Intensive Course for Hong Kong Postgraduates

 

It has been exciting to host a group of 19 Doctoral and Master students from Hong Kong in Bergen across a 2-week period in December 2023 for a new intensive course called Education and Society in Norway Today. They visited as part of the government-sponsored Global Competence Partnership project that enables collaboration at the PhD and faculty development levels between Education University of Hong Kong and Western Norway University of Applied Sciences. It is the second time in 2023 that we have had a large delegation of visitors coming from Hong Kong to Bergen through this project.   

This time, the 19 students came to Bergen along with one professor (Koji Matsunobu) and one administrator (Rachel Yik Man Li). Their intensive course has featured academic lectures and discussions, museum tours, visits to an array of Norwegian schools (including comprehensive school, outdoor school, barnehage, and kulturskole, and the HVL Stord island campus), cultural heritage sites (Viking sites, stave churches, etc.), and training in VR/MR technologies and educational research methods. 

Click HERE to see an article about our Outdoor School visit as part of the recent course in the local Nordhordland newspaper.   

This weekend we will also be hosting the second annual GAME Symposium of the Grieg Academy Music Education research group, which this time features writing workshops for an EU Horizon Europe application as well as cooperation with notable Sami musicians. The GAME symposium in Bergen will include a number of scholars, musicians and other guests doing interesting work: Stefan Ostersjo, Johan Sara, Annukka Hirvasvuopio, Maia Mazurkiewicz, Mikolaj Rykowski, Judith Trondle, Boris Traue, Knut Eysturstein, Susanne Rosenberg, Koji Matsunobu, David Johnson, Odd Turleiv Furness, Sondre Pettersen, Steinar Satre, Sergei Tchirkov, Jostein Stalheim, Knut Jonas Sellevold, Matthieu Stepec, and several more joining online. Click HERE to learn about the 2022 GAME Symposium offered last year.

Tour Posters: Sympathetic Resonance Trio

Here are posters for the Barents tour of the Sympathetic Resonance Trio, which offers a program of timeless songs on the theme of nature, peace, empathy and international cooperation during wartime.

TESTIMONIALS FROM THE TOUR: 

“… truly exceptional. The event seamlessly blended artistic expression with community engagement, showcasing the profound impact of sympathetic resonance in a live performance setting. The musicianship was outstanding, deeply engaging the audience and creating a captivating atmosphere. This concert not only provided a delightful cultural experience but also underscored the innovative dedication of Sympathetic Resonance in exploring the intricate connections between music and human emotions across national borders.” 

– Research Director, Norwegian Institute of Bioeconomy Research (May, 2024).  

“The Sympathetic Resonance Trio, consisting of Sergei Tchirkov (accordion), David Gabriel Hebert (trumpet, vocals), and Ole Øvretveit (guitar), delivered a memorable performance that deeply resonated with our audience. The trio's ability to play with different musical traditions and styles resulted in a unique program that captivated everyone in attendance. For us, it was also important that the trio's work is built on collaboration and improvisation, crossing cultural and geographical boundaries. Their music serves as a meeting point for different cultures, represented by the USA, Norway, and Russia. We believe that this kind of collaboration and dialogue is extremely important today. Hosting the Sympathetic Resonance Trio was a great experience. They showed impressive artistry and professionalism. We're keen to invite them for future performances. We believe their music has significant cultural and artistic value, and their presence supports our mission of promoting artistic exchange and cultural enrichment in Kirkenes. We look forward to the possibility of working with the Sympathetic Resonance Trio again and continuing to support their artistic journey.” 

– Co-curator and Producer, Pikene på Broen (May, 2024). 

