Whatever happened to Community Music?

这一研究网络提案推进了AHRC最近一项关于社区音乐的“互联社区”范围研究(McKay和Higham，2011)提出的一些核心问题。该网络的目的是提高人们对社区音乐(以下简称CM)在AHRC‘互联社区’倡议范围内，在促进社区参与方面所能发挥的历史、当前和潜在作用的理解。鉴于英国的CM活动目前正在协商一段相对紧缩的时期，网络组织者将此视为批判性地反思CM的当代状况并重振对其在连接社区中(潜在)作用的理解的关键时刻。这种对社区管理的理解的复兴不仅有利于AHRC的“互联社区”倡议，也将与“大社会”对地方主义、志愿主义和社区赋权的强调联系在一起。在英国，社区管理在最近几十年里经历了重大的变化。毫无疑问，这些变化在很大程度上是由于Everitt(1997)所说的“补贴革命”，国家彩票提供的资金机会促进了这种革命。伴随着国家资金的激增，一个关键的事态发展已经采取了“更高的期望和对‘结果’的强调”的形式(Price 2002：3)。这给那些参与促进CM活动的人开展和思考他们的工作的方式带来了重要的变化，这一点可能最明显地体现在“关注的明显转变……从集体成果转向个人成果”(Matarasso 2007：449)。这样的转变也表明，社区管理委员会对社区赋权、参与过程和民主决策实践(包括了解社区层面的决策和基层组织过程)等问题的长期关注出现了更微妙但意义重大的转变。这种关注体现在更广泛的赋权哲学中，并反映在索尔·阿林斯基、卡尔·罗杰斯、伊万·伊利奇和保罗·弗里尔等作家的作品中，是社区发展理论家和20世纪60年代末70年代初蓬勃发展的社区艺术运动的核心。然而，随着时间的推移，他们在CM运动中的中心地位已经被削弱，正如AHRC最近的一项‘互联社区’范围界定研究指出的那样，CM运动主要是‘资源导向的，而不是积极的反身性’(McKay和Higham 2011：6)。到目前为止，CM管理者和实践者的这种资源导向，阻碍了前者和那些委托、资助和制定与CM活动相关的政策的人之间的富有成效的对话，结果是掩盖了CM活动对社区发展的潜在贡献。这个研究网络由在非正式音乐教育和社区文化发展领域具有专门知识的学者和研究人员(包括上述AHRC范围研究的作者)、现有的CM资助者和专员、经验丰富的管理人员和受人尊敬的从业者组成，将提供一个论坛，在其中既探索CM对社区发展的潜在有价值的方面，并制定未来的研究议程，通过该议程回应英国CM倡议面临的一系列核心问题。网络组织者开发了一系列结构化的网络活动，在适当的时候吸引关键利益相关者参与，为了解决以下问题：-个人和集体的参与动机--社区参与是社区参与/激进主义的途径--对不同的发展实践和社区参与模式的评价--社区作为民主表达和/或反对批评的场所--社区参与中的自由和控制--社区参与活动中的意图、过程和结果之间的关系--社区参与实践中的伦理问题

This research network proposal takes forward a number of core concerns issuing out of a recent AHRC 'Connected Communities' scoping study on community music (McKay and Higham 2011). The purpose of the network is to improve understanding of the historic, current, and potential roles that community music (hereafter CM) can play in promoting community engagement, within the terms of the AHRC's 'Connected Communities' initiative. Given that CM activity in the UK is currently negotiating a period of relative austerity, the network organisers see this as a crucial moment to critically reflect on the contemporary condition of CM and to revitalise understandings of its (potential) role in connecting communities. Such a revitalisation of understandings of CM stands to benefit not only the AHRC's 'Connected Communities' initiative but also to connect with the 'Big Society's emphasis on localism, voluntarism and community empowerment.In the UK, CM has undergone significant shifts over recent decades. Undoubtedly, these shifts have been due - in no small part - to what Everitt (1997) has termed the 'subsidy revolution' facilitated by the funding opportunities made available by the National Lottery. One key development accompanying the upsurge in state funding has taken the form of 'increased expectation and an emphasis upon 'outcomes'' (Price 2002: 3). This has brought important changes in the ways those involved in facilitating CM activities both go about and think about their work, something perhaps most evident in the 'noticeable shift in focus...from collective to individual outcomes' (Matarasso 2007: 449). Such a shift is also indicative of a more subtle yet significant move away from CM's longstanding concern with issues of community empowerment, participatory processes and democratic decision-making practices (including learning about community-level decision making and grass-roots organisation processes). Such concerns, articulated within a broader philosophy of empowerment and reflected in the work of writers such as Saul Alinsky, Carl Rogers, Ivan Illich and Paolo Friere, were central to community development theorists and the burgeoning community arts movement of the late 1960s/early 1970s alike. Over time however, their centrality has been diminished for a CM movement which, as a recent AHRC 'Connected Communities' scoping study notes, has been primarily 'resource-oriented rather than actively reflexive' (McKay and Higham 2011: 6).To date, this resource-orientation, on the part of CM managers and practitioners, has served to inhibit a productive dialogue between the former and those commissioning, funding and developing policy relevant to CM activity, with the result of obscuring the potential contribution of CM activity to community development. The formation of this research network, comprising of academics and researchers with expertise in the areas of informal music education and community cultural development (including the authors of the aforementioned AHRC scoping study), established CM funders and commissioners, experienced managers and respected practitioners will provide a forum within which to both explore the potentially valuable dimensions of CM for community development and formulate a future research agenda through which to respond to a series of core concerns facing CM initiatives in the UK.The network organisers have developed a series of structured network events, engaging key stakeholders at appropriate junctures, in order to address issues including: - Individual and collective motivation to participation - CM participation as a pathway towards community engagement/activism - Evaluation of different models of developmental practice and community engagement - Community as a site of democratic expression and/or oppositional critique - Freedom and control in community engagement - Relationships between intent, process, and outcome in CM activity - Ethical issues in CM practice