Reconceptualizing “Music Making:” Music Technology and Freedom in the Age of Neoliberalism

In this episode I unpack Benedict and O’Leary’s (2019) publication titled “Reconceptualizing “music making:” Music technology and freedom in the age of Neoliberalism,” which explores the use of computer science practices to counter neoliberal influence on education.

Welcome back to another episode of the
csk8 podcast my name is jared o'leary
each week of this podcast is either an
interview with a guest or multiple
guests or a solo episode where i unpack
some scholarship in relation to computer
science education in this week's episode
i'm unpacking a paper titled
reconceptualizing music making colon
music technology and freedom in the age
of neoliberalism this paper was written
by kathy benedict and jared o'leary
apologies if i mispronounced any names
i'm just kidding i actually was the
co-author for this but it heavily
relates to an episode that came out two
weeks ago so it made sense to tie this
in with that particular episode which i
do link to in the show notes which
includes a direct link to this free
paper and you can find that in the app
that you're listening to this on by
clicking the link in the description or
by simply going to jaredoleary.com where
there are hundreds if not thousands of
free computer science education
resources including a link to the
curriculum that i create for free at
boot up professional development which
is the nonprofit that i work for and you
can learn more about boot up and the pd
at boot up pd.org alright here's the app
shack for this particular paper quote
recent initiatives by for-profit
corporations and funding measures
instituted by governments intended to
support the preparation of students for
careers in computer science and
technology although such initiatives and
measures can indeed increase
opportunities for students engagement
with computer science and technology in
k-12 schools we question whose needs are
being served for what purposes and at
what cost in particular we ask whether
music educators might be complicit in
advancing technology that subordinates
human needs specifically students's
interests in making music in their own
creative ways to modes a production that
benefits certain dominant commercial
interests in society after discussing
how current computer technology narrows
students choices we counter this
determinism by highlighting a music
subculture that creates and appropriates
music technologies for music related
purposes our example of the chip scene
illuminates how music educators might
reconceptualize music making through
modification of existing music
technology and thereby restore students
freedom to reclaim making in the age of
neoliberalism end quote try to summarize
this paper into a single sentence i
would say that this paper explores the
use of computer science practices to
counter neoliberal influence on
education and again you can find a link
to this free paper in the show notes all
right so in our introduction we talk
about digital natives and how the term
is problematic and that it assumes oh
well because students are growing up
around technology and therefore they
must understand how to use it and how to
create with it etc this is problematic
for a number of reasons we kind of talk
about some of those reasons in the
introduction we then talk about how
computer science is being positioned as
teaching students to create with
technology rather than just consume with
it and how there's a ton of funding from
organizations like national science
foundation or for-profit institutions
etc that positions code as quote a
functional literacy necessary for
meeting societal demands end quote it's
from page 27 and then here's a quote
from page 28 quote such initiatives are
frequently supported by for-profit
corporations that not only provide
schools and organizations with
significant amount of funding and
technology but that position themselves
as industry experts in developing
curricula and standards to prepare
students for the future job market end
quote and then a little bit further down
on page 28 quote coding this context is
put forth as functional and as serving
the productive purposes i.e maintaining
the status quo of the dominant interest
in society we wonder in what ways music
educators might be complicit in
implementing technology that
subordinates the human and musical needs
of students to modes of production that
benefit a highly commercial society in
quote okay so then we go on to say that
we are trying to reclaim the phrase to
make music by describing hardware and
software practices from computer science
that can be used to make music in ways
that are not typically discussed so
before we kind of unpack that a little
bit more we go into a next section
that's titled defining technology and so
we talk about how technology is
presented as this neutral or benign
device or tool that people use and
doesn't have biases and among music
educators this isn't really talked about
much so i know this is much more common
practice in computer science education
there are many podcast episodes that
kind of unpack this so we highlight some
of the biases in terms of like facial
recognition technology algorithms
tagging photos inappropriately etc and
then here's a quote from page 29 quote
there are biases embedded in all
technology influencing how one
experiences or uses it moving us beyond
defining technology simply as a tool
technology must also be read in a much
larger way as involving intertwined
processes the way in which technology is
used to deliver for example educational
experiences content and structures of
accountability for both students and
teachers extends an instrumental
definition of technology to encompass a
range of cultural social and productive
processes having powerful ramifications
for the purpose of education end quote
so the next section is on technological
determinism and freedom so in this
section we talk about how
there is influence on education and
educational contexts from devices
themselves and corporations that are