 

Handbook of Japanese Music in the Modern Era

It is a pleasure to announce a new book that promises to become an invaluable resource for anyone interested in the current state of music in Japan. The Handbook of Japanese Music in the Modern Era is soon being published by Brill. It is edited by Henry Johnson, an accomplished ethnomusicologist who is known for his important books on Japanese instruments. Johnson has worked in this field for many years and is a skilled and meticulous editor who carefully selected leading experts to write on an array of topics for this anthology. Here is how the book is described:

“Exploring an array of captivating topics, from hybridized Buddhist music to AI singers, this book introduces Japanese music in the modern era. The twenty-five chapters show how cultural change from the late nineteenth century to the present day has had a profound impact on the Japanese musical landscape, including the recontextualization and transformation of traditional genres, and the widespread adoption of Western musical practices ranging from classical music to hip hop.”

I am happy to have developed a chapter for this book on the teaching of musical instruments in Japanese schools, co-authored with Koji Matsunobu as a research outcome of the Global Competence Partnership project between our institutions. We look forward to further collaborations of this kind, and I encourage anyone interested in this topic to examine the book.

Here is a link to our chapter: 

https://brill.com/edcollchap/book/9789004687172/BP000027.xml

 

ISME Routledge Book Series

 

After some years, the ISME Routledge book series of the International Society for Music Education (on Routledge press) is now seeing some changes.

It was a joy to learn that I have been appointed to the Editorial Board along with a group of accomplished scholars from around the world: Emily Akuno, José Luis Aróstegui, Pamela Burnard, Chee Hoo Lum, Alexandra Kertz Welzel, Susan O’Neill, and John O’Flynn. The series is led by senior editor Gwen Moore.

Clearer procedures have now been established for handling proposals, contracting, and reviews for robust quality assurance and I am pleased to report that we have some quite interesting books on a broad range of topics coming soon!

Creative Innovations in Higher Education PhD Course

The next Bergen Summer Research School (2024) will include an exciting new PhD course called Creative Innovations in Higher Education.

Colleges and universities across the world are evolving to better meet the needs of a changing society, seeking new opportunities through innovations in teaching, research, outreach, and governance. This course will explore and critique concepts and initiatives that promise to improve the effectiveness and relevance of higher education.

Click HERE for more information on Bergen Summer Research School, which attracts PhD students from all around the world each year.

Here is more information about the course Creative Innovations in Higher Education:

Course leader
David G. Hebert, Professor, Faculty of Education, Western Norway University of Applied Sciences (HVL), Bergen.

Course lecturers
Emily Achieng' Akuno, Vice Chancellor, Jaramogi Oginga Odinga University of Science and Technology (JOOUST), Kenya. 
Chetwyn Chan, Professor of Psychology, Vice President, Education University of Hong Kong.
Marianne Løkke Jakobsen, Founding member and project leader, The Global Conservatoire. Head of Department, Director of Global Engagement, Royal Danish Academy of Music, Copenhagen. 
Tom Are Trippestad, Professor of Educational Theory and Policy, Western Norway University of Applied Sciences. 
Yusef Waghid, Distinguished Professor of Philosophy of Education and Acting Head of Department at Stellenbosch University, South Africa.  
Abdul Quddus, Professor of Organization and Management, Western Norway University of Applied Sciences.

Course description
How can higher education become more effective, relevant, and inspiring? This course is designed for future professors and university leaders who intend to generate sustainable improvements.

Sometimes higher education is seen as an “ivory tower”, distant from practical concerns, but many new approaches seek to cultivate universities that are more directly engaged with professions and local communities. Some initiatives that claim to be “innovative” come with risks and provoke debates about the proper balance between financial costs and educational quality, or between practical skills and holistic competencies.

Some forms of internationalization are effective while others merely have a superficial impact. We will critically examine examples of sustainable creative innovation in specific professional fields, such as the training of teachers. Our course will focus on foundational values, ongoing debates, and recent research findings, with the aim of discerning which creative innovations are most promising for the future of higher education.

Learning outcomes - Students will:

•       Understand how the higher education sector can contribute to the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals.

•       Develop a global sense of various ways that colleges and universities are changing worldwide, and the underlying reasons for their evolution.

