Full Text Available
Note: Clicking the button above will open the full text document at the original institutional repository in a new window.
Surveying Post-Apartheid Decolonisation of the BMus Curriculum at Four South African Tertiary Music Departments
ENGLISH ABSTRACT: This thesis surveys post-apartheid curricular decolonisation at four South African tertiary music departments: Nelson Mandela University, Stellenbosch University, the University of Cape Town (South African College of Music) and the University of KwaZulu-Natal. Data for this survey...
Saved in:
| Main Author: | |
|---|---|
| Other Authors: | |
| Format: | Thesis |
| Language: | en_ZA |
| Published: |
Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University
2021
|
| Subjects: | |
| Tags: |
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
|
| _version_ | 1867614064371302400 |
|---|---|
| access_status_str | Open Access |
| author | Struwig, Mieke |
| author2 | Venter, Carina |
| author_browse | Struwig, Mieke Venter, Carina |
| author_facet | Venter, Carina Struwig, Mieke |
| author_sort | Struwig, Mieke |
| collection | Thesis |
| dc_rights_str_mv | Stellenbosch University |
| description | ENGLISH ABSTRACT: This thesis surveys post-apartheid curricular decolonisation at four South African tertiary music departments: Nelson Mandela University, Stellenbosch University, the University of Cape Town (South African College of Music) and the University of KwaZulu-Natal. Data for this survey were obtained through systematic analysis of archival material, focusing on yearbooks and module outlines between 1994 and 2020. This data is supplemented and contextualised by 27 interviews with current and former staff members at the included music departments. The result is a critical curriculum history which, this thesis posits, has the potential to act as a mechanism for change, drawing on Agbedahin and Agbedahin’s (2019) argument for the need for critical university histories. Eurocentrism and coloniality are found to be pervasive in the hidden and explicit curricula of each of the departments, albeit in varying degrees. Chapter one broaches this stubborn tenacity of coloniality and Eurocentrism in the broader context of the university and the discipline of music. The embeddedness of these notions in institutional curricula and the accommodating rapport between coloniality and neoliberalism are demonstrated in chapter two, which provides an account of institutional crisis narratives to understand the institutional environments in which curricular change takes place. Amongst other things, the survey of curricular changes taken from yearbooks and interviews in chapter three points to the sustained presence of hegemonic terminology, the continued positioning of non-traditional musics as optional and marginal and the reduction of curricular change to bureaucratic procedure. Chapter four makes sense of the survey materials of chapter three through a classification of the surveyed changes, followed by a consideration of positions on decolonisation drawn from my interviews. Taken together, this categorisation and the insights from interviews on decolonisation point to an overwhelming reliance on superficial additive strategies for curricular decolonisation that will, at best, leave intact a Eurocentric centre. In closing, the thesis urges researchers, scholars and students to “stay with the trouble” (Haraway, 2016) of decolonisation in their efforts to make “a world just a little better” (Stengers and Despret, 2014:165). |
| format | Thesis |
| id | oai:scholar.sun.ac.za:10019.1/109940 |
| institution | Stellenbosch University (South Africa) |
| language | en_ZA |
| last_indexed | 2026-06-10T12:46:06.004Z |
| license_str | Other — see source repository |
| provenance_str_mv | Harvested via OAI-PMH from SUNScholar — Stellenbosch University Repository |
| publishDate | 2021 |
| publishDateRange | 2021 |
| publishDateSort | 2021 |
| publisher | Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University |
| publisherStr | Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University |
| record_format | dspace |
| source_str | SUNScholar — Stellenbosch University Repository |
| spelling | oai:scholar.sun.ac.za:10019.1/109940 Surveying Post-Apartheid Decolonisation of the BMus Curriculum at Four South African Tertiary Music Departments Struwig, Mieke Venter, Carina Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of Music. Thesis (MMus)--Stellenbosch University, 2021. Music -- Instruction and study Decolonisation Education -- Curricula Racism in higher education Discrimination in higher education ENGLISH ABSTRACT: This thesis surveys post-apartheid curricular decolonisation at four South African tertiary music departments: Nelson Mandela University, Stellenbosch University, the University of Cape Town (South African College of Music) and the University of KwaZulu-Natal. Data for this survey were obtained through systematic analysis of archival material, focusing on yearbooks and module outlines between 1994 and 2020. This data is supplemented and contextualised by 27 interviews with current and former staff members at the included music departments. The result is a critical curriculum history which, this thesis posits, has the potential to act as a mechanism for change, drawing on Agbedahin and Agbedahin’s (2019) argument for the need for critical university histories. Eurocentrism and coloniality are found to be pervasive in the hidden and explicit curricula of each of the departments, albeit in varying degrees. Chapter one broaches this stubborn tenacity of coloniality and Eurocentrism in the