pushing devices or funding into schools
so for example we talk about how
chromebooks and ipads or other tablets
and whatnot are presented as solving
issues in education as being the tool
that is needed to allow students to have
a voice or be able to create etc which
is inaccurate and problematic but we
also talk about how there's this push
for industry experts having a say on
what is taught in schools for example by
having industry experts have a say on
the standards or curriculum that schools
will adopt or use in k12 context so
here's a quote from pages 30 and 31
quote farming out policy into the hands
of outside experts because we perceive
these kinds of decisions to be outside
our purview serves to ensure predatory
capitalism's mode of governance and the
idea that computing skills are geared
toward enabling students to succeed in
the 21st century is clearly linked to
jobs of the future again underscoring a
model of neoliberalism that is focused
on the maximization of entrepreneurial
freedoms and the unyielding logic of
corporate profit making end quote and
then here's another quote from page 31
quote technology as stallman reminds us
can be said to serve its users only if
it respects their freedom what if the
technology is designed to put chains on
its users in both examples and these are
two among many technology and computing
curricula are presented as tools
designed for instructional ends in
different with respect to politics
instead as giroux has observed freedom
and agency are defined through the
prevailing ideology and principles of
the market teachers simply need to equip
every child with computing skills by
tapping into the latest technology whose
potential simply awaits human direction
the presumed technological beneficence
unchecked seemingly autonomous and
purportedly neutral now couple with the
voracious corporate mentality in a
society that no longer sees schooling as
a public good is a cause for alarm end
quote so we end this section by saying
that technology in schools is often
being placed into curricula without any
kind of critical reflection and i would
argue that computer science is often
being placed into other subject areas
without critical reflection and i talk
about that in the podcast titled the
subservient co-equal effective and
social integration styles and their
implications for computer science so
check that one out if you haven't
listened to that one it talks about some
of the problems with integration and how
there are many different ways that you
can do it that can be problematic not
just for students and teachers but for
computer science as a whole so the quote
that i just read for you is kind of like
a segue into our next section titled
education as a public good so this
builds off of giroud's work of education
as a public good so the example of like
the devices being in the classrooms and
then industry experts having a say on
curriculum or standards or whatever are
examples of neoliberal influence on
education at least according to like
scholars like giroud and others that we
cite in this particular paper and so we
raised the questions on page 32 that
says quote when design decisions reside
within commercial entities alone whose
interests are being served and for what
purposes how might music education
curricula be constrained by those
factors end quote so for example the
devices limit you to certain hardware
constraints and software constraints
that can be used on those devices and
then the industry experts having an
influence on the content being taught
and the purposes that drive education
like getting a job as a computer
scientist or whatever all have an
influence on what students learn and for
what purposes or even how they learn and
so we are raising this question of well
whose interests are actually being
served with this which resonates with
the paper that i unpacked two weeks ago
by aman yadav emery heath so check that
one out if you haven't listened to that
one it's a wonderful paper all right so
here's a quote for pages 32 and 33 and
think of this in relation to integration
of computer science into music education
it kind of is gonna lead us into the
main point of our paper that's coming up
quote in music education context where
teachers have adopted many of these
standards of judgment the emphasis is on
engaging with the music and technologies
created by others performing a
pre-existing composition rather than
composing an original composition using
a manufactured instrument rather than
designing and building a new instrument
or engaging with music software rather
than conceptualizing and developing new
music software are just a few examples
using the music tools or literacies
developed by others rather than
challenging or crafting new technologies
for being musical diminishes students
agency however tobias suggests that by
viewing technology through a critical
lens identifying multiple possibilities
of technology and envisioning how it
might be used in ways that it was not
originally intended music educators can
avoid deterministic analyses of the role
that technologies play in music teaching
and learning end quote okay so the way
that integration is frequently talked
about in other disciplines is to learn
domain specific content or to solve
problems etc and while those are great
the thing that we're actually
positioning here is a focus on
creativity within the arts and
specifically within music so rather than
using an instrument that an instrument
manufacturer has created why not have
students design their own or hey if
you're using software to compose music
or produce music or whatever why not
actually modify that software or create
your own to do things that could not be
done with the inherent constraints of
the software that you're currently using
so this approach is very different form
of integration than simply solving
problems or using computer science to
learn content knowledge so we unpack
this more by providing a more concrete
example of well what could this actually
look like so the section title music
