religious music and a multicultural education

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Religious Music and Multicultural EducationAuthor(s): Iris M. Yob

Source: Philosophy of Music Education Review , Vol. 3, No. 2 (Fall, 1995), pp. 69-82

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Religious Music and Multicultural Education

Iris M. Yob

Bloomington, Indiana

That the religions and the arts are closely

associated is evidenced by the architecture,

paintings, drawings, sculptures, the many forms

of liturgical music, costumes, symbolic artifacts,

floor and wall coverings, landscaping, illuminat-

ed manuscripts, sacred literature, or dance that

are part of many religious occasions and places.

So interpenetrated are they, that music and art

teachers have a difficult time avoiding works

with religious subject matter, function, or

meaning, in their programs of study and course

offerings.

While some argument may be mounted

against dealing with religious art works in the

avowedly secular public school arts education

programs, this close affinity between religion

and the arts has also been the very grounds for

a number of arguments in favor of including

them for study in the curriculum. I shall exam-

ine one of these arguments to discover some-

thing of its strengths and limitations, and pro-

pose some guiding principles for its application

to classroom practice- the argument that deals

with the use of religious art works for the

purposes of multicultural education.

In this context, multicultural education

may be substituted by the more modest term,

cultural sensitivity. It is more modest be-

cause it does not promise on the face of it to

plumb the depths of many different cultures (an

unrealistic expectation) but, rather, suggests that

learners will be exposed to the existence of

profound differences between people and learn

to deal with those differences in ways that are

enriching, equitable, and community-building.

Its focus is not only on knowing about different

cultural world views but developing appropriate

feelings toward them of appreciation, respect,

and empathy. Both terms, multicultural educa-

tion and cultural sensitivity, however, imply

an ongoing critique of institutions and their

systemic inequity in matters of race, gender,

and class. For both, the underlying motive is to

encapsulate the values and aspirations of a

democracy, like that of the U.S.A., which

embodies new and diverse groups of people,

and in a world like ours which we increasingly

recognize to be interdependent and whose

prospering and even survival depends in large

part on being able to negotiate the differences

among peoples in caring and just ways.

I

We shall begin with an illustration, one

which may on first blush even seem to be a

counter-example. In March of 1995, three

Jewish students, who were members of the

Swarthmore College Chorus, announced their

intention to refuse to sing Bach's St John

Passion during parents' weekend the following

month. They were objecting, they claimed, to

participating in a work that has been put to anti-

Semitic uses in its recounting and interpretation

of the crucifixion of Christ. One of the singers

described her reaction to the work in an essay

she wrote for the student newspaper in these

words: After I read the text, my heart told me

® Philosophy of Music Education Review 3, no. 2 (Fall 1995): 69-82.



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7 Philosophy of Music Education Review

that I could never utter those words. Another

member of the chorus elaborated: I remem-

bered from history books how Passion plays

have been used sometimes to inspire anti- Jew-

ish feeling, and I knew how they were revived

by the Nazis and used as propaganda.

Among the offending passages, according

to the report of this event in The Chronicle of

Higher Education, are the following:

Evangelist: The body of soldiers with

their captain, who were sent by the

Jews, laid hold of Jesus, and bound Him

fast and led Him away at first unto

Annas for he was Caiphas' father-in-law,

which was high priest that same year.

Now it had been Caiphas who had told

the Jews that it was expedient that one

man should die, should die for all. (from

Parti)

Evangelist: That so might be fulfilled

the word of Jesus, which He had spoken,

and had signified by what manner of

death He should die. Then Pilate en-

tered into the Hall, and again he called

in Jesus, and said to Him: Art thou the

King of the Jews then? Jesus then

answered him: Sayest thou this thing of

thyself or did these others tell it thee to

say of me? And Pilate thus answered

Him: Am I a Jew? Thy nation and Thy

Chief Priests have brought Thee here for

judgment before me. What then hast

Thou done? And Jesus answered him:

My kingdom is not of this World, for

were my kingdom of this World, then

my servants all would fight, yea, battle,

that I be not delivered unto the Jews.

Nay then, for not from hence is my

kingdom. (from Part II)1

Allowing, valuing and even being enriched

by cultural diversity is not always a natural

response to different others. Religio-cultural

tensions, in particular, are among the most

divisive and destructive forces within communi-

ties and between peoples, because most reli-

gions have traditionally believed they are right

and others outside the faith are wrong.2 I

suspect, however, that positive and productive

attitudes and approaches can be taught, or at

least their possibility is something to which I

would hope to expose my students. Coming to

allow, appreciate and even be enriched by

cultural diversity is a life-long learning process

given the changing complexity of today's world

and the dynamic character of culture develop-

ment, but the schools are ideally situated to

undertake this education formally in planned

and purposeful ways and informally in bringing

together a cultural mix in both the faculty and

student body in many schools.

Cultural differences have been presented to

learners in studies of different foods, festivals,

housing, geographic regions, languages, dress,

governments, and works of art. Too often,

however, the temptation has been to keep the

examination of cultural diversity at the level of

these phenomena and to overlook or ignore the

deeper significances and understandings they

might represent.3 Teachers do not always ask

what meaning these phenomena have for the

people who exhibit them, to what ultimate

values do they relate, or even why things are as

they are. For instance, to tell students that the

people of Tonga wrap a floor mat around

themselves before leaving home is merely to

exhibit a curiosity. To explain further that, in

the Tongan view, there is a hierarchy of powers

in the world: God is supreme, the ruling mon-

arch is second and the Tongan people come

somewhere below that, and, therefore, to appear

in public better attired than members of the

royal family is not only a mark of disrespect

but also a blasphemous act, a usurping of

position that is not rightfully theirs. To explain

this is to reveal the meaning of the curious

behavior. At these deeper levels, the apparent

differences between peoples are rooted and it is

here that one must look for fundamental cultur-

al differences, resolve cultural tensions where

possible and engage in cultural interchanges.

