Hidden Meanings in Elementary Instrumental Music Method Books: A Multimodal Critical Discourse Analysis

• In Event: AERA Graduate Student Research-in-Progress Roundtable Session 1
  In Roundtable Session: Understanding Race and Culture in Music and Museum Education (Table 3)

Abstract

Educators rely upon textbooks to deliver curriculum in numerous subject areas and educational contexts, but much previous research has revealed that these texts impart hidden meanings to students. This Multimodal Critical Discourse Analysis explored two elementary instrumental music textbook series to investigate whose cultures, perspectives, and knowledge are conveyed by the texts and whose are excluded or misrepresented. Applying a theoretical framework of Postcolonialism, the research found that the texts privilege narratives of social groups representing Eurocentric, White perspectives. The texts incorporate non-dominant cultures as a "token," omitting many groups and, in multiple cases, altering the representations of others. In addition to these findings, the research contributes to the fields of Multimodal Critical Discourse Analysis, ethnomusicology, and critical textbook analysis.

Author

• Mara Hope Thompson, Central Dauphin School District