technology in the chip scene elaborates
on a lot of the research that i did for
my dissertation so we begin by talking
about the demo scene and how
when early computers and video game
consoles were created people would
change the code to create what it was
called demos so the demos would
demonstrate like your prowess as a
programmer in terms of creating unique
visuals or sounds etc in early computing
hardware this led to like a subculture
known as chiptunes or chip music or the
chip scene where people specifically
focused on creating music with this like
retro hardware so for example they would
program software called trackers that
allowed people to make music with like
video game hardware that wasn't
originally designed to make music or at
least didn't have software to make music
with so here's a quote from page 34.
quote rather than accepting the inherent
music making limitations of early
computer and video game hardware and
software people modified existing code
or develop entirely new music making
software to create music with early
sound chips further many of the people
who now create such software often
openly share their source code with
others and encourage modification or
continuous development when the original
developer must abandon work on a project
end quote so this open source nature had
a profound impact on the ways that
people are able to create software or
modify software to make music and i
actually have an upcoming interview that
will come out probably in a few weeks
with somebody where we specifically talk
about open source and how that can
influence education so stay tuned in
addition to like the software
modifications and whatnot that are often
discussed like in
mod culture which is like culture around
modifying video games to do something
that they couldn't originally do and
i've done some podcasts to talk about
mod culture so check that out members of
the chip scene also engage in hardware
modification so for example people would
modify the nintendo game boys to be able
to perform live with it so they would
bypass the internal amplifier and then
this would allow them to have a better
signal with less noise that they could
then plug into like a pa system so that
way they could perform music in a
concert or record it using the trackers
that were developed by members of the
chip scene and so while that's just one
of many many examples that i talk about
in my dissertation for hardware
modification they also talk about
designing and building devices
specifically for making music with these
retro consoles and computers so here's a
quote from pages 35 and 36 quote these
music-related practices and literacies
are guided primarily by individual and
group interests in their leisure rather
than corporations or industry experts
seeking to fill computing jobs
interestingly some people within the
chip scene regularly engage in
entrepreneurial practices such as buying
selling trading promoting and
manufacturing a range of created or
modified media hardware and software
while those who create or modified
devices may appear only to have replaced
one commercialized interest for another
some within the chip scene design music
technologies expressly to facilitate
modification in other words the
technologies that these chip musicians
create are not closed ecosystems limited
to original design decisions and biases
but rather are meant to be altered by
the people who use them in their leisure
ship musicians encourage or design
opportunities for such engagement in a
variety of ways for example one members
of chiptune discussion forum often sell
their music under a pay what you want
model and include original project files
so people can learn from or remix their
music two members sell hardware parts
that can be combined or altered to
modify existing hardware in an
individually meaningful manner and three
software developers within the chip
scene often release source code for
their creations and encourage others to
modify their code to meet their own
purposes each of these examples
demonstrates how some people within the
chip scene engage in commercialized
practices through the products they
create which can establish new forms of
determinism for the created or modified
technologies however chip musicians
often do so with the intention that
users will have the freedom to alter
these technologies further to better
suit their own purposes this approach
enables people to be not only users but
makers of music and music technologies
in contrast with those music
technologies and curricula that lead to
technological and musical determinism
end quote okay so that is like the main
crux of this particular argument rather
than just using devices as is or
software as is we are encouraging people
to modify not only the software but the
hardware for purposes not originally
designed into that hardware or software
whether it's to eliminate biases to
solve problems or to enable expressive
mediums that couldn't be done without
such modifications for example to be
able to create chiptunes or whatever the
point is we don't have to let the
technologies the hardwares and the
softwares or the corporations that
donate those technologies determine how
we use them so this leads into the final
section of this particular paper titled
lingering questions and potential points
of dialogue which reading through this i
wonder if that's what led to my
lingering questions at the end of
podcasts i didn't realize that we used
this verbage in this paper that was
written in 2019 so before i actually
recorded the first episode of the
podcast it was kind of funny so here's
two quotes from page 36 in this section
quote examples above present a
perspective on music technology that
reflects the ontological shift that
takes place when a user of
commercialized music technologies
becomes a creator or modifier of music
technology for leisure end quote then
another quote quote we intend for the
examples we have presented to provide a
heuristic illustration for potential
reconceptualizations of what it means to
make music with and through music
