.uk/sociology/staff/denora/" target="_blank">Tia DeNora</a>:<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOxj7NKqTcR5ABgn5xPqoGg4JYVXQ6W4EBLE7Jx-f47osFgqI4ERns6Au8GVFUAx6fvt0k898QpOBTJUnH0MiKa3Kyc2sM8amQFPL8EMW5GOEz1TVyqENEZDMDvrXa74NWxilKoEVaWyYv/s1600/photo+(2).jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOxj7NKqTcR5ABgn5xPqoGg4JYVXQ6W4EBLE7Jx-f47osFgqI4ERns6Au8GVFUAx6fvt0k898QpOBTJUnH0MiKa3Kyc2sM8amQFPL8EMW5GOEz1TVyqENEZDMDvrXa74NWxilKoEVaWyYv/s320/photo+(2).jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
So now begins the long slog to find gainful employment that is at least somewhat related to music and conflict transformation. I think I came close a couple of times, but the market in the UK is pretty dire for 'soft' subjects like music and sociology, let alone new fields such as mine. All is not lost, however. I have made some great connections with the University of Leeds and I have put a bid in for a post-doctoral fellowship with the British Council to be hosted by both the Music Department and the Institute of Communications Studies at Leeds. I have also just applied for a research fellowship there as well. Meanwhile, I am still editing the upcoming book Music, Power and Liberty with Dr. Olivier Urbain from the <a href="http://www.toda.org/" target="_blank">Toda Institute</a>, who have also kindly invited me to participate in the <a href="http://www.appra2013.net/" target="_blank">Asia Pacific Peace Research Association</a> (APPRA) conference in Bangkok in November. I shall be presenting and co-hosting a special panel on the arts and non-violent conflict reduction along with Dr. Urbain and Daisuke Akimoto. I am also writing a chapter for a book to be published next year entitled Protests as Events: Events as Protests. Finally, an article that I wrote last year about the potential for music and conflict transformation has finally been accepted by Poetics, although I need to make some changes which will not be published until next year as well.<br />
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More updates from around the world soon.</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-626951746719976906.post-4382512558267083092013-06-06T09:04:00.002-07:002013-06-06T09:04:35.668-07:00Music and the Turkey Protests<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
One thing that is necessary for productive conflict transformation is a fairly even playing field when it comes to human rights and access to basic needs. It is unlikely collaborative musicking under these conditions would generate positive shared new identities that lessen tension and prejudice. Under these unequal circumstances, such as in Turkey at the moment, those with less power have the express need to band together, maintain courage and express their own joint identities in the face of oppression. Under these circumstances the usual rules of music and conflict transformation as researched thus far do not apply until the balance of power becomes more even. Until such time, the oppressed have been using music as representation and memory triggers as demonstrated in the below clips. Analysis to come later.<br />
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-626951746719976906.post-54911206074892143062013-06-06T06:59:00.001-07:002013-06-06T06:59:14.829-07:00Music Above Fighting<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
As with most music and conflict transformation initiatives that I come across, I was excited when I started watching the mini-documentary Music Above Fighting. Based in three conflicted areas separated physically by walls or partitions (Northern Ireland, Israel/Palestine, India/Pakistan), the documentary shows musicians on either side playing with each other across the border. There was one line in particular from an elderly tabla player on the Indian/Pakistani border that struck me: "Only in death and music can I cross the border." I thought this had real potential. I was very disappointed to then discover that they were all just singing and playing "Imagine" by John Lennon. I don't have anything against the song exactly, but songs for peace don't actually change anything. Increased dialogue through music across physical barriers, in spite of the barriers, no that would be inspiring. A missed opportunity.<br />
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-626951746719976906.post-3719768338133388592013-06-06T02:25:00.000-07:002013-06-06T02:28:07.044-07:00Long Time - The State of Things in Music and Conflict Transformation<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
It has been a very long time since I posted anything on this blog, for which I am mightily sorry. I have not been idle, though. I have finally submitted my PhD thesis entitled "Singing to be Normal: Tracing the Behavioural Influence of Music as Conflict Transformation" and I will complete my viva in August. I have an article under review in Poetics, I'm co-authoring/co-editing a book with Olivier Urbain from the Toda Institute entitled Music, Power and Liberty, and I am now an editor and journal manager of the Music and the Arts in Action Journal. I have a couple of conference presentations coming up, including "Protests as Events/Events as Protests" at Leeds Metropolitan University and the European Sociological Association Arts Branch conference in Turin. I have been spending the rest of my time applying for jobs or trying to create my own. Hopefully something will materialise before I starve.<br />
So what has the world been up to since my last post? What follows are some things that have caught my attention:<br />
<br />
