Publications and Postgraduates in Uganda

Two more music Master students have conditionally passed their examinations, and after completing revisions will soon be able to graduate with their Master degrees in Music from Kyambogo University, Uganda. CONGRATULATIONS!! 

It was a pleasure to work with both Vincent Muhindo and Hellen Hasahya through the CABUTE project, funded by the Norwegian government's NORHED program.

Additionally, the CABUTE project’s music PhD graduate, Erisa Walubo, will soon publish an additional co-authored publication, this time in the International Journal of Music Education.

Below are Dr. Erisa Walubo’s two major publications:

• Walubo, E., Johnson, D. T., & Hebert, D. G. (accepted for publication, 2026). Decolonisation of musical arts education in Uganda, Kenya, and Tanzania: A scoping review. International Journal of Music Education.

• Walubo, E. & Hebert, D. G. (2026). Epistemic decolonization of musical arts education: Analysis and recommendations from Uganda. Philosophy of Music Education Review, 34(1), 42-63.   https://muse.jhu.edu/pub/3/article/988395/summary

 

AI+ Music Education II

It was a great pleasure to participate in the Second International Symposium on AI+Music Education, held in beautiful Xiamen, China, at Jimei University. I gave one of the invited keynote speeches along with notable invitees such as Alex Ruthmann and Bo-wah Leung. Click HERE to learn more about this event. 

In addition to our keynotes, there were over 150 presentations at this event, with 85 in just one of the three major conference themes.

China is certainly leading the world when it comes to research and development of Music AI (particularly in relation to education), and it was exciting to see so many presentations expressing a sensible balance of both excitement about the possibilities and concern regarding the artistic and educational risks of AI.

The discussion was very thought provoking and reached some important points of consensus on how arts educators can properly respond to revolutionary technologies.   

Next year this event will be held at Beijing Language and Culture University.

 

Book Review: AI and Music Education

A quite informative review of our recent book A New Philosophy of Music Education for the Era of AI (Routledge, 2026) has now been published by Cambridge University Press in the British Journal of Music Education. 

Click here to access: 
https://doi.org/10.1017/S0265051726101107

According to its author, Associate Professor Lee Cheng, “the philosophical foundations, values and purposes of music education in an environment increasingly shaped by AI remain underexplored. A New Philosophy of Music Education for the Era of AI addresses this gap by exploring how music education can help individuals achieve self-discovery in this transformative era (...) the book offers a timely philosophical intervention at a moment when people are increasingly embracing and relying on AI without critically reflecting on its broader implications for humanity or how society may be transformed by its growing presence. This book is a call for music educators to look beyond what AI can do and reconsider what it means to be human through music education.”

Click HERE to see reviews of my previous books. 

 

Inequalities in Higher Education and the Arts

Each year, more than 100 PhD students from universities around the world come to Bergen, Norway for its Bergen Summer Research School (BSRS), where during a brief residency they gain valuable new perspectives with interdisciplinary insights.

The theme of the 2027 BSRS is Moral Economies, and it will be held on 7-17 June, 2027. I look forward to teaching its PhD course Inequalities in Higher Education and the Arts. Click HERE for the course description. 

More information about the BSRS application process is on the Bergen Summer Research School website, and the application deadline is at the end of January 2027. We anticipate strong interest in this course and look forward to seeing who is accepted and what develops from our global collaborations.

 

Chinese Translations

Recently there are several publications—in Chinese language translation—of various music R&D projects that I have been working on. Chinese is certainly one of the most important languages, with around 1.4 billion people, or 17% of the world’s population speaking Chinese as a native language, so it is exciting to be directly reaching these readers in an approachable and inclusive way.

 

Pictured here is the Chinese translation of our book Teaching World Music in Higher Education (World Music Pedagogy, vol.7), and a very impressive translation of Theory and Method in Historical Ethnomusicology was also published just a few years ago.

 

I also had the opportunity to assist in development of a Chinese-English bilingual book called English Coursebook on Chinese Music, led by Dr. Zijin Yao of Beijing Language and Culture University, which offers a very approachable overview (for students) of all aspects of Chinese music tradition in both Chinese and English languages.