technologies end quote and then we
provide some questions on pages 37. the
first set is quote how might a shift
from music technologies created by
others to creating and using music
technologies shape music making and
learning what copyright laws might music
educators need to consider when
appropriating commercialized music
technologies where is the place for and
or the balance between time spent making
music technologies and making music with
such technologies why might stakeholders
consider such a shift as a move away
from music making and learning in what
ways do these shifts help us to attend
to democratic education and social
justice respect for others critical
inquiry equity freedom civic courage and
concern for the collective good end
quote and then the next set of questions
quote however we also wonder where such
practices might be situated in other
words would students code music
technology software and a computer
science class a music technology class
an interdisciplinary class or through
collaborations between such classes in
an ideal setting we might respond to
such a question by asking why does that
matter in quote and then finally a quote
from page 38 quote rather than
conceiving of music technologies as
being constrained by immutable design
decisions and biases we invite music
educators to explore the many creative
possibilities that could arise through
students self-creation and
self-modification of music technologies
chiptune practices demonstrate one such
possibility for students to circumvent
technological determinism such an
approach expands the notion of music
making to include the creation and
modification of hardware and software
end quote okay so this leads to some of
my lingering questions to borrow some
terminology from this particular paper
so the first one is how might educators
and hegemonic influences on education
balance societal organizational group
and individual needs so that was
mouthful so for example a societal need
might be the need to collaborate on
combating climate change an
organizational need might be
corporations who need qualified
candidates for open jobs a group need
might be removing systemic barriers for
marginalized identities and then an
individual need might be just the goals
and desires
of individuals these are all worthwhile
causes that could be focused on within
schools but what i'm wondering out loud
is why do people and the broader
discourse focus on one over another for
example we critique organizational needs
in this paper but they're still valid
needs while it is problematic that
corporations are having a say on what
students learn they do have a need for
qualified candidates and while i
forefund individual and group needs over
organizational the broader societal
needs also need to be addressed so this
is where i think as i mentioned
previously that multi-perspectivalism is
key i don't think we should have school
or a single discipline focus on one set
of needs while ignoring the others so we
shouldn't just cater to
for-profit institutions just because
they give us funding and because they
need jobs filled but we also shouldn't
just focus on individual needs we need
to also think about group needs and
societal needs but i don't know what
that balance looks like so let's zoom
out and look at education in a k-12
setting like which classes should focus
on
one more than another but then if we
look at individual classes what's the
balance between these different needs
within that class or that domain or
discipline so for computer science how
do we balance societal organizational
group and individual needs within the
curriculum or within a given project etc
i don't really have an answer to it but
i think it's something that we could
explore more and talk about more and we
need to do that in my opinion by zooming
out so while the paper discussed two
weeks ago was critiquing organizational
needs and focusing on centering group
needs or individual needs other papers
have talked about how we need to focus
more on societal needs all of these
areas are important for us to consider
as we shouldn't just focus on one at the
cost of ignoring all others in my
opinion but you might disagree with me
and that's okay i'm happy to actually
talk with you about it on the podcast
there's a contact me button on my
website in case you're interested now
the next question that i have is when
might the approach described in this
paper position computer science within a
subservient relationship with another
discipline so building off of the
bressler podcast that i did a couple
months ago if we use computer science to
solve problems in the domain or to
encourage expressivity or to
enable expression of creativity or
motion or whatever or to learn domain
specific content at what point is it
putting computer science into a
subservient relationship to other
disciplines and i don't have a clear
answer to that and i mentioned that on
many other episodes but i say it as a
critique to the writing that i did in
collaboration with kathy on this
particular article one might describe
this approach as an interdiscipline but
you could also look at it as positioning
computer science in a subservient
relationship with music education but it
really depends on how you frame that or
implement that so while i obviously
agree with a lot of what was written
here because i helped write it i still
think it's important to critique it but
anyways if you're interested in reading
the actual paper it is available for
free and you can find the link in the
show notes or by going to jaredlery.com
where there's a bunch of computer
science education resources as well as a
link to boot up pd.org is the nonprofit
i work for and then there's also a bunch
of gaming and drumming content like
literally several hundred hours worth of
drum content and a bunch of gaming
content that i keep adding daily because
i'm a nerd thank you so much for
listening to this episode stay tuned
next week for another and until then i
hope you're all staying safe and are
having a wonderful week