The kinds of understandings that give rise

to observable behaviors and customs make up

a people's world view, and often these world

views are constructed and expressed through



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rY b

religious (manifested at times as religio-political

or religio-social) beliefs. That is to say, reli-

gion is a primary source of answers to the

questions of What is real? What is the nature

of things? and What is of ultimate worth? To

understand a people then, one needs to include

a consideration of the religious underpinnings

of that people's historical development and

cultural expressions.

n

Numerous appeals have been made for

including the study of religion in education. In

the post- World War II period, the American

Association of Colleges of Teacher Education

opened its 1959 report on teacher education and

religion with the words:

In recent years there has been an accel-

erated interest and concern by educators

in public education on the place and role

of religion ... in the curriculum. From

an examination of current literature in

higher education, it is evident that many

of the national associations, representing

various segments of higher education

regard this area as one of great challenge

and opportunity.4

One of the paradoxes in education in the ensu-

ing thirty-plus years is the relative paucity of

attention in curriculum developments to reli-

gious studies5 on the one hand and yet the

continuing and even renewed interest in and

support for this field of study on the other.6

Of course, there have been some notewor-

thy developments over this period, including

projects undertaken by university departments,

school districts and interested individuals work-

ing independently or together,7 and some im-

provements in the social studies textbook treat-

ments of world religions.8 Yet, Mary Hatwood

Futrell, president of the National Education

Association, still found it necessary to urge, As

religion has been an integral part of the history

of civilization-its arts and sciences, its lan-

guage and literature, its politics- so it should be

included as an integral subject for classroom

instruction. 9 Albert Shanker, president of the

American Federation of Teachers, was also

compelled to state, In omitting religion from

school studies we are omitting an extremely

important force acting on the institutions that

we examine. 10 In a later editorial he wrote:

If students don't know anything about

the religions that helped shape our cul-

tural heritage, they'll have a very limited

appreciation of that heritage. And if

they're ignorant about the religions

practiced in our multicultural society, it

will be difficult for them to understand-

or live harmoniously with-the people

who practice them. Most important, if

students don't get a chance to discuss

religion in their American history class-

es, they won't learn about our unique

tradition of religious freedom or how

and why the separation of church and

state was established and maintained-

and they won't find out about the role

they must play in carrying on these

essential forms of our democracy.11

Incidentally, in this statement Shanker covers a

wide range of purposes to be served by the

study of religion in a multicultural curriculum-

the personal (an appreciation of one's own

cultural heritage), the social (learning to live

harmoniously with people of different faiths),

and the political (participation in a democracy

that is characterized by religious freedom).

A notable impetus was given religious

studies by the publication of the Williamsburg

Charter, a ten-point affirmation of religious

liberty, issued at the bicentennial of Virginia's

call for the Bill of Rights.12 Among the

Charter's significant spin-offs was the publica-

tion by the First Liberty Institute of George

Mason University and Learning Connections of

Boulder, CO, of a three volume curriculum,

Living With Our Deepest Differences. Howev-

er, the concerted study of the religions for their

influence on cultural development and diversity

remains spotty at best in schools across the

country, and regrettably large numbers of



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7

students in schools in the U.S.A. graduate with

little or no knowledge of the various world

religions which characterize not only the world-

out-there but also the world-here-at-home.13

m

The challenge and responsibility to devel-

op cultural sensitivity through the study of

different others does not rest solely with the

social studies programs. Apart from incidental

opportunities both formal and informal in many

subject areas and school activities, teachers of

the arts have a particularly significant role

because of the close affinity between religion

and the arts. This affinity is apparent whether

one considers the sacred sand drawings of

Australian aboriginal dreamings, Jewish

biblical literature, the paintings, sculptures and

music of Christianity, the clean lines yet stun-

ning majesty of many Islamic mosques, the

carvings of Jainism, magnificent Hindu temples,

the Buddhas of stone or pure gold, Balinese

masks or Japanese Zen garden sanctuaries.14

The affinity of religion and the arts has not

always been welcomed by religion as the Jew-

ish prohibition against graven images, the early

Buddhist ban on representations of the Buddha,

the iconoclasm of the Protestant Reformation

and the Puritan restraint in sensual activity all

illustrate, yet even under these convictions an

alternative aesthetic expression often arose-

when sculpture and painting were proscribed,

architecture, music or literature could some-

times flourish, though it may have possessed a

beauty that was stark and simple. Even reli-

gious prohibitions against the aesthetic are

evidence that the religions have been sensitive

to the arts.

This close tie between religion and art can

be explained in a number of ways. Foremost,

a great deal of extant art has been produced at

times when religious understandings have

dominated human thinking. Representations or

expressions of human experience would natural-

ly be done in religious terms or with religious

symbols, even more so when the patrons of the

arts were also religious authorities. We do not

know whether Bach would have composed

cantatas and passions had he lived in a different

time and not depended on the church for his

livelihood or whether Michelangelo would have

sculptured a Moses if he had had other clear

choices of subject matter, but they produced the

art works that they did as their response within

and to the religious contexts and understandings

of their time and place.