 

Most recently, the following chapter was translated, to be published very soon in Chinese language:

·       Hebert, D. G. (2026, submitted/forthcoming). Music, Diplomacy, and Intercultural Understanding (translated into Chinese). In C.-H. Leung (Ed.), Proceedings of International Conference on One Belt One Road Arts and Culture 2025. Hong Kong: Sino United Publishing/Chung Hwa Book Co.  

And here are selected reviews in Chinese language:

·       ----Click HERE for a review of our book A New Philosophy of Music Education for the Era of AI (Routledge, 2026).

·       ----Click HERE for discussions in Chinese surrounding the translation of Theory and Method in Historical Ethnomusicology.

·       ----Click HERE to access Chinese language discussion of one of my conference speeches.

·       ----Click HERE to access records from one of my many keynote speeches in China.

 

Historical Ethnomusicology 2026

I look forward to participating in the 71st Annual Meeting of the Society for Ethnomusicology (SEM), which will be held on November 5 - 8, 2026, in Bloomington, Indiana (USA), on the Indiana University campus.

 

At this conference, I will lead one meeting as Chair of the Historical Ethnomusicology Section, and will also be presenting a paper, “A Philosophy of World Music Instruction for the Age of AI”. I also intend to visit the university's world-renowned Archives of Traditional Music to discuss digitization and research procedures related to a proposal to develop a major interdisciplinary MUSIC research center in Bergen, Norway.  

 

The Historical Ethnomusicology Section meeting will be on Thursday, 05 November 2026, 7:00pm - 9:00pm, in the Walnut room, Main Floor, 60.

The abstract of my paper presentation is below.

 

 

A Philosophy of World Music Instruction for the Age of AI

David Hebert

Western Norway University of Applied Sciences; Education University of Hong Kong

 

In most ethnomusicology graduate programs, current debates in philosophy of education tend to receive little to no attention. The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate the application of a new philosophy in the teaching of world music, a common responsibility of ethnomusicologists in higher education. While previous books (e.g. World Music Pedagogy, VII: Teaching World Music in Higher Education) offer helpful methods for collegiate world music instruction, the purpose of a philosophy text is to provide foundations that empower us to reconceptualize the meaning and ultimate purpose of instruction in this field, while illuminating new resources for sustained inspiration, thereby reducing professional “burnout”. The presenter’s twelfth book, co-authored with a Chinese ethnomusicologist (Routledge, 2026), is concerned with how music educators can respond to the array of novel challenges coming from generative AI, and serves as background for this paper. Our book applies a systems science approach to global philosophy of history by arguing how and why human narratives evolved in particular ways across time, which ultimately engenders a new perspective on musical meaning in relation to both personal identity and AI. This matters for ethnomusicologists teaching world music, particularly as the popularization of generative AI tools challenges us to reconsider what quality education entails and what we could hope world music students might learn to do and understand through our teaching. AI prompts us to rethink not only classroom activities and approaches to assessment, but also notions of creative originality, ownership, and music heritage, demanding a new educational philosophy.

 

Session Details:

12I: Mediating World Music: Authority, Authenticity, and Musical Tradition in a Global Age
Time: 08/Nov/2026: 10:45am-12:15pm · Location: Dogwood

 

Humanities and Social Sciences Communications

It is exciting to now be joining the Editorial Board of Humanities and Social Sciences Communications (Springer Nature). 

With a distinguished history, this is a major international journal, and according to some metrics, ranked first in general humanities and social sciences, with a 4.8 impact factor. 

It will be quite interesting to have a chance to review articles submitted to this journal and to contribute to its quality assurance. 

Here is a description of the journal's scope: 

Our scope is inclusive and is open to theoretical, methodological, quantitative and qualitative scholarship that makes a contribution to the literature. We particularly welcome research that speaks to emerging areas of thinking, agenda-setting issues, or grand societal challenge—irrespective of the field of study.

We encourage the submission of interdisciplinary perspectives where there is a clear relevance to the advancement of the humanities, or behavioural or social sciences. This includes research arising in, or informed by, the physical, life, clinical and environmental sciences, for instance: medical humanities, digital humanities, environmental sociology, and complex network studies. 

Scholarship that reflects on, or seeks to inform, policymaking of all types, is also welcomed.