Article

Benedict, C. & O’Leary, J. (2019). Reconceptualizing “Music Making:” Music Technology and Freedom in the Age of Neoliberalism. Action, Criticism, and Theory for Music Education, 18(1), 26-43. (link to pdf)

Abstract

“Recent initiatives by for-profit corporations and funding measures instituted by governments intend to support the preparation of students for careers in computer science and technology. Although such initiatives and measures can indeed increase opportunities for students’ engagement with computer science and technology in K-12 schools, we question whose needs are being served, for what purposes, and at what cost. In particular, we ask whether music educators might be complicit in advancing technology that subordinates human needs—specifically students’ interests in making music in their own creative ways—to modes of production that benefit certain dominant commercial interests in society. After discussing how current computer technology narrows students’ choices, we counter this determinism by highlighting a music subculture that creates and appropriates music technologies for music-related purposes. Our example of the “chipscene” illustrates how music educators might reconceptualize “music making” through modification of existing music technology and thereby restore students’ freedom to “reclaim making” in the age of neoliberalism.”

Author Keywords

Music technology, freedom, technological determinism, neoliberalism, chiptunes

My One Sentence Summary

This paper explores the use of computer science practices to counter neoliberal influence on education.

Some Of My Lingering Questions/Thoughts

How might educators and hegemonic influences on education balance societal, organizational, group, and individual needs?
When might the approach described in this paper position computer science within a subservient relationship with another discipline?

Resources/Links Relevant to This Episode

Other podcast episodes that were mentioned or are relevant to this episode
- Breaking the Code: Confronting Racism in Computer Science through Community, Criticality, and Citizenship
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- Computer Science in Music (CSTA Wyoming interview)
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- How to Get Started with Computer Science Education
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- Intersections of Popular Musicianship and Computer Science Practices
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- Music Making in Scratch: High Floors, Low Ceilings, and Narrow Walls?
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- Programming Music with Sonic Pi Promotes Positive Attitudes for Beginners
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- The Subservient, Co-equal, Affective, and Social Integration Styles and Their Implications for [Computer Science]
  - In this episode I unpack Bresler’s (1995) publication titled “The subservient, co-equal, affective, and social integration styles and their implications for the arts,” which “examines the different manifestations of arts integration in the operational, day-to-day curriculum in ordinary schools, focusing on the how, the what, and the toward what” (p. 33).
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