Music Theory’s Therapeutic Imperative and the Tyranny of the Normal

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joseph Straus
Keyword(s):  
Music Theory ◽  
Medical Model ◽  
Traditional Music ◽  
Gender And Sexuality ◽  
Bodily Appearance ◽  
Sociocultural Model ◽  
Anomalous Event ◽  
Medical Model Of Disability ◽  
Musical Elements ◽  
Individual Body

Abstract Traditional music theory rationalizes abnormal musical elements (like dissonant or chromatic tones or formal anomalies) with respect to normal ones. It is thus allied with a medical model of disability, understood as a deficit or defect located within an individual body, and requiring remediation or cure. A newer sociocultural model of disability understands it as a culturally stigmatized deviance from normative standards for bodily appearance and functioning, analogous to (and intersectional with) race, gender, and sexuality as a source of affirmative political and cultural identity. The sociocultural model of disability suggests the possibility of a disablist music theory, one that subverts the traditional therapeutic imperative and resists the tyranny of the normal. Disablist music theory is music theory without norms, and without a commitment to wholeness, unity, coherence, and completeness—those fantasies of a normal, healthy body. Instead, disablist theory brings the seemingly anomalous event to the center of the discussion and revels in the commotion and discombobulation that result: it makes the normal strange. In the process, it opens up our sense of what music theory is and might be.

Therapeutic Music Theory and the Tyranny of the Normal

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joseph N. Straus
Keyword(s):  
Music Theory ◽  
Medical Model ◽  
Traditional Music ◽  
Sociocultural Model ◽  
Medical Model Of Disability ◽  
Musical Elements

This chapter weaves together two stories that are usually told separately. The first is the story of disability, especially how people have talked about bodies perceived as defective, deviant, or deformed. The second is the story of music, especially how music theorists have talked about musical features perceived as in some sense abnormal. Traditional music theory is a normalizing discourse, designed to rationalize abnormal musical elements (like formal anomalies or dissonant harmonies) with respect to normal ones, and it has thus implicitly allied itself with the medical model of disability. A countertradition within music theory is a disablist discourse that embraces elements traditionally understood as strange, odd, eccentric, and idiosyncratic, without making any effort to position them within a normative context, and is thus aligned with the sociocultural model of disability. Disablist music theory crips music.

Madness

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joseph N. Straus
Keyword(s):  
Mental Illness ◽  
Medical Model ◽  
Affective States ◽  
Sociocultural Model ◽  
Human Difference ◽  
Divine Punishment ◽  
Musical Modernism

The sorts of mental or affective states that are understood as madness (or medicalized as “mental illness”) vary with time and place. As with other culturally stigmatized bodily differences (i.e., disabilities), madness has been understood in three ways. First, madness has been understood in religious terms, as a mark of divine punishment or transcendent vision. Second, there is the medical model, which constitutes madness as “mental illness.” Third, in line with the sociocultural model of disability, madness is seen as a (potentially valuable) human difference rather than a deficit, pathology, or disease. Musical modernism represents madness in its divided consciousness (stratification into conflicting layers) and its hearing of voices (quotation of stylistically incongruous music).

The Rio 2016 Paralympic Games: The Visibility of People With Disabilities in Brazil as a Possible Legacy

2020 ◽  
pp. 216747952094273
Author(s):  
Doralice Lange de Souza ◽  
Ian Brittain
Keyword(s):  
Medical Model ◽  
People With Disabilities ◽  
Disability Rights ◽  
Negative Stereotypes ◽  
The Media ◽  
Paralympic Sport ◽  
Medical Model Of Disability ◽  
Managerial Positions ◽  
Depth Interviews ◽  
Paralympic Games

There are claims that the Paralympic Games (PG) might contribute to a better world for people with disabilities (PWD). However, there are also claims that the PG might in fact be counterproductive to the PWD’s rights movement because they might promote the medical model of disability and/or ableism. In this context, we developed a qualitative exploratory study to investigate the legacies of the Rio 2016 PG from the perspective of disability rights activists and people involved in Paralympic sport managerial positions. In this article, we discuss one of the main perceived legacies that the PG fostered PWD’s visibility and a change in society’s perception of PWD. We conducted 24 open in-depth interviews and found that, for our participants, the PG worked as a showcase for PWD who were rarely seen in the media and in public spaces before the Games. This visibility helped to challenge negative stereotypes and stigmas associated with PWD, as well as possibly opening new doors for them. Our interviewees believe that we shouldn’t expect that the PG alone can change people’s perceptions and PWD’s status overnight. They are part of a larger and complex set of actions that are slowly contributing to this process.