broader context of the university and the discipline of music. The embeddedness of these notions in institutional curricula and the accommodating rapport between coloniality and neoliberalism are demonstrated in chapter two, which provides an account of institutional crisis narratives to understand the institutional environments in which curricular change takes place. Amongst other things, the survey of curricular changes taken from yearbooks and interviews in chapter three points to the sustained presence of hegemonic terminology, the continued positioning of non-traditional musics as optional and marginal and the reduction of curricular change to bureaucratic procedure. Chapter four makes sense of the survey materials of chapter three through a classification of the surveyed changes, followed by a consideration of positions on decolonisation drawn from my interviews. Taken together, this categorisation and the insights from interviews on decolonisation point to an overwhelming reliance on superficial additive strategies for curricular decolonisation that will, at best, leave intact a Eurocentric centre. In closing, the thesis urges researchers, scholars and students to “stay with the trouble” (Haraway, 2016) of decolonisation in their efforts to make “a world just a little better” (Stengers and Despret, 2014:165). AFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: Hierdie tesis onderneem ’n oorsig van post-apartheid kurrikulum-dekolonisering by vier Suid-Afrikaanse tersiêre musiekdepartemente: Nelson Mandela Universiteit, Universiteit Stellenbosch, Universiteit van Kaapstad (Suid-Afrikaanse Musiekkollege) en die Universiteit van KwaZulu-Natal. Data vir hierdie oorsig is versamel deur sistematiese analise van argiefmateriaal, met ’n fokus op jaarboeke en moduleraamwerke vir die tydperk 1994 tot 2020. Hierdie data word ondersteun en geplaas binne konteks aan die hand van 27 kwalitatiewe onderhoude met huidige en voormalige personeellede by die ingeslote musiekdepartemente. Die resultaat is ’n kritiese kurrikulumgeskiedenis wat, so argumenteer hierdie tesis, beskik oor die potensiaal om te dien as ’n meganisme vir verandering, na aanleiding van Agbedahin and Agbedahin (2019) se argument vir die noodsaaklikheid van kritiese universiteitsgeskiedenisse. Daar word bevind dat Eurosentrisiteit en kolonialiteit tot mindere of meerdere mate deurslaggewend is in die departemente se eksplisiete en verskuilde kurrikula. Hoofstuk een beskou hierdie problematiese voortsetting van kolonialiteit en Eurosentrisiteit in die breër konteks van die universiteit en die dissipline van musiek. Die ingesetelheid van die genoemde konsepte in die institusionele kurrikula en die akkommoderende verhouding tussen kolonialiteit en neoliberalisme word uitgelig in hoofstuk twee, wat bestaan uit ’n beskouing van institusionele krisis-narratiewe gemik daarop om die institusionele omgewings waarin kurrikulumverandering plaasvind, te begryp. Die oorsig van kurrikulumveranderinge volgens jaarboeke en onderhoude in hoofstuk drie, wys onder andere op die voortgesette teenwoordigheid van hegemoniese terminologie, die volgehoue posisionering van nie-tradisionele musieke as opsioneel en gemarginaliseerd en die reduseer van kurrikulumverandering tot burokratiese prosedure. Hoofstuk vier interpreteer die oorsigmateriaal in hoofstuk drie aan die hand van ’n klassifikasie van kurrikulumverandering, gevolg deur ’n oorweging van beskouings van dekolonisering in die onderhoude. As ’n geheel dui hierdie klassifikasie en insigte uit die onderhoude daarop dat dekolonisering oorweldigend steun op oppervlakkige byvoegingstrategieë vir die dekolonisering van die kurrikulum wat, ten beste, ’n Eurosentriese sentrum onaangeraak laat. Ter afsluiting, spoor hierdie tesis navorsers en studente aan om “die ongemak te handhaaf” (Haraway, 2016) van dekolonisering in ’n poging om die wêreld selfs net ’n klein bietjie beter te maak (Stengers and Despret, 2014:165). Masters 2021-03-07T09:24:20Z 2021-04-21T14:33:00Z 2021-03-07T09:24:20Z 2021-04-21T14:33:00Z 2021-03 Thesis http://hdl.handle.net/10019.1/109940 en_ZA Stellenbosch University ix, 151 pages application/pdf Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University |
| spellingShingle | Music -- Instruction and study Decolonisation Education -- Curricula Racism in higher education Discrimination in higher education Struwig, Mieke Surveying Post-Apartheid Decolonisation of the BMus Curriculum at Four South African Tertiary Music Departments |
| title | Surveying Post-Apartheid Decolonisation of the BMus Curriculum at Four South African Tertiary Music Departments |
| title_full | Surveying Post-Apartheid Decolonisation of the BMus Curriculum at Four South African Tertiary Music Departments |
| title_fullStr | Surveying Post-Apartheid Decolonisation of the BMus Curriculum at Four South African Tertiary Music Departments |
| title_full_unstemmed | Surveying Post-Apartheid Decolonisation of the BMus Curriculum at Four South African Tertiary Music Departments |
| title_short | Surveying Post-Apartheid Decolonisation of the BMus Curriculum at Four South African Tertiary Music Departments |
| title_sort | surveying post apartheid decolonisation of the bmus curriculum at four south african tertiary music departments |
| topic | Music -- Instruction and study Decolonisation Education -- Curricula Racism in higher education Discrimination in higher education |
| url | http://hdl.handle.net/10019.1/109940 |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT struwigmieke surveyingpostapartheiddecolonisationofthebmuscurriculumatfoursouthafricantertiarymusicdepartments |