Furthermore, art provides apt symbolic

material for religious expression. In their

separate studies of world religions, Rudolf Otto

and Walter Kaufman identify some of the ways

religions have employed aesthetic symbols.

They note, among other things, how the erec-

tion of huge monoliths, obelisks, and pyramids

expressed the feeling for the solemn and impos-

ing magnitude of the Holy, the single magnifi-

cent dome of the mosque reflected the mono-

theism of Islam, the silence and darkness in

western religious works and the empty distances

in eastern works produce a strong impression of

the numinous, the bronzes and buildings of

southern India are uniquely Hindu, the art of

China, Japan and Tibet is influenced by Taoism

and Buddhism, and the Jewish passion for

literature has been nurtured in religious under-

standings and vice-versa. 15

Music and the other arts, being highly

suggestive, figurative, and in their most funda-

mental manifestations more non-discursive than

verbal, employing significant gestures, move-

ments, colors, shapes, figures of speech, tones,

timbres, rhythms, rhymes, and textures, are

often the only language appropriate to religious

insights and expression. As Mendelssohn

explained, A piece of music, which I love,

expresses thoughts to me which are not too

imprecise to be framed in words, but too pre-

cise. So I find that attempts to express such

thoughts in words may have some point to

them, but they are also unsatisfying. 16 Artis-

tic symbols have often expressed, explored and

instructed religious experience and the esoteric

and intuited objects of religious thought because



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found, representations of a culture.

In developing his theology of culture,

Tillich was selective about what he regarded as

noteworthy art. He was drawn to Expression-

ism and considered the avant garde to be genu-

inely revealing but was inclined to overlook

other schools of art and dismissed a great deal

of popular culture as kitsch. As some have

pointed out, [w]hile Tillich formally made all

cultural artifacts material for analysis, in prac-

tice ... he avoids popular culture . . . [and]

privileges the self-interpretation of the cultural

elite . . . 25 Several reasons have been offered

for his exclusivism on this matter of what art

works count, but whatever the reason, his

written argument on the one hand and his

personal preferences on the other raise compel-

ling questions for music and art educators

seeking to raise the level of multicultural awar-

eness. Whose musics and art works should be

included, and which sacred musics and art

works are genuinely religious and, therefore,

authentically reveal a people's ultimate con-

cerns?

In defense of a selective view, it could be

said that good music is more thoughtful, more

creative, more penetrating, more revolutionary,

more idealistic than bad music. As such, this

is the kind of music that is the proper study for

schools and is likely to give more accurate

insights into the lives and meanings of a people.

Popular musics are usually regarded as bad

music because they are seen to be little more

than mass produced commodities designed by

the economically powerful and substitute for the

hard work of culture building by failing to

penetrate below the surface of things to where

meanings are truly constructed. In essence, this

is a restatement and expansion of Tillich's basic

position.

Set out in these simple terms, the argu-

ment prompts several questions- questions

which are raised several degrees of difficulty

for those who wish to reach beyond the west-

ern, classical tradition to study the musics (and

other art works) of different others. First, how

precisely is good music to be differentiated

from bad ? While there is this sense in which

Tillich's preference for good art seems rea-

sonable, because surely the better the work, the

more expressive it will be of significant mean-

ings, the criteria for judging musics are to a

considerable extent determined within a culture

or a genre. Tillich's case being typical of a

widespread attitude, the music of one's particu-

lar cultural elite tends to provide the standard

for judging all musics. This kind of cultural

hegemony is one of the bogeys to be dismantled

in education for cultural sensitivity.

Second, is popular culture accurately

portrayed as a commodity which is passively

accepted by the masses? Kelton Cobb's re-

sponse to Tillich (and the Frankfurt School of

Social Research which helped shape Tillich's

thought) follows the line laid down by John

Fiske: popular culture is not merely consump-

tion, but indeed culture. It is what a people

or class do with the products that come off the

assembly lines of the culture industry. People

may accept or reject these products, usurp,

transform or rework them. They become then,

in effect, their own cultural expressions.

Third, does popular culture not embody

the ultimate concerns and religious meanings

of the large numbers of people who participate

in it in these ways? Isn't the very existence of

a particular popular culture a manifestation of

ultimate concerns? Cobb answers: Read from

below, as it were, the appropriated texts [of

popular culture] will disclose an ongoing wran-

gling of ultimate concerns and genuine erup-

tions of ultimacy demanding that cultural forces

be reordered and moral injustices rectified. 26

Whether or not the themes of popular culture

are an outworking of ultimate concerns for the

reordering of the social order, the important

point is that popular culture can indeed also

disclose ultimate concerns.

One may argue that what is expressed as

ultimate in popular culture is not ultimate

enough, or falls short of genuine ultimacy.

Tillich identified a number of concerns which



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r

are taken as ultimate but which eventually

prove too shallow in this role- he mentions, for

example, success in social standing or economic

power, one's own mother or father, the nation,

an ideology such as nationalism or socialism or

the American way, as well as many of the

lesser concerns of religion, or even the God of

religion poorly understood.27 They do what

every ultimate concern must do - demand

unconditional surrender to them in return for

the promise of fulfillment of one's being - but

the promise they offer is not only indefinite

but in the long run also empty. 28 Misguided

though they may be, however, these lesser

concerns are nevertheless taken to be ultimate

by those who embrace them- and so their

examination in popular culture still has the

potential to reveal their espousers' deepest

meanings and yearnings.

