The Justice-In-Education Initiative at Columbia University invites you to:
Music of the Oppressed: Tradition, Un-tradition, and the Unschooling of Music.
Helga Davis and Alkinoos Ioannidis in Conversation
Helga Davis and Alkinoos Ioannidis have independently of each other engaged with the question of music as political engagement from the vantage point of the creator and the performer, especially with what could be called, a la Paulo Freire, “music of the oppressed.” They have been articulating this question in the music that they create and perform, especially from within the context of what constitutes “tradition” in musical education and what the role of the Classics can be in the production of modern music. As teachers, they have taken these questions to their students actively facing the challenges of what it takes to un-school children in music and school them again in a music project that is emancipatory (or e-womancipatory, e-humancipatory) utilizing the long tradition of humanity (mythology, in the case of Helga Davis, or “traditional” music, as Alkinoos Ioannidis does). They are both engaged in reorienting music for children as a pedagogical project, teaching them what music can do for humanity.
Moderated by Stathis Gourgouris, this dialogue will cover what can be possible for music on the stitches, borders, and folds of its being.
This is a joint event with Leros Humanism Seminars (LHS/ΣΛ), a project of Columbia Global Centers, Athens.