In Jamaica and other hurricane prone Caribbean countries, poverty and a lack of opportunities has led many men to become involved in crime and violence. Recently, Catholic Relief Services have started the <a href="http://blog.usaid.gov/2013/05/how-rap-music-is-saving-lives-in-the-caribbean/?mkt_tok=3RkMMJWWfF9wsRonua/Md%2B/hmjTEU5z16OwpXqexlMI/0ER3fOvrPUfGjI4HSsVgI/qLAzICFpZo2FFcH/aQZA%3D%3D" target="_blank">Youth Emergency Action Committee</a> with the help of USAid in order to refocus youth attention on how to best respond to hurricanes and help their communities. They have discovered that the most successful manner in which to do this is through rap music in what they labelled 'edutainment.' This approach has also been used successfully for sex and AIDS education in Ghana. What seems to be happening here is not directly the result of the music, but music that appeals or resonates with a particular group promotes a more attentive mode of attention where messages located in the lyrics may infiltrate into memory, especially if the experience is enjoyed and repeated.<br />
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Cambodia Living Arts is an organisation founded by Arn-Chorn Pond, a musician, former child soldier and survivor of the Khmer Rouge genocide. The principles behind the organisation suggest that the arts are needed in order to restore identity, pride and hope to the population. This is particularly remarkable in Cambodia where, according to the Huffington Post, up to 90% of artists were killed. As in other dictatorships, despots are often the first to understand the power of music and the arts. In order to control a population in order to commit atrocities, the victims need to be seen as less than human. This is impossible if the victims are engaged with cultural expression which is the ultimate humanising activity. Despite this fact, aid agencies rarely support cultural activities. This has been criticised by research conducted by the Post-conflict Reconstruction and Development Unit at the University of York as well as by the popular press like the Huffington Post. As a result, Cambodia Living Arts has produced a month-long arts festival in New York called <a href="http://seasonofcambodia.org/" target="_blank">Season of Camboda</a>, with the support from various American philanthropists in order to raise awareness. The localised use of music in this case is the real music and conflict transformation work, yet that is not what is seen in the festival. The festival is an advertisement and fund-raiser, yet that is what audiences will remember. They will also remember a spectacle of sorts that represents a culture they are probably less familiar with. the danger here is that music and the arts is still seen as entertainment or representing a culture that is somehow rarefied, separate and unknowable. Hopefully the festival has been successful in raising awareness and funds for the important work that they do in their own communities. I hope that their work is not commodified too much in the process.<br />
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<a href="http://seasonofcambodia.org/soc/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/IMG_5741_620x400_scaled_cropp.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="206" src="http://seasonofcambodia.org/soc/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/IMG_5741_620x400_scaled_cropp.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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That's probably enough for this post.</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-626951746719976906.post-15779577924448508742012-03-27T02:10:00.000-07:002012-03-27T02:17:14.468-07:00Yet another article on the Salafist protest in Tunis<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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Tunisia's Islamist Ennahda edges away from Sharia</h1>
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<img alt="Tunisian Salafists stage a demonstration request the application of Islamic law in the new constitution (image from 25 March 2012)" height="112" src="http://news.bbcimg.co.uk/media/images/59313000/jpg/_59313033_014353139-1.jpg" style="-webkit-user-select: none; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-image: initial; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-top-width: 0px; font-style: italic; letter-spacing: 0px; position: relative;" width="200" /><span style="display: block; width: 304px;">Some 10,000 demonstrated</span><span style="display: block; width: 304px;"> in favour of Sharia in Tunis</span><span style="display: block; width: 304px;"> on Sunday</span></div>
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Officials from the largest party in Tunisia's governing coalition have said they will not support moves to enshrine Islamic law in the new constitution.</div>
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Senior members of the moderate Islamist Ennahda Party said the wording of the old constitution, which proclaims Islam as the state religion, would remain.</div>
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A group of ultra-conservative Muslims known as Salafis had demanded the introduction of Sharia.</div>
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Ennahda has been under growing pressure to declare its position on the issue.</div>
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The BBC's Jon Leyne says that the news will disappoint the increasingly vocal conservative minority, but it will bring relief to liberals and secularists who fear a tide of Islamism sweeping across the region.</div>
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"Ennahda has decided to retain the first clause of the previous constitution without change," senior Ennahda official Ameur Larayed told local media.</div>