In effect, for music educators who choose

to contribute to multicultural education through

the music program, there emerges from the

discussion of the three questions above three

corresponding invitations: 1) to make judgments

of worth more culture-specific in selecting

works to be studied; 2) to broaden their defini-

tion of what counts as culture and what

Tillich identifies as cultural style to include

popular as well as classical productions and the

uses to which they are put; and 3) to look for

expressions of ultimate concern in all cultural

styles.

Some music educators have recognized the

role of religious music in promoting cultural

sensitivity. Abraham Schwadron, for instance,

who knew firsthand what it was like to be

Jewish in Christian settings, opened his discus-

sion of this topic with this observation: It is

both strange and unfortunate that the subject of

religion and music, as applied to public educa-

tion, has not attracted the proper research it

warrants. In his opinion, this is particularly

strange and unfortunate given that we now seek

a greater tolerance of religious ideas and a

deeper understanding of others' positions.

Estelle Jorgensen concurs in suggesting that

music education ought to explore the diversity

of religious experiences expressed through

music and provide opportunities for students to

come to grips with the religious ideas of text,

program, title and the implied liturgical function

of a variety of religious works.29

Both these writers have in essence reflect-

ed the 1987 position of the Music Educators'

National Conference Ad Hoc Committee on

Religious Music in the Schools:

It is the position of the MENC that the

study of religious music is a vital and

appropriate part of the total music expe-

rience in both performance and listening.

To omit sacred music from the repertoire

or study of music would present an

incorrect and incomplete concept of the

comprehensive nature of the art.30

In elaborating on the intent of this statement,

the chairman of the committee, Alex B. Camp-

bell, noted that such study should be conducted

in a religiously neutral context in which musics

for study were chosen for their musical and

. educational value, not their religious content per

se in order to share different traditions with

students and lead to a respect for them.31 It is

not clear why religious content should be

downplayed in or even excluded from consider-

ation when choosing music for study especially

in multicultural studies, because it often is the

religious content itself that determines the

nature, function and style of the different music

traditions.

While not wanting to speak for the com-

mittee members, I suspect that in an attempt to

avoid criticism that they were supporting any

form of religious indoctrination, they intended

by religious content to refer less to subject

matter and more to the injudicious use of that

subject matter in teaching religious faiths to

public school students. If this was their intent,

here is another instance of the common confu-

sion between teaching about religion and reli-

gious traditions and teaching for religion and

induction into that religion which commonly

appears in discourses on this topic in many

educational circles.



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76 Phlosophy of Music Education Review

There is also an unrealistic interpretation

of religious neutrality in a great deal of

educational thought. When this concept indi-

cates that no particular religious faith is accord-

ed a privileged position, that teachers are not to

advocate in the classroom specific religious

commitments, and that all religious traditions

can be equally explored for their educational

and aesthetic values, a realistic and attainable

standard for the study of religions and religious

art works in schools is being indicated. How-

ever, if religious neutrality further means that

no religious responses will be permitted in

teaching/learning episodes, it is in effect de-

manding the impossible-it is asking students to

check their personal history at the school gate.

Returning briefly to our case in point, to

what has been dubbed the Swarthmore Pas-

sion, the fact that some Jewish students were

offended by the work and that some Christian

students were possibly inspired by the same

work together do not provide reasonable

grounds for disallowing its study and perfor-

mance in the school. Nobody would argue that

one exclude from one's teaching any subject

matter that could arouse responses in students,

either positive or negative- in fact, the reverse

is usually true, one is delighted when students

do respond personally and passionately to what

is being taught. This is true whether the re-

sponses are labelled cognitive, aesthetic, moral,

emotional, or behavioral, as long as they are

appropriate within the school setting. Why

would one seek to eliminate, then, those re-

sponses that are spiritual or religious? If one's

view of the learner is holistic and one's concept

of community is multicultural awrfmulti-faithed,

different personal responses to specific religious

objects are part of the picture of who we are

and what we are dealing with. The establish-

ment clause of the First Amendment ( Congress

shall make no law respecting an establishment

of religion ) which has undergirded the public-

ness of the public schools is counterbalanced by

úítfree exercise clause ( . . . or prohibiting the

free exercise thereof), which protects the right

of individuals for religious expression.32

IV

In light of the role of religion and of

religious works of art in multicultural education,

then, can support be found for the inclusion of,

for example, the St John Passion on the pro-

gram for parents' day at Swarthmore? (Swarth-

more, of course, is a private school and, there-

fore, exempt from some of the strictures regard-

ing religious teaching binding on public

schools, but because its student body is diverse

it does serve as a case in point for our present

needs.) In the light of the discussion so far, I

am inclined to answer affirmatively. However,

I also reserve the right to add a caveat.

This has to do with the whole educational

package in which a religious music work is

presented. Teachers may rightly expect that

any item, and particularly a religious art object,

can be studied provided it has sound education-

al purposes to serve, is presented in a context of

acceptable learnings and this is clear to all

parties concerned (including teachers, adminis-

trators, students, parents and the wider commu-

nity supporting the school). In the report of the

Swarthmore case, it is apparent that this became

increasingly the case. The St John Passion had

not been randomly chosen for performance.

The chorus director selected this particular work

to coincide with a seminar on Bach being

taught in another class-it was part of a larger

program of study of one artist's oeuvre.

