This summary of this article-based dissertation consists of a report on the research process, the main findings of the sub-studies, and a wider theoretical extension and synthesis of the research task as a whole. The sub-studies, which are comprised in article form as part of this dissertation (see appendices I-IV), complete the main research objective by bringing various perspectives to the processes of inclusive music education offered by the pedagogical practices, important events, policy negotiations, and individual accounts that have taken place during the research process and in interactions between myself and the actors of Resonaari. In chapter 1, I have described the background information and context needed for the research agenda. chapter 2 comprises a literature review and conceptualization of key issues around inclusion and music education
from perspectives that are relevant to this research project. chapter 3 provides a thorough description of the development of the methodological lenses for the reflexive process of this project as a whole. In chapter 4 I will describe each sub-study separately, including the methodological choices and summaries of the main findings. Chapter 5 offers the discussion of the research findings on a wider conceptual and theoretical level through emerging key themes. Lastly, in chapter 6, I will conclude by summarizing the reflexive research process and present practical outcomes of this research project, and make suggestions in how to engage with democratic inclusion in music education, and specifically music teacher education.
2 At the crossroads of inclusion discourses
The Salamanca Declaration (UNESCO, 1994) formed the roots for a universal inclusive principle for policy and practice in schooling and education, ensuring full United Nations support for developing comprehensive frameworks for achieving equitable education systems globally that draw special attention to children with disabilities. The declaration states, for example, that
• every child has a fundamental right to education, and must be given the opportunity to achieve and maintain an acceptable level of learning,
• every child has unique characteristics, interests, abilities and learning needs,
• education systems should be designed and educational programmes implemented to take into account the wide diversity of these characteristics and needs,
• those with special educational needs must have access to regular schools which should accommodate them within a child-centred pedagogy capable of meeting these needs,
• regular schools with this inclusive orientation are the most effective means of combating discriminatory attitudes, creating welcoming communities, building an inclusive society and achieving education for all; moreover, they provide an effective education to the majority of children and improve the efficiency and ultimately the cost-effectiveness of the entire education system. (UNESCO, 1994, pp. viii-ix)
A common disappointment during the two decades since the Salamanca statement has been the lack of success and progress toward Education for All in different countries, particularly in the UK and the Nordic countries (Kiuppis &
Sarromaa Hausstätter, 2014). The criticisms address various issues. First, inclusive action through educational practice has been run over by neoliberalist policy benchmarking (Rix & Parry, 2014). Second, there is a lack of definition of what inclusion is, thus maintaining the special education industry and pathologizing discourses, rather than offering more reflection or theorizing about it (Allan, 2014; 2010). Third, the ethos of ‘education for all’ is often narrowed down to education for students with disabilities or special needs – therefore, it has been stated that inclusive education should disengage itself from special education agenda (Hollenweger, 2014; Allan, 2010; Young & Mintz, 2008).
In research literature, inclusion has been scrutinized widely across disciplines, from educational theory, including schooling policy, curriculum theory, teacher
education, and identity theories, to social theory, postcolonial theory, feminist theory, and disability studies, among others. In this chapter I will provide a brief literature review on the key issues and questions regarding how inclusion is understood, more specifically in relation to disability and ageing, as they are pertinent topics of the sub-studies of this research project, and how these questions have been addressed in music education.
In general public discourse and policy, inclusion is regarded as the key solution to injustices confronted by marginalized groups of society. However, this view is often accepted without a deeper problematization of the inclusion processes, goals, and consequences (Enslin & Hedge, 2010). Considerations around the complexity, or the impossibility of inclusion as stated in the title of this dissertation emanate from the dichotomous understandings of inclusion as an educational principle.
While I want to emphasize that disability is not the only identity available for people given such a medicalized assignment, the following notions on inclusion discourses circulate to a great degree around the literature focusing on disability within institutional settings and educational relationships. Nevertheless, whilst inclusion is usually discussed in reference to students assigned to the category of disability, thus regarding them as incompetent within the educational system (Jenkins, 1998), this notion of inclusion is insufficient for this research project.
It is perhaps noteworthy to point out, especially to international readers, that the interplay between the concepts of inclusion and diversity in this dissertation is intentional, and contextual. Indeed, targeting disability, although as one kind of diversity, as the sole center of inclusion discourse should be problematized in the first place (Enslin & Hedge, 2010). In the same vein, the conceptualization of diversity is not limited here to differentiating people in terms of their ethnicity or cultural origins, especially aligning with the broad conceptualization of diversity as human pluralism in the Scandinavian educational realm (Bagga-Gupta, 2007).
This broad approach is taken in the hope that this research project might have a contribution to make beyond the dualistic ‘special’ and ‘regular’ schooling agenda.
Thus, it is understood here that inclusion concerns a broad spectrum of human diversifying characteristics, such as ethnicity, age, gender, sexual orientation, (dis) ability, religion, language, and socioeconomic class that may lead to oppression and marginalization of individuals that are “differently positioned” (Alvarez McHatton & Vallice, 2014) in educational and social-cultural fields. Hence, and with regard to sub-study I (appendix I) as part of this research project (see section 4.1 for a more detailed description of the study), I extend the inclusion framework to older citizens with a notion of age as one of the most marginalizing elements in educational and cultural surroundings, where youth is idealized
and old age stigmatized (Nelson, 2011; Zebrowits & Montepare, 2000; Cuddy
& Fiske, 2002). Indeed, it has been argued that older adults confront ageism in educational settings by teachers due to ignorance or even fear (Greenberg, Schimel & Martens, 2002).
This research project aims to penetrate inclusion discourses by drawing both thin and broad lines between disability studies, ageing studies, adult education, humanist psychology, medicalized models of disability, and overemphasized care discourse in relation to ageing. Here I thematize the tensions and dichotomies of the prevailing inclusion discourses in the notion of the individual through dependency versus agency; difference versus normalcy; and incompetence versus learning potential.
These dichotomies can be perceived both in the practical understandings and the theoretical formulations of inclusion within special education discourse.
‘Special education’ has become a kind of euphemism for oppression (Slee, 2008), suggesting different goals should exist for students who should be considered the same as any other student group (Young & Mintz, 2008). Moreover, another identified form of oppression, namely ageism, can be argued to be a fallacy, as many stereotypes of older people assume a homogeny that simply does not exist (Nelson, 2011). In music education, older adults are rarely provided with opportunities to enroll in intergenerational and pedagogically ambitious learning contexts; rather, they are considered as a homogenous group overlooking the individual learning potential and interests (Koopman, 2007). Thus, arguments about segregated institutional contexts as safe havens for ‘inclusive practices’
within music education need more challenging and theoretical questioning.
To account for this argument of the existing inclusion paradox (Slee, 2009), I will first present some of the literature concerning the conceptual views of inclusion in general educational research, and the dichotomous relationship between special and mainstream education related to disability (2.1). Then, in section 2.2, I will extend the literature review to a dichotomous notion between the ‘new language of learning’ (Biesta, 2006a) and the more holistic view on lifelong learning and agency (Biesta, Field, Hodkinson, Macleod & Goodson 2011; Formosa, 2002) in relation to the marginalization of old age in music education (e.g. Harnum, 2007), as well as more broadly. In section 2.3, I will focus more specifically on music through pinpointing these dichotomous discourses as related to and realized through music education. Finally, I will adjoin some perspectives from the studies deriving from critical social theory, especially concerning the marginalization of
disability and age, making a further note on the current discourses concerning the democratic and inclusive potentials in education through a broader notion of diversity, and the conceptual, methodological, and practical challenges that are emerging within (2.4).