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"We want the unity of our people and we do not want divisions."</div>
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The article from the 1959 constitution states: "Tunisia is a free, sovereign and independent state, whose religion is Islam, language is Arabic and has a republican regime."</div>
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Another senior figure, Ziad Doulatli, said he hoped the decision would help Tunisia to "serve as a model for other countries going through similar transformations".</div>
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Some 10,000 Salafis took to the streets of the capital, Tunis, on Sunday to express their support for the proposal that the country's legislation should be based on Islamic law.</div>
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The Tunisian uprising last January, which unseated long-time President Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali, inspired a wave of pro-democracy movements across North African and the Middle East.</div>
</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-626951746719976906.post-84324026592918357792012-03-27T02:05:00.003-07:002012-03-27T02:05:57.826-07:00Another article on the Salafist protest in Tunis<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<h1 class="post-title single" style="background-color: white; border-left-color: rgb(0, 66, 118); border-left-style: solid; border-left-width: 3px; color: #004276; font-family: georgia, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 20pt; letter-spacing: -1px; line-height: 1.2em; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 9px; padding-right: 9px; padding-top: 0px;">
<a href="http://www.tunisia-live.net/2012/03/25/several-thousand-salafists-demonstrate-for-islamic-law-attack-dramatists-in-tunis/" rel="bookmark" style="color: black; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" title="Permanent Link to Several Thousand Salafists Demonstrate for Islamic Law, Attack Dramatists in Tunis">Several Thousand Salafists Demonstrate for Islamic Law, Attack Dramatists in Tunis</a></h1>
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<span class="meta-author"><a href="http://www.tunisia-live.net/author/ahmedellali/" rel="author" style="color: black; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" title="Posts by Ahmed Ellali">Ahmed Ellali</a> | </span><span class="meta-date">25 March 2012 </span><span class="meta-comments">| <a href="http://www.tunisia-live.net/2012/03/25/several-thousand-salafists-demonstrate-for-islamic-law-attack-dramatists-in-tunis/#comments" rel="bookmark" style="color: black; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;" title="Comments for Several Thousand Salafists Demonstrate for Islamic Law, Attack Dramatists in Tunis">35 Comments</a></span></div>
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<a href="http://www.tunisia-live.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/Salafist-Demonstrators-with-Flag.jpg" style="color: black; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;"><img alt="" class="size-medium wp-image-35358" height="300" src="http://www.tunisia-live.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/Salafist-Demonstrators-with-Flag-226x300.jpg" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; border-bottom-style: none; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-color: initial; border-image: initial; border-left-style: none; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-style: none; border-right-width: 0px; border-top-style: none; border-top-width: 0px; border-width: initial; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="Salafist Demonstrators with Flag" width="226" /></a><div class="wp-caption-text" style="font-size: 8pt; padding-bottom: 5px; padding-left: 5px; padding-right: 5px; padding-top: 5px;">
Salafist demonstrators wave Caliphate flag on top of Tunis clocktower</div>
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A group of several thousand Salafists and their supporters demonstrated in downtown Tunis today in support of the Koran, claiming that the Muslim holy book was under threat by more secular elements of Tunisian society. Demonstrators climbed the clock tower of Tunis to fly black caliphate flags from the top of the tower and chanted slogans such as “the people want a new caliphate.”</div>
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At the same time and on the same street, the Tunisian Association for Drama Arts held a celebration for the upcoming World Day of Theater (usually March 27th) in front of the Municipal Theater. As the Salafist protest came to a close, a number of Salafist demonstrators attacked the Theater celebration.</div>
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According to Yassine Ouni, a student from the Higher Institute for Drama, the Ministry of Interior was responsible for the confrontation because they gave permits for both events knowing there would be a conflict. “The Tunisian Association for the Drama Arts event and the Salafist demonstration was held at the same time. We want to hold the Interior Ministry accountable since it gave permission to the two movements on the same day and the Ministry knew there would be tension since Drama is sacred for all artists and religion is sacred for every citizen.”</div>