At the forum that accompanied the Jewish

student protest, which incidentally drew 250

students from across campus, religion and

music professors spoke to the concerns that had

been raised and presumably addressed the

historical and musical complexities of the work.

Without knowing the details of the forum

discussion, we may assume from the Chronicle

report that the protesting students could explain

how they had been able to perform Vivaldi's

and also Poulenc's Glorias the previous semes-

ter, but balked at the Passion not because it was



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r

Christian in sentiment but because it was

against who they were as Jews.

Music professors could show how Bach's

Passion was different from the anti-Semitic

Passion plays of the medieval era and how

Bach had drawn on works other than the Book

of John, notably, the writings of 18th Century

poet Barthold Heinrich Brockes and commen-

tary from 16th-, 17th- and 18th-century hymns

while avoiding their more egregious anti-Semit-

ic references, especially those in Brockes'

poetry. The words Bach selected, they could

add, were intended to make Christian listeners

uncomfortable by stressing the sins of the

followers of Christ- they were not intended to

focus on who killed Jesus. The religion profes-

sor could explain how the gospel account of

John was written later than the other three

gospels and at a time of internecine strife in the

building of the Christian community. Identify-

ing the Jews as responsible for the death of

Christ created a distinction between the believ-

ers and the larger Jewish populace and provided

a common enemy, two elements in strengthen-

ing identity and bonding in the fledgling com-

m unity.33

Certainly, such discussions to accompany

the performance of the work build greater

understanding not only of the contribution of

Bach, but of the cultural understandings of both

Christians and Jews. While all this was implicit

in the educational package, the protest of the

Jewish students brought it out into the open

where the educational possibilities of the work

could be clarified and shared. Admittedly,

much of the contextual learning took place after

the fact of the student protest and by then, some

complained about the oversimplifications and

hype that the debate had generated. However,

education, like life, is a messy business-curric-

ulum evolves as it is applied, strategies improve

with hindsight, and responses are tempered with

experience- and Swarthmore, it would appear,

eventually got it as right as it could be made

under the circumstances.

Even so, what should be our stance regard-

ing those works of religious music that carry

the possibility of being controversial? Some

have argued that it is best not to introduce

anything that could prove religiously controver-

sial. In a way reminiscent of this, Horace

Mann offered strong advice to teachers on that

other hot potato -political dissent in schools.

In his Twelfth Annual Report (1848) to the

Board appointed to examine the cause of com-

mon schools in Massachusetts, Mann urged

teachers to include political education for

teaching about the nature and functions of a

republic and the responsibilities of its citizens.

In undertaking this education, he advised teach-

ers to take a middle course between banishing

all political teaching from the schools and

becoming consumed with political debate.

Teach those articles in the creed of republican-

ism that all sensible and judicious men, all

patriots, and all genuine republicans accept and

believe in, he suggested. They form the basis

of our political faith and should be taught to

all. (The religious terms he has employed in

this argument- creed and faith in particular-

-further manifest the parallel challenges in

teaching about politics and about religion.)

Then he added:

But when the teacher, in the course of

his [or her] lessons or lectures on the

fundamental law, arrives at a controvert-

ed text, he [or she] is either to read it

without comment or remark; or at most,

he [or she] is only to say that the pas-

sage is the subject of disputation, and

that the schoolroom is neither the tribu-

nal to adjudicate, nor the forum to dis-

cuss it.34

In a similar vein, Paul Farber35 makes a

case for dealing with controversial religious

matters in schools. In a recent article, he

identifies a deeply problematic fissure in

liberalism where religion is concerned. This

fissure is illustrated by putting side by side two

recent works on the subject: Nel Noddings'

Educating for Intelligent Belief or Unbelief and

Stephen Carter's The Culture of Disbelief In



11/15


the first, Noddings urges teachers to overcome

the taboo against religion in the schools by

critically, openly, and intelligently engaging

religious thought in dialogue. In essence, she

argues for a program of life-affirming inqui-

ry. In the second, Carter takes up the case of

those who would regard education less as

endless critical discourse and more as a

process of coming to know rightly. He

argues for vigilance in resisting the overarching

secularism that fails to respect the integrity of

diverse religious cultures ~even in their funda-

mentalist or absolutist stances.

In the light of these opposite views, Farber

asks When . . . should teachers forge ahead,

and when demonstrate restraint, where the

interests of individual group members seem to

be at stake? He believes some rapprochement

between the two views is possible and should

inform future discussion; however, he proposes

that drawing together religiously and culturally

diverse students would better come from do-

mains other than religion (environmental studies

or studies of power and political economy)

which may in fact subsume religious interests to

some extent. He concludes:

Fostering inquiry, teachers must recog-

nize that not every taboo must topple.

At times (but when?) the wisdom of

practice says dampen the brush fires of

hostility and change the subject. There

are other topics to talk about, matters

that might more readily engage broad

bands of common concern and foster the

recognition of dimensions of solidarity

and interdependence that we surely need

despite, and in view of, our religious

differences.36

Where Mann tended to distance schools from

political dissent altogether, Carter is more

inclined to acknowledge the significance of

religious differences but to seek alternatives to

fostering multicultural awareness within diversi-

ty; but they both prefer that teachers focus

instead on areas of agreement and both shrink

from the prospect of debate, especially heated

debate, in the classroom.

