Ideologi och musik i Läroplan för grundskolan, förskoleklassen och fritidshemmet 2011 [Elektronisk resurs]

• In this chapter, the author analyses a new Swedish curriculum for schools that was presented in 2011 and came into effect the same year. Basically the focus in the subject of music is on playing music, creating music, and listening to music. But key citations within the subject of music show a return to some ideas from the beginning of the 20th century regarding nationalism, a Nordic ethnocentric worldview and a tie to Christianity in a way that was abandoned in curricula at the end of the 20th century. Also a concept of a collective cultural heritage is presented in the subject of music. But since a collective cultural heritage is very difficult to define without making a canon it is required that the cultural heritage is defined locally between teachers and students. Music is also presented as a tool to the understanding of other cultures. The author presupposes that there is an ideological connection between education and the state’s formation of the citizen, and that the concepts used in the curricula also are formed by ideology, the political and economical reality, as well as by contemporary debates. The focus in the chapter is on ideological issues such as the connection to the concept of the nation-state, the concept of culture, the canon of music, and who the Other is. Quotations from the curriculum are compared not only with other quotations but also with legal documents such as the Education Act and other laws. Comparisons are also made with older curricula. By comparing different quotations and different kinds of documents, it is indicated that there are contradictions within the curriculum from 2011 that counteract its official purpose. 

Genre

government publication  (marcgt)