•       Recognize diverse approaches and initiatives to generate sustainable innovations to teaching, research, outreach, and governance in higher education institutions.

•       Critically evaluate applications of “innovation” discourse in higher education.

•       Produce research publications based on the course material.

Course leader

David G. Hebert, PhD, is a professor with the Faculty of Education, Western Norway University of Applied Sciences, Bergen. He is also Honorary Professor with the Education University of Hong Kong and Affiliated Professor with University of the Faroe Islands. Additionally, he mentors postgraduate students with Kyambogo and Makerere universities and teaches a course on arts policy for China University of Political Science and Law. Author or editor of 10 academic books, he has taught for universities on each inhabited continent. With grant support from Norwegian government programs, he is now co-developing new doctoral programs in China and Uganda.

 Credits

Participation at the BSRS is credited under the European Credit Transfer System (ECTS). Participants submitting an essay, in a form of a publishable manuscript of 10-20 pages, after the end of the summer school will receive 10 ECTS. Deadline for submission will be decided by your course leader. It is also possible to participate without producing an essay. This will give you 5 ECTS. In order to receive credits, we expect full participation in the course-specific modules, plenary events and roundtables.

More details: https://www.uib.no/en/rs/bsrs/165806/creative-innovations-higher-education

 

UPDATE: I am happy to report that due to the nationwide strike my course Creative Innovations in Higher Education is not actually cancelled, but merely postponed to summer 2025. More information will be posted on the BSRS website by Autumn 2024.

 

Ethnomusicology of a European Composer

In just a few months, a new book will be published by Mikolaj Rykowski (vice rector, Paderewski Academy of Music, Poznan, Poland) as the fourth volume in Deep Soundings: The Lexington Series in Historical Ethnomusicology (Lexington Books, Rowman & Littlefield).

This book applies the theoretical concept music glocalization and methods from historical ethnomusicology to bring unprecedented insights into the life, times, and social milieu of European composer Franz Xaver Scharwenka (1850-1924), who experienced great success in the USA as well as central Europe. The book promises to be a useful model for others who seek to apply an ethnomusicological perspective to western art music.

 

Book description:

Music Glocalization and the Composer: The Case of Franz Xaver Scharwenka (1850-1924) examines the life and compositions of composer Franz Xaver Scharwenka. Mikołaj Rykowski argues that Scharwenka held the ability to function on a global scale relatively early in music history, founding conservatories in Berlin and New York, becoming one of the first artists to record music using cutting-edge audio technology of his time, namely the Welte-Mignon rolls, and by staging his own opera at The Met. Using a relatively new methodological perspective called music glocalization, Rykowski enables us to explore the composer's cultural roots in Poland and observe how the nineteenth century global sense of nationality influenced his musical output.

 

Barents Tour

 

It was a great pleasure to learn today that Sympathetic Resonance Trio has been awarded some funding from the Norwegian Barents Secretariat. This will enable us to work on project development and concert planning in the Kirkenes area, along the Russian border in the far Northeast of Norway.

We hope our songs from Norway, Russia, and the United States, will encourage the diverse peoples of that region (which has long depended on mutually-beneficial trade with Russia) by sharing some collective hope as we all eagerly await a return to peaceful and prosperous cooperation.

 

Image source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kirkenes#/media/File:View_of_Kirkenes.jpg

Courses in Doctoral Supervision

via GIPHY

This year, 2023, will be my fourth year of doing some teaching for the annual university-wide faculty professional development course on Doctoral Supervision at University of Bergen UPED 691: Becoming a Supervisor: Community, Expertise, Dialogue. Each time this course has quite interesting discussions, and includes lecturers and young professors from a vast array of academic fields, so I look forward to it.

I am now developing a similar course for faculty at Western Norway University of Applied Sciences through the Global Competence Partnership project. Also, I am now authoring a book chapter that discusses this topic through a critical literature review as well as reflections on my own experiences as a PhD student and mentor. There is so much to say about this topic, and I am hopeful that the chapter will be useful for readers. 