There is of course some wisdom to this

approach. Dissent can be divisive in deeply

disturbing and irresolvable ways, as well as

distracting from other legitimate learning out-

comes. One difficulty with this solution to the

problem of difference, however, is that not all

areas of dissent are predictable. Jews in Israel,

for instance, justify their singing of the St John

Passion, not as worship but as performance

with an appreciation of Bach's work as part of

a cultural heritage37-a position some Jewish

students at Swarthmore did not choose to adopt.

The choral director could not be reasonably

expected to know beforehand what his students

would do in this instance (although as a general

rule teachers should be culturally sensitive in

the presentation of all works).

Conflict being predictable or not, however,

the Mann-Farber approach of retreat-avoidance

rather than engagement with dissent in the

classroom seriously fails in the context of

multicultural education in a number of ways

which we can only briefly note here. In es-

sence, avoiding dissent represents a retreat from

the kind of learning opportunities that dissent

can afford. The preparation for citizenship in a

democracy to which Mann devoted his educa-

tional energies was undermined to the extent

that he overlooked the role of protest among

free peoples. Preparation for citizenship in a

democracy with heightened awareness of its

multicultural and multi-faithed constituency to

an even greater extent depends on admitting

tensions between peoples and learning how to

deal with them in productive ways.

At the very least, to avoid dissent may

amount to losing the opportunity to discover

what cultural difference can really mean.

Cultural and religious differences are more than

merely a fact of life to be cognitively encoun-

tered, empirically measured, and systematically

recorded; they are also a matter of the heart-of

commitment, of self-esteem, of cherishment, of

passion, or of threat, or fear, or even disgust,

depending on which side of a cultural divide



12/15

r

one happens to be. Ignoring these issues and

passionate involvements may leave out of

consideration a great deal of what is significant

to individual learners and what sets them apart

from other cultural groups. Allowing dissenting

views to be expressed can be an experience in

learning that cultural differences are a fact of

communal life as we now know it and that they

do matter to those who hold them.

In this respect, becoming culturally sensi-

tized is part of the learning process not only for

the disenfranchised or the minority but also for

the dominant cultural group. The protest over

the Passion at Swarthmore was not only a good

learning experience for the Jewish students but

also for the Christian students who may never

have been confronted before with the impact

their art works have had on different others.

Cultural sensitivity may very well have devel-

oped in both groups as a consequence.

Beyond that, cultural sensitivity is more

than affect- it is praxis. What does it mean to

be culturally sensitive? Minimally, it means

allowing difference, our own or others, in life-

affirming ways. Martin Marty suggests that in

a constitutional republic, public institutions

cannot satisfy everyone in all respects. In this

regard, he adds, we are inclined to overlook a

time-honored strategy-finding it a mark of

nobility to teach [the] young that the surround-

ing culture might in many ways not be conge-

nial and might even, indeed, be hostile to some

of their familial, tribal, or confessional val-

ues. 38 Coming to this acceptance is a useful

initial accomplishment and one which has

enormous benefits for the one who is different-

in sustaining self esteem, in learning to main-

tain personal integrity even ki the face of social

pressure, and importantly in experiencing a

sense of personal freedom. It also has signifi-

cant benefits for those from whom one has

differed. Coming up against difference can be

a experienced as corrective or at least as a

resistance to the flaws, limitations and blind

spots within the status quo or at least, its paro-

chialism and hegemonic tendencies. Expressed

in more positive terms, confronting differences

can enrich a culture's vision of itself and widen

its perspective on its place in the world.

Beyond merely becoming aware of differ-

ences in their cognitive and affective reality and

learning to live with them in positive and

affirming ways when they are irresolvable, is

learning how to negotiate differences between

groups of people. In a democratic society, this

is an ultimate objective of multicultural educa-

tion. Negotiation depends on listening and

communicating skills, the ability to compromise

where appropriate, and the formulation of just

codes of behavior that give due respect to all.

It is a set of skills to be learned, and in a world

that seems so easily tempted to protest in vio-

lent and controlling ways, teaching these skills

is an important objective. Schools traditionally

have been hesitant in developing policies for

the expression of dissent or indicating how

dissenters may appropriately respond. In fact,

schools have been slow in developing policies

for introducing controversial topics or activities

in the first place. This has left teachers feeling

insecure in their roles and students feeling

relatively powerless in maintaining appropriate

competing interests and in redressing inequi-

ties.39

In this instance, Swarthmore provides a

model for consideration. There, dissenters

formed a coalition among themselves to present

specific requests to the faculty of the music

school, they had access to student newspapers

and eventually involved TV and other news

media, and an open forum in which students

and faculty from across the college could

participate. Because these avenues for the

expression of dissent were ad hoc and because

both teachers and students were ill-equipped to

deal with dissent before it arose, the difficulties

escalated and tensions mounted. Taking a cue

from this episode, one may conclude that stud-

ies of models for offering and responding to

dissent and the opening of channels for commu-

nication among students, teachers, and other

educational policy makers should be part of a



13/15

8 Phlosophy of Music Education Review

program for developing cultural sensitivity.

V

Among the purposes of multicultural

education is the development of a knowledge of

and the skills in responding to different others

in a democratic society. Religious studies in

general and cross-cultural studies of religious

art works in particular are among the most

significant means for developing cultural sensi-

tivity, because religion is likely the most impor-

tant expression of a group's ultimate concerns,

its grounding meanings, and its most profound

self-understandings and because religious music

and other religious art works are usually the

most representative and expressive articulations

of those concerns, meanings and self-under-

standings.