scholarly journals Reconceptualizing Assistance for Young Children of Color With Disabilities in an Inclusion Classroom

2021 ◽  
Vol 41 (1) ◽  
pp. 57-68
Author(s):  
Soyoung Park ◽  
Sunmin Lee ◽  
Monica Alonzo ◽  
Jennifer Keys Adair
Keyword(s):  
Early Childhood ◽  
Head Start ◽  
Young Children ◽  
Medical Model ◽  
Surveillance Culture ◽  
Children Of Color ◽  
School Year ◽  
Child Centered ◽  
Medical Model Of Disability ◽  
Inclusion Classroom

In this article, we draw on DisCrit to critically analyze how a group of early childhood educators approached assistance with young children of color with disabilities in a Head Start inclusion classroom. Using examples from data collected over one school year, we demonstrate how child-centered assistance advances justice for young children of color with disabilities who are often subjected to a surveillance culture in schools. We critique assistance that aligns with the medical model of disability and aims to change young children of color with disabilities to conform to ableist, racist expectations of schooling. We offer examples of assistance practices that contrastingly aim to support young children of color with disabilities to pursue their own interests and purposes. Through these counterstories, we reconceptualize assistance as a practice that can support young children of color with disabilities to be more fully themselves.

Disability and Biomediation

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mack Hagood
Keyword(s):  
Medical Model ◽  
Media Technologies ◽  
Political Struggles ◽  
Medical Model Of Disability

The medical mediation of bodily differences can be fraught, and many scholars have shown how the combination of media and medicine can produce disablement according to biopolitical norms. Mack Hagood proposes a framework for the study of biomediation that disentangles medical uses of media technologies from the medical model of disability. Using tinnitus as his case study, he demonstrates the value of this framework for understanding the complex role of media in both biological and political struggles over disability and disabled identities.

Art.1 Purpose

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kakoullis Emily ◽  
Ikehara Yoshikazu
Keyword(s):  
Medical Model ◽  
Social Model ◽  
International Human Rights Law ◽  
Human Rights Law ◽  
International Human Rights ◽  
Persons With Disabilities ◽  
Social Model Of Disability ◽  
Societal Participation ◽  
United Nations Convention ◽  
Medical Model Of Disability

This chapter examines Article 1 of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD). The article sets out the purpose of the CRPD and describes its target group. It enshrines a ‘paradigm shift’ in approach to the concept of ‘disability’ in international human rights law: a shift from an approach underpinned by a ‘medical model of disability’ that views persons with disabilities as ‘objects’ of medical treatment and in need of charity; to a ‘social model of disability’, which views persons with disabilities as ‘subjects’ with rights and focuses on the barriers persons with disabilities face that may hinder their societal participation.

scholarly journals The Purpose of Play

2021 ◽  
Vol 28 (2) ◽  
pp. 1-40
Author(s):  
Katta Spiel ◽  
Kathrin Gerling
Keyword(s):  
Large Scale ◽  
Medical Model ◽  
Self Determination Theory ◽  
Status Quo ◽  
Self Determination ◽  
Top Down ◽  
Medical Settings ◽  
Medical Model Of Disability ◽  
Future Work

Play presents a popular pastime for all humans, though not all humans play alike. Subsequently, Human–Computer Interaction Games research is increasingly concerned with the development of games that serve neurodivergent 1 players. In a critical review of 66 publications informed by Disability Studies and Self-Determination Theory, we analyse which populations , research methods, kinds of play and overall purpose goals existing games address. We find that games are largely developed for children, in a top-down approach. They tend to focus on educational and medical settings and are driven by factors extrinsic to neurodivergent interests. Existing work predominantly follows a medical model of disability, which fails to support self-determination of neurodivergent players and marginalises their opportunities for immersion. Our contribution comprises a large-scale investigation into a budding area of research gaining traction with the intent to capture a status quo and identify opportunities for future work attending to differences without articulating them as deficit.

