Lutfia Rabbani Foundation Sponsors Musicians Without Borders

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

"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."

They are one of the sponsors for the Musicians Without Borders project in Palestine. Read about both here:

https://rabbanifoundation.org/about-us/the-foundation/

https://www.musicianswithoutborders.org/eng/our-work/programs/where-we-work/palestine/

Keywords in Music and Peacebuilding

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)[1], 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.

 https://musicandartsinaction.net/index.php/maia/issue/view/keywords-for-music-in-peacebuilding-vol-1

[1] http://institute.min-on.org/

Palestinian Cultural Resilience Through Musicking under Israeli Military Rule 1948-1966

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.

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!

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.

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.

 

This is Habib, a 96 year old Palestinian Greek Orthodox Communist, proudly displaying his tree.

 

 

This is Badea, a traditional wedding singer and son of perhaps the most famous wedding singer in Palestine, Attallah.

 

 

Some of the border wall in Bethlehem. 

 

 

A bit of Banksy in Bethlehem. 

 

 

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!

 

 

It was also Coptic Christmas and there were a lot of Ethiopians who made the pilgrimage in clothing not suitable for the mountain winter.

 

 

The seventh station of Christ in Jerusalem, with soldiers with guns at the ready. No idea why.

 

 

One example of an illegal Jewish settlement, heavily defended, smack in the middle of the Muslim Quarter in Jerusalem. Cozy.

The Relationship Between Wellbeing and Peacebuilding: A Musical Perspective

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?
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.
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.

Peace, Empathy and Conciliation Through Music Event

This sounds like a very interesting event in Australia in September. Featuring a keynote by Laura Hassler, the director of Musicians Without Borders, whom I met in Bogota last year.

Date: 21-22 September 2017
Venue: The University of Melbourne, Parkville VIC 3052
Submission Deadline: Thursday 1 June 2017
Event Registration Deadline: Saturday 1 July 2017
Enquiries: Samantha Dieckmann (samantha.dieckmann@unimelb.edu.au)

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.

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’.

ISA Conference, Baltimore - Part 1

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.

The Society for Ethnomusicology's Music and Social Justice Resources Project

This is very interesting and hopefully a point of renewed contact between the music and peacebuilding researchers and the applied ethnomusicologists:

https://ethnomusicology.site-ym.com/page/Resources_Social

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...

Idara Baraye Taleem-o-Taraqi (IBT)

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.