A study of religious expressions- music,

paintings, sacred places, worship practices,

beliefs, and so on- in public schools can be

controversial, but as part of well developed

educational programs they can also make con-

siderable contributions to understanding one's

own personal meaning-making and cultural

history and those of different others. Music and

other works of art to be studied for their in-

sights into diverse cultural groups need to be

selected on the basis of a wider set of criteria

than usually pertains in the study of art works

within one's own classical tradition, viz., their

role, place and value within the cultural group

which gives rise to them in the first place.

Dissent may arise in an education program

which engages the religious expressions of

others. Rather than choosing to avoid or ignore

the possibility of conflict and tension of this

kind, the experience of passionate dissent can

provide useful learnings for all students. It may

afford an occasion for coming to a realization

of what differences among peoples really mean

emotionally as well as cognitively; for develop-

ing a sense of the nobility or value of differ-

ence, even irresolvable difference, in a multicul-

tural and multi-faithed society, and for learning

how to negotiate dissent in ways that are pro-

ductive and community building.

NOTES

1. Reported in The Chronicle of Higher Education,

March 3, 1995: A33.

2. There is an amelioration of this attitude in some

circles. Diana Eck provides a model and a personal

sketch of interfaith dialogue in Encountering God:

A Spiritual Journey from Bozeman to Bañaras

(Boston: Beacon Press, 1993). See also John Hick,

God Has Many Names (Philadelphia: Westminster

Press, 1980) and Huston Smith, Forgotten Truth:

The Common Vision of the World's Religions (San

Francisco: Harper Torch Books, 1992). These kind

of texts are useful in designing multicultural

education programs.

3. Estelle R. Jorgensen addresses this problem in an as

yet unpublished paper, Musical Multiculturalism

Revisited: Attic Vases, Elgin Marbles and Musical

Artifacts, to be presented at the Music Educators

National Conference, Kansas City, MO (Spring

1996).

4. A. L. Selby, ed., Teacher Education and Religion

(Oneonta, NY: American Association of Colleges of

Teacher Education, 1959). Also quoted by Charles

Knicker, Teacher Education and Religion: The

Role of Foundations Courses in Preparing Students

to Teach About Religions, Religion and Public

Education 17 no. 2 (Spring/Summer 1990): 203-219

which traces the lack of practical applications of

these sentiments in teacher education curriculum

developments since then.

5. See for instance, Thomas Hunt, Religion, Moral

Education and Public Schools: A Tale of Tempest,

Religion and Public Education 13 no. 2 (Spring

1986): 25-40; Warren Nord, Religious Literacy,

Textbooks, and Religious Neutrality, Religion and

Public Education 16 no. 1 (Winter 1989): 111-122;

Dan Fleming, Religion in American Textbooks:

Were the 'Good Old Days' of Textbooks Really So

Good, Religion and Public Education 18 no. 1

(1991): 79-102; Richard Jones and Rebecca Glover,

Teaching About Religion: A Study of Attitudes,



14/15

rs Y b

Religion and Public Education 18 no. 1 (1991):

141-148; Iris M. Yob, Reflections on an Experi-

mental Course: Religion and the Public Schools,

Phi Delta Kappan 16 no. 3 (November 1994): 234-

238.

6. See for instance, J. B. Morris, Moral and Spiritual

Values in Public Education, Religion and Public

Education 11 no. 4 (Fall 1984): 48-51; Thomas

Goodhue, What Should Public Schools Say About

Religion? Religion and Public Education 13 no. 2

(Spring 1986): 15-17; Charles Glen, What Public

Schools Can Do to Accommodate Religious Diver-

sity, Religion and Public Education 13 no. 4 (Fall

1986): 92-98; David Owens, Recent Textbook

Cases and Children's Rights, Religion and Public

Education 15 no. 3 (Summer 1988): 286-291;

Stephen Oates, The Holistic Paradigm and the

Supreme Court's Search for a New Definition of

Religion, Religion and Public Education 18 no. 1

(1991): 161-175; Theresa McCormick, Teaching

About Religious Diversity as a Multicultural Issue,


117-128; Ronald Jensen, Social Change and the

Changing Meaning of Religion in a Pluralistic

Society: Implications for the Public Schools,


103-115; Gary Brock, The Academic Study of

Religion in Missouri Secondary Social Studies

Classes, Religion and Public Education 18 no. 1

(1991): 129-140.

7. These projects include but are not limited to the

Idaho Humanities Council and Boise State Universi-

ty project, Teaching About Religion in Public

Schools, the North Carolina Humanities Council

and Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation with the Univer-

sity of North Carolina at Chapel Hill seminar series

on religion and the public schools, Western Illinois

University's Religious Contours of Illinois Pro-

ject, Connecticut's Comparative Religions

Course in high schools, the Indiana Religious

Studies Project, the Gladstone, Oregon high school

project, and so on.

8. For instance, see the reports by Margaret Trautman,

The Reformation as Presented in Six 1990 High

School World History Textbooks and World

Religions as Found in Six 1990 World History

Textbooks in Religion and Public Education 17 no.

1 (Winter 1990): 35-41 and 17 no. 2

(Spring/Summer 1990): 196-200, respectively.

9. Mary Hatwood Futrell, Education About Religions:

A Public School Responsibility, Religion and

Public Education 13 no. 4 (Fall 1986): 78-80.