Here are links to postings about previous years in which I taught for this course: https://sociomusicology.blogspot.com/2020/10/doctoral-supervision-course.html

 

Keynote Speech for Higher Arts Education conference in China

There will soon be a very interesting opportunity to offer a keynote speech (through videoconferencing) titled “Recent Developments in Arts Diplomacy and Arts Education Policies,” for the conference Traditional, Ethnic, Global: Forum on Higher Education Art and Traditional Arts Education from an International Perspective. 

This conference is hosted by China's leading law faculty at one of the world's most selective universities, China University of Political Science and Law. 

Decolonisation of Academia

There will soon be a public event at University of Bergen called Decolonisation of Academia. I am one of the invited speakers for it, and look forward to the discussion. It is hosted by SAIH, the Norwegian Students' and Academics' International Assistance Fund. Below is an announcement about the event from SAIH-Bergen: 

Decolonization is an important topic within the field of academic freedom. Within academia decolonization can be discussed in relevance to curriculum, scientific methods and university culture. Questions such as : ‘’What is valuable knowledge?’’ or ‘’What is valid research?’’ can make us reflect upon old colonial influence and how it is constraining science and corrupting power relations within academia. Approaching this topic from both international and Norwegian perspectives will help in understanding the recent efforts and discoveries in achieving decolonization. At its core, decolonization within academia aims to restructure power systems which do not support adequate development of research and by extension, society. 

-----

In this panel discussion we have the following panelists:

- Anwesha Dutta, PI of an NFR (NORGLOBAL) project, "Prioritising the Displacement-Environment Nexus: Refugee and IDP Settlements as Social- Ecological Systems."

- Carmeliza Soares da Costa Rosário,  postdoctoral researcher at Chr. Michelsen Institute (CMI) and a Development and Social Anthropologist. 

- Lise Rakner, PI of Norhed:  epistemologies Decolonizing Epistemologies: Disciplines and the University in Relation to the Society and the World (NORHED II).

- Wesley Maraire, a guest researcher and affiliate at the Centre on Law & Social Transformation: CMI (University of Bergen).

- David Gabriel Hebert, who has contributed to the fields of comparative education and East Asian Studies.

--------------------

The panel will be moderated by Morgan Alangeh. 

Location: Ulriken Aula, Ulrikes Pihls Hus, Professor Keysers gate 1, 5007 Bergen

This event is part of Internasjonale Uke.

--------------------

Here are some recent publications that have aimed to decolonize approaches to philosophy of education as well as both teaching and research activity in music history, music education, and music performance studies in higher education:

• Theory and Method in Historical Ethnomusicology (2014, Rowman & Littlefield)
• Music Glocalization: Heritage and Innovation in a Digital Age (2018, Cambridge Scholars)
• World Music Pedagogy VII: Teaching World Music in Higher Education (Routledge, 2021) 
• Ethnomusicology and Cultural Diplomacy (Rowman & Littlefield, 2022)
• Comparative and Decolonial Studies in Philosophy of Education (Springer, 2023)
• Shared Listenings: Methods for Transcultural Musicianship and Research (Cambridge University Press, 2023).

Some of my recent projects have introduced principles of decolonization through international cooperation:

• https://www.hvl.no/en/research/prosjekt/global-competence-partnership/
• https://www.uib.no/en/cabute

 

Music in Action: Grieg Research School

For PhD candidates, post-docs, postgraduate students and senior researchers ... the GRS Autumn Course Music in Action will run from November 28-30, 2023. The event is organized by the Grieg Research School in Interdisciplinary Music Studies and is hosted by The University of Agder. 

Also, I am pleased to mention that as of a few weeks ago I am now serving on the GRS Board, which was part of what brought me to Norway over a decade ago. I am glad this promise has been kept, and I now have an opportunity to contribute to GRS as expected.