<div class="wp-caption alignright" id="attachment_35362" style="background-color: white; border-bottom-color: rgb(229, 229, 229); border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-image: initial; border-left-color: rgb(229, 229, 229); border-left-style: solid; border-left-width: 1px; border-right-color: rgb(229, 229, 229); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1px; border-top-color: rgb(229, 229, 229); border-top-style: solid; border-top-width: 1px; color: #222222; float: right; font-family: georgia, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 22px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 10px; margin-right: 10px; margin-top: 0px; padding-top: 5px; text-align: center; width: 310px;">
<a href="http://www.tunisia-live.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/Salafists-in-front-of-Municipal-Theater.jpg" style="color: black; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;"><img alt="" class="size-medium wp-image-35362" height="225" src="http://www.tunisia-live.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/Salafists-in-front-of-Municipal-Theater-300x225.jpg" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; border-bottom-style: none; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-color: initial; border-image: initial; border-left-style: none; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-style: none; border-right-width: 0px; border-top-style: none; border-top-width: 0px; border-width: initial; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="Salafists in front of Municipal Theater" width="300" /></a><div class="wp-caption-text" style="font-size: 8pt; padding-bottom: 5px; padding-left: 5px; padding-right: 5px; padding-top: 5px;">
Salafists gather in front of the Municipal Theater</div>
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The permit given to the dramatists was supposed to allow them to celebrate theater in the space between the municipal theater and the Africa Hotel while the Salafists had a permit to demonstrate by the Tunis clock tower. While the Salafist organizers agreed to separate the events at first, a group of Salafists later came and damaged equipment, disrupted outdoor performances and threw eggs, empty bottles and sharp objects at those celebrating theater.</div>
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Fawzi Guara, one of the demonstrators at the Salafist organized event for supporting the Koran blamed the theater celebration organizers for the confrontation. “Some Tunisians are not respecting our religious sanctity, campaigns against our religion confirm that there are elements here who want to provoke us. They don’t respect our views.”</div>
<div class="wp-caption alignleft" id="attachment_35365" style="background-color: white; border-bottom-color: rgb(229, 229, 229); border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-image: initial; border-left-color: rgb(229, 229, 229); border-left-style: solid; border-left-width: 1px; border-right-color: rgb(229, 229, 229); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1px; border-top-color: rgb(229, 229, 229); border-top-style: solid; border-top-width: 1px; color: #222222; float: left; font-family: georgia, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 22px; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: 10px; margin-right: 10px; margin-top: 0px; padding-top: 5px; text-align: center; width: 310px;">
<a href="http://www.tunisia-live.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/Municipal-Theater.jpg" style="color: black; outline-color: initial; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; text-decoration: none;"><img alt="" class="size-medium wp-image-35365" height="225" src="http://www.tunisia-live.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/Municipal-Theater-300x225.jpg" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; border-bottom-style: none; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-color: initial; border-color: initial; border-image: initial; border-left-style: none; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-style: none; border-right-width: 0px; border-top-style: none; border-top-width: 0px; border-width: initial; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="Municipal Theater" width="300" /></a><div class="wp-caption-text" style="font-size: 8pt; padding-bottom: 5px; padding-left: 5px; padding-right: 5px; padding-top: 5px;">
Members of the Tunisian Association for Drama Arts in front of the Municipal Theater</div>
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Guara admitted that the Tunisian Association for Theater had received permission to hold an event first, but he said the Koran was more important than theater. “We knew they got permission before us, but they should give priority to defending the Koran and our religion. Anarchy can happen at any time, and simply by calling themselves ‘Theater of Resistance’ they are provoking us, resistance to whom? Did we sell out our country?”</div>
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For Guara, his demonstration was necessary because he sees Islam as being under attack. “Today Tunisia is witnessing a historical day. Tunisians went to the street to show their disapproval against the desecration of the Koran in Ben Guerdene, against the six pointed star on the wall of the Al-Fateh Mosque.”</div>
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He added that opponents of Salafists have been making a big deal out one Salafists’ desecration of the Tunisian flag at Mannouba University, just to give them a bad name. “We do love our country and our flag but the priority is for our religion and what is sacred. Islam does not oppose civility. We are here today to express our love for the Koran, for the prophet, for our holy sites. Our slogans are in support of the Koran, defending that which is sacred and rejecting discord and strife between Tunisians,” Guara said.</div>
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