10. In an interview with Patricia A. Lines reported in

Religion and Public Education 13 no. 4 (Fall 1986):

81-84.

11. Albert Shanker, Why We Should Teach About

Religion in On Campus (December 1990/January

1991): 5.

12. The text of the Charter is given in Charles C.

Haynes and Oliver Thomas, eds., Finding Common

Ground: A First Amendment Guide to Religion and

Public Education (Nashville, TN: The Freedom

Forum First Amendment Center at Vanderbilt

University, 1994), Appendix A.

13. Eck, The Pluralism Project: A New View of the

World s Religions in America, cd rom in produc-

tion, Harvard University Divinity School provides

some recent information on the growth of non-

Judeo-Christian religions in North America.

14. Mircea Eliade, Symbolism, the Sacred, and the Arts,

ed. Diane Apostolos-Cappadona (New York: Cross-

road, 1986), and Walter Kaufman, Religions in Four

Dimensions (New York: Reader's Digest Press,

1976), especially chaps. XIII and XTV draw on the

history of religions to demonstrate the interrela-

tionships between religion and the arts across times

and cultures.

15. Rudolf Otto, The Idea of the Holy, trans. John W.

Harvey (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1923),

chap. IX, Means of Expression of the Numinous,

and Kaufman, Religions in Four Dimensions, chaps.

XIII and XIV. Kaufman is less inclined to regard

Christian art as particularly Christian for, he

argues, it does not represent a new ethos or a new

understanding of humanity, nor does it have its own

distinctiveness from Greek, Hellenistic or Roman

features (336-369), but Margaret Miles' more

sympathetic analysis of Medieval and Reformation

art in Image as Insight: Visual Understanding in

Western Christianity and Secular Culture (Boston:

Beacon Press, 1985) shows how indispensable the

visual arts were in Christian religious understanding.

16. Quoted by Aaron Ridley in Musical Sympathies:

The Experience of Expressive Music in The Jour-

nal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism 53 no. 1 (Winter

1995): 49.

17. See Iris M. Yob, Religious Emotion in the Arts,

Journal of Aesthetic Education (Winter 1995), in

press.

18. William James, Varieties of Religious Experience,

ed. and intro Martin Marty (Middlesex, England:

Penguin Books, [1902] 1982), 458-461.

19. Horace Bushnell, Preliminary Dissertation on the

Nature of Language as Related to Thought and

Spirit, in God In Christ (Hartford, CT: Brown and

Parsons, 1849), 74-77.

20. Otto, The Idea of the Holy, 59.

21. On this point, David J. Loomis, Imagination and

Faith Development, Religious Education 83 no. 2

(Spring 1988): 251-263 describes his research on



15/15


the role of poetic imagination in faith development.

22. John and Jane Dillenberger, eds., Paul Tillich: On

Art and Architecture (New York: Crossroad, 1989),

9 2.

23. Ihid.. 21-31.

24. Ibid., 32.

25. Kelton Cobb, Reconsidering the Status of Popular

Culture in Tillich's Theology of Culture in Journal

of the American Academy of Religion LXIII no. 1

(Spring 1995): 53-54. See also John P. Clayton,

The Concept of Correlation: Paul Tillich and the

Possibility of a Mediating Theology (Berlin: Walter

de Gruvter. 1980V

26. Cobb, Popular Culture, 78.

27. Paul Tillich, Dynamics of Faith (New York: Harper

Torchbooks, 1957), 2-4; Ultimate Concern: Tillich

in Dialogue, ed. D. MacKenzie Brown (New York:

Harper and Row, 1965), 29, 183; Religious Sym-

bols and our Knowledge of God, Christian Scholar

38 (September 1955): 192.

28. Tillich, Dynamics of Faith, 3, 4.

29. Jorgensen, Religious Music in Education, Philos-

ophy of Music Education Review 1 no. 2 (Fall

1993): 109.

30. Reported in Religion and Public Education 15 no.

4 (Fall 1988): 435-440.

ÓÌ. IDia. 433.

32. In late August, 1995, Secretary of Education,

Richard Riley, at the request of President Bill

Clinton, began distributing to schools a directive

that outlines what religious activities are allowed in

schools. These include permitting students to read

Scriptures, pray, talk about their religious commit-

ments, express religious beliefs in class assignments

and homework, distribute religious literature, excuse

themselves from lessons that they find objection-

able, and wear religious garb.

33. Elaine Pagels, The Origin of Satan (New York:

Random House, 1995) traces how the concept of the

devil originated in the efforts of early Christians to

define themselves by demonizing their enemies-

especially Jews, pagans, and heretics.

34. Lawrence A. Cremin, ed., The Republic and the

School: Horace Mann on the Education of the Free

Man (New York: Teachers College Press, 1957), 97.

35. Paul Farber, Tongue-tied: On Taking Religion

Seriously in Schools, Educational Theory 45 no. 1

(Winter 1995): 85-100.

36. Ibid., 100.

37. Martin Marty makes this point in an article written

before the Swarthmore incident, Around Religion,

About Religion, Of Religion, and Religion: The

Issues of Public School Teaching Today, Religion

and Public Education 15 no. 4 (Fall 1988): 400.

38. Ibid., 390.

39. Block, The Academic Study of Religion, reports

this lack of clarity in policies regarding controver-

sial subjects to be one of the reasons why teachers

are hesitant about dealing with the academic study

of religion in schools.

religious music and a multicultural education

Documents