Link to event announcement: 

https://www.uib.no/en/rs/grieg/163696/music-action

 

INVITATION 

Music in Action

 

The theme of the course is 'Music in Action' and will explore the ways in which music acts in complex social, cultural, educational, and historical contexts. Music in Action invites presentations on how musical practices encounter and engage with society. The meeting points between artistic and scholarly approaches to research in music – such as applied or practice-based research – is of particular interest. An overarching question for the call is How can research in and with music can understand, analyse, and even initiate musical practices that act in complex social, cultural, educational, and historical contexts?

 

The course will feature presentations and discussions convened by researchers from key research groups/projects based in UiA's Faculty of fine arts, including researchers and topics from:

1. Arts and social relations
2. Art and Conflict
3. Art & Young People
4. Reconfiguring historical, Musical Crafts Education RHiMuCE
5. Music, Dance, Drama - cross-artistic practices and educational discourses
6. CreaTeMe centre of excellence at UiA

You may choose to engage in a dialogue with one or more of these groups and their areas of research in your presentations (please specify in your abstract if you wish to do so).

 

Specific questions to address include, but are not limited to:

• How can research in and with music create new approaches to questions of health, social justice, and sustainability?
• How can musical experiences and practices play a dynamic role in dealing with complex and potentially conflicting social conditions?
• What role can/does music play in children’s and young people’s lives?
• How can we educate musicians as socially engaged artists?
• How can we improve, develop and discover new interdisciplinary methodological approaches to how we study and present music?  
• How can we revitalize music pedagogy and arts education in the school of the future?

GRS courses are an interdisciplinary space that fosters critical and constructive dialogue. The format of presentations is flexible, and we invite performances, multimedia presentations, posters, panel discussions, and workshops, in addition to the usual oral presentations. Other formats that utilize our fields and ways of doing and disseminating research in music are also welcomed.

 

CALL FOR PAPERS

Abstracts are welcomed from any Ph.D. Candidates, Post-docs, Masters’ students, supervisors and researchers from any institution. The event is free for all registered participants.

Deadline for abstracts is 12th October. Follow this link to submit an abstract:

https://skjemaker.app.uib.no/view.php?id=15634751

 

ECTS CREDITS 

Ph.D. candidates can gain 3 or 5 ECTS credit points for active participation during this course and have the option of presenting on the main theme of the course OR on their own research project. These presentations will receive feedback from senior researchers and peers. 

 

REGISTRATION 

Registrations are now open. Follow this link:

https://forms.microsoft.com/e/mGEwGSTHCW

 

Kyambogo University Delegation in Bergen

We are excited to be hosting a delegation of special guests from Kyambogo University (Kampala, Uganda) for two weeks (16-26 October 2023). The Ugandan guests are coming through support of the CABUTE project. They will have the opportunity to receive research mentoring, use university libraries and offices, observe teaching, and visit rehearsals of several music ensembles in the Bergen area.

Click HERE to see the program for the 2023 CABUTE symposium at Western Norway University of Applied Sciences. 

I greatly enjoyed visiting Kyambogo University last year, which is soon launching a PhD program in Music Education. The university especially plays an important role in the field of teacher education in Uganda. Shown here are the Kyambogo University logo and an image of the new university gate to be erected in the coming months.

Philosopher Kathleen Higgins in Bergen

I am very pleased to announce that we were able to invite philosopher Kathleen Higgins to visit Bergen in a few weeks. She is an extraordinary scholar. Below is the poster for this event and the covers of several books for which Prof. Higgins is an author, co-author, or editor. Her visit to Norway is co-sponsored by the Grieg Academy Music Education research group and the Bergen Network for Women in Philosophy.  

Click HERE to see the announcement of this event at University of Bergen. 

I am happy to report that a photo I took of three women philosophers at this event later became the cover for the University of Bergen philosophy department's brochure ... 

Below are some of the many books for which Kathleen Higgins is an author, co-author or editor ...