The Power of Aesthetic Education

I remember talking to one of my professors about what I thought the power of aesthetic education and he told me to continue to expand on one particular kernel of my thoughts.  Today, as we finish a year another year, I thought I might do just that.

First of all, American education

Bennett Reimer tells us musical experiences in education "are necessary for all people if their essential humanness is to be realized" (p. 29).

David Elliott summarized by James Daughtery "Music is a domain of human activity accessible, achievable and applicable to all. Moreover, the primary values of music as an end in itself, i.e., self-growth, self knowledge, and enjoyment, coincide with and overlap values beneficial to individuals and societies. Teaching music is a means of enculturation."

"Music is strongly associated with the brain's reward system. It's the part of the brain that tells us if things are valuable, or important or relevant to survival, said Robert Zatorre, professor of neurology and neurosurgery at Montreal Neurological Institute." http://www.cnn.com/2012/05/26/health/mental-health/music-brain-science/index.html

"Some people have theorized that that was the original function of this behavior in evolution: It was a way of bonding people emotionally together in groups, through shared movement and shared experience," Patel said.

As the interview comes to an end, Dr. Schlaug briefly touches on the importance of music education in the development of a child’s brain. He also mentions his work using song as a means of verbal development within children, as well as rehabilitation of the speech/language functions lost in stroke victims. http://musicbrainerblogger.blogspot.com/2012/09/making-music-changes-brains.html; Schlaug, G. (2010) Making Music Changes Brains, Gottfried Schlaug: Music and the Brain. [podcast] April 29, 2010. Link: http://www.loc.gov/podcasts/musicandthebrain/podcast_schlaug.html

Forward from An Aesthetic Education in the Era of Globalization: Forward: Aesthetic Education for the Ethical Impulse, editors comments (Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak)
"In a world where there are so many forces conspiring to shatter any person’s sense of having a self, the deconstruction that Spivak once championed is problem, not solution. The solution lies right where great theorists who dominated the field twenty years ago denied it lay, in teaching literature as a means of causing people to realize that they have souls.