Cultural Anecdotes from a Music Teacher #2 – Intersectionality
Cultural Anecdotes from a Music Teacher #2 – Intersectionality
This is part of a fortnightly series of articles to be shared on Linked In – expect the next one on 29th March
I have recently, after decades as a classroom music teacher, had a career change to working at Cultural Infusion, a place where knowledge and resources are gathered with the aim of building harmony and wellbeing. (I particularly like the harmony part!). Away from the bustle of schools, I’m reflecting and sharing ideas about cultural exchanges.
In the past week, I’ve participated in two events: International Women’s Day (IWD) and World Of Music And Dance Adelaide (WOMADelaide). The former comes around annually, although as a feminist I find that gender issues inform my behaviour and are central to who I am constantly. The latter is a music festival held over long weekend in the Adelaide Botanic Gardens. As the name suggests, it features performers from around the world, and celebrates music and dance. My involvement in both in a short space of time had me thinking about intersectionality in a number of ways.
International Women’s Day
To celebrate with the women in our office at Cultural Infusion, I organised an informal talking circle where exclusively women spoke (the men listened) about anything they wanted to. To kick things off, I described my passion for independent music and going to live gigs. Another colleague spoke about her feisty grandma, another about feeling alienated going to church as a child. We spoke for about 40 minutes and then had morning tea. I was sensing discomfort from some of the men and checked in with them. Whilst some thought it would be good to allow men to speak in the circle, others thought that hearing from women on IWD was fitting and thought that some men may need to sit with their discomfort to understand what they were feeling. The following morning the women in our office were still buzzing and planning to get together again soon. The event had definitely raised awareness of some intersectionality between men and women in the office, and some changes for the better.
WOMADelaide
This was my second time to WOMADelaide. The previous time, in 2018, our 14 year old daughter had been with us. Seeing Rodrigo y Gabriela play modern flamenco guitar sparked her interest in expanding her rock n roll repertoire to include this amazing style, and she now plays in both styles. I like to think that this as her version of intercultural appreciation as she’s also travelled to Spain. I was definitely enjoying listening to music as diverse as Sorong Samarai from Papua New Guinea (see picture), Punjabi-Australian Parvyn, YID! featuring Yiddish tunes and dub-fusion outfit Sub-Tribe from New Zealand. But I found that my own lenses of viewing them side by side interfered somewhat with the enjoyment – there was that intersectionality again! I saw about a dozen acts in two days, and in that time only two of them featured women playing instruments. All of the rest had exclusively women singing and men playing instruments. I checked my privilege at that point. I have a music degree and played classical piano when I was young. I had drum kit lessons and joined a punk band in my 50s. My daughter plays guitar and now her band The Vovos use my drum kit for rehearsals and gigs. If the women at WOMADelaide were loving singing in a band, who was I to judge?
Intersectionality – Sitting With Discomfort
What did I learn from experiencing IWD and WOMADelaide in close proximity? To check my own judgement and try to empathise with the people I am judging. I’m really glad we had a women’s talking circle for IWD. It gave us a chance to hear more women speak at work and to bond over shared concerns and interests. I’m also really glad that saw and heard music and dance from so many people last weekend. Music is a universal language, and it helps to bring people together. And if I feel a little bit of discomfort about my own biases, so much the better – I am sitting with and learning from it.
If you'd like to share more ideas about culture in the classroom email [email protected]