The Reinforcement of Ableism: Normality, the Medical Model of Disability, and Humanism in Applied Behavior Analysis and ASD

2016 ◽  
Vol 54 (5) ◽  
pp. 366-376 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eric Shyman
Keyword(s):  
Autism Spectrum Disorder ◽  
Behavior Analysis ◽  
Applied Behavior Analysis ◽  
Medical Model ◽  
Autism Spectrum ◽  
Spectrum Disorder ◽  
Effective Intervention ◽  
Central Argument ◽  
Medical Model Of Disability

Abstract The field of educating individuals with Autism Spectrum Disorder has ever been rife with controversy regarding issues ranging from etiology and causation to effective intervention and education options. One such basis for controversy has been between humanism, and humanistic philosophical concepts, and its fundamental differences with behaviorism, and behavioristic philosophical concepts. These differences have long been debated, and the belief that the two orientations are generally mutually exclusive has been largely maintained. Recently, however, there has been some resurgence of interest in reconciling some of the fundamental humanistic and behavioristic tenets. Most of these discussions, however, center on specific interventional methodologies as its basis without delving more deeply into the underlying philosophical issues. This article will explore some fundamental humanistic concepts that ought to be reconciled in order for behaviorism to be considered a humanistic practice. While the notion that the possibility of reconciliation is maintained, the central argument maintains that much work needs to be done on the part of behaviorism both philosophically and methodologically in order for such reconciliation to be achieved.

scholarly journals Los paisajes de la sal y la música Española = The landscapes of salt and Spanish music

2020 ◽  
pp. 35
Author(s):  
Faustino Núñez
Keyword(s):  
18Th Century ◽  
Traditional Music ◽  
The Self ◽  
Self Confidence ◽  
Spanish Music ◽  
Musical Elements

RESUMEN:Si los italianos son dulces, los españoles somos salaos. La sal como analogía de una idiosincrasia que mezcla lo exótico con el desparpajo propio de los hispanos. En contraposición a la delicadeza del europeo el temperamento español. Aunque sea considerado un tópico, en nuestra música queda reflejado a la perfección ese carácter. La música española es extrovertida, abierta, simpática, sociables, cordial, salada. En los géneros inspirados en la música tradicional más que en aquellos cultivos en la música académica se aprecia ese carácter, y entre ellos, y ahí vamos a centrar nuestra exposición, en las tonadillas, sainetes y entremeses de la segunda mitad del siglo XVIII y en nuestro género más internacional, el flamenco. En esta ponencia repasamos aquellos momentos en los que la sal es protagonista y, en la medida de lo posible, expondremos los elementos musicales que podemos considerar salados en los géneros mencionados. Estos contenidos han sido recopilados en los últimos años a través de la investigación en los archivos y bibliotecas que contienen las partituras de estas obras, así como el análisis de los estilos flamencos. ABSTRACT:If the Italians are sweet, the Spaniards are salty (salaos). Salt as an analogy of an idiosyncrasy that mixes the exotic with the self-confidence of Hispanics. In contrast to the delicacy of the European, the Spanish temperament. Although it is considered a topic, in our music that character is perfectly reflected. Spanish music is outgoing, open, friendly, sociable, friendly, salty. In the genres inspired by traditional music more than in those crops in academic music, that character is appreciated, and between them. And there we will focus our exhibition, on the tonadillas, saleros and hors d'oeuvres of the second half of the 18th century and on our most international genre, flamenco. In this paper, we review those moments in which salt is the protagonist and, as far as possible, we will present the musical elements that we can consider salty in the aforementioned genres. These contents have been compiled in recent years through research in the archives and libraries that contain the scores of these works, as well as the analysis of flamenco styles. 

scholarly journals Disability as Socio-Rhetorical Action: Towards a Genre-Based Approach

2011 ◽  
Vol 31 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Rick Carpenter
Keyword(s):  
Social Action ◽  
Medical Model ◽  
Genre Theory ◽  
Traditional View ◽  
Human Actions ◽  
The Past ◽  
Social Nature ◽  
Rhetorical Action ◽  
Critical Attention ◽  
Medical Model Of Disability

<p>In many respects, the reconceptualization of genre over the past few decades mirrors that of disability.&nbsp; Just as disability scholars and activists reject rigid categories of fixed difference based solely on individual deviations from some supposedly neutral norm, so too have contemporary genre theorists rejected the traditional view of genre as static categories of discourse that share certain objective conventional features. Such a view is unsatisfactory because, in casting genres as decontextualized, ahistorical forms or receptacles, it fails to adequately reflect the inherently social nature of discourse and texts. Instead, genre theorists now (re)conceive genres as dynamic sites of social action. Disability is also a form of social action, a rhetorical convention used to construct and regulate human actions and interactions, and, as such, can be viewed and analysed in generic terms. Conceiving disability as genre (and metagenre) provides an additional theoretical lens for examining and transcending, among other things, the reductive and oppressive categorization deployed by the medical model of disability. A perspective informed by genre theory helps to shift critical attention from description to explanation, a necessary step in deconstructing hegemonic discourses.</p>

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