Songs of Resilience

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Songs of Resilience [Hardcover]

Andy Brader (Author, Editor)

Editorial Reviews

Review

'Practitioners working with those facing adversities know that music is a source of untapped educational power. This important volume documents resilience through music projects, the making of meaning and the remaking of lives and cultures.' --

Allan Luke, Queensland University of Technology, Australia

'In a world increasingly beset by polarizing and fragmenting forces, this book sets an example of activism that is deeply rooted in analysis and critique. Both the scholarly and practitioner communities will benefit from this work, which recounts compelling stories of compassion and empathy building a strong case for understanding the nexus between music and resilience.' --

Andre de Quadros, Boston University, USA

'Music, including singing, is one of the core features of our human communication and identity. Research is also providing significant details of how music can have extremely positive benefits to health (physical and psychological). This book is an important contribution to our growing awareness of why music should be integral to lifelong educational experiences.' --

Graham F. Welch, Institute of Education, London

Product Description

The chapters in this book form a persuasive chorus of social practices that advocate the use of music to build a capacity for resilience in individuals and groups. As a whole they exemplify music projects that share common features aligned with an ecological view of reform in health, education and social work systems. Internationally renowned and early career academics have collaborated with practitioners to sing 'Songs of Resilience'; some of which are narratives that report on the effects of music practices for a general population, and some are based on a specific approach, genre or service. Others are quite literally 'songs' that demonstrate aspects of resilience in action. The book makes the connection between music and resilience explicit by posing the following questions - Do music projects in education, health and social services build a measurable capacity for resilience amongst individuals? Can we replicate these projects' outcomes to develop a capacity for resilience in diverse cultural groups? Does shared use of the term 'resilience' help to secure funding for innovative musical activities that provide tangible health, education and social outcomes?

About the Author

Andy Brader is a research fellow specialising in education, music and technology. He trained as a sociologist, music producer and an education practitioner in the UK, and his research now focuses on multi-media content created by and with disengaged youth. His teaching expertise focuses on the development of blended multi-media education projects. Andy possesses significant skills in working collaboratively in low socio-economic areas, and as the founder of a non-profit community music organisation in the UK, he has a strong commitment to securing first class multi-media education services for all young people.

Youth Identities: Time, Space & Social Exclusion

Product Description

The type and quality of youth identities ascribed to young people living in residual housing areas present opportunities for action as well as structural constraints. In this book three ethnographies, based on a youth work practitioner's observations, interviews and participation in local networks, identify young people's resistant identities. Through an analysis of social exclusion, youth policies and interviews with young people, youth workers and their managers, the book outlines a contingent network of relationships that hinder informal learning. Globalisation, individualisation, welfare/education reform and the rise of cultural social movements act upon youth identities and steer youth policies to subordinate the notion of informal group learning. Drawing on Castells' and Touraine's sociological models of identity, the book explores youth as a category of time and residual housing areas as a category of space, as they pertain to local dynamics of social exclusion.