Women Music Educators in Institutions: Pathways Into, Through and Beyond Colleges of Advanced Education (CAEs) in Adelaide 1973-1990

By Dr Helena Raymond Lauer

This thesis concerns music educators' pathways from early-life musical-training contexts, through a Graduate Diploma course at a College of Advanced Education, and into practice as music educators; these three key periods also shaped the data analysis.

The methodology employed was life-story research, and methods of data collection comprised interviews of nineteen informants and document study. The conceptual framework combined the notion of contextualising music education pathways as social-learning experiences with Bourdieuian perspective on practices to explore the fields traversed.

From analysis of the accounts of the informant's life stories it was found that multiple social-learning experiences across musician and teaching settings provided the practices from which they could reify and construct their professional identity as classroom teachers or instrumental music teachers.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Tellwell Talent
• Release date: Dec 29, 2020
• ISBN: 9780228844150

Dr Helena Raymond Lauer

Dr Helena Raymond Lauer was born in Adelaide (1945). Dr H.R. Lauer attended PGC for her primary and secondary education, with her first round of tertiary education occurring at University of Adelaide and Elder Conservatorium where Bachelor of Arts and Music I, II, III were completed, respectively. Helena began piano lessons at aged four and began organ lessons aged sixteen; the latter with James Govenlock at St Francis Xavier Cathedral.In 1972 Helena married German anthropologist Dr Peter K. P. Lauer, and lived in Brisbane, Queensland for 22 years, where her three sons were born. Helena earned a Teaching Diploma from Trinity College London in 1983 and taught piano in a private studio, both in Queensland and upon returning to Adelaide, South Australia from 1991. Helena became an organist at St David's Anglican Church, Burnside South Australia in 1994 and still holds that position at the time of publication in 2020. In 2000, Helena earned a Licentiate in Organ Performance from Trinity College London.Since returning to Adelaide, Helena has continued her tertiary education at University of Adelaide and Elder Conservatorium, completing Master of Educational Studies, Master of Arts (thesis explored the role of the Elder Professors of Music in South Australia) and a Master of Music (thesis on the history of Anglican church music in South Australia). Following the conferral of these degrees, Helena attended University of South Australia where she was awarded a Master of Education prior to a Doctor of Philosophy (thesis exploring women music educators, as presented by this publication).

Book preview

Women Music Educators in Institutions

Pathways Into, Through and Beyond Colleges of

Advanced Education (CAEs) in Adelaide 1973-1990

Women Music Educators in Institutions

Copyright © 2020 by Dr Helena Raymond Lauer

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the author, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other non-commercial uses permitted by copyright law.

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www.tellwell.ca

ISBN

978-0-2288-4414-3 (Hardcover)

978-0-2288-4413-6 (Paperback)

978-0-2288-4415-0 (eBook)

Women music educators in institutions: Pathways into, through and beyond Colleges of Advanced Education (CAEs) in Adelaide 1973-1990

by

Helena Raymond Lauer

B.A., A.T.C.L., M.Ed.St., M.A., L.T.C.L., M.Mus., M.Ed., M.I.M.T.

A thesis submitted for the degree of

Doctor of Philosophy in Education (MPDE)

School of Education

Division of Education, Arts and Social Sciences

ulatc2l-blk25%

February 2020

Table of Contents

List of Figures and Plates

List of Tables

Glossary

Abstract

Declaration

Acknowledgments

Chapter 1 - Introduction

1.1 Introduction

1.1.1 The purpose and significance of this study

1.2 Conceptual framework

1.2.1 Lifelong learning frame

1.2.2 Community of practice

1.2.2.1 Identity

1.2.3 Bourdieu

1.2.4 Perspective on feminist research

1.3 Thesis structure

Chapter 2 - Literature Review

2.1 Introduction

2.2 Musician Training

2.3 Instrumental Music Teacher Training

2.3.1 Classroom Music Teacher Training

2.3.2 Music Teacher Training: Generalist or Specialist

2.4 The Role of Colleges of Advanced Education (CAEs) in Australia

2.5 Women musicians in music education

2.5.1 Gendered Instrumental Choice for Musicians

2.5.2 Feminist writings by women music teachers

2.6 Teacher Identity

2.6.1 Music Teacher Identity

2.6.1.1 School Music

2.7 Conclusion

Chapter 3 - Methodology and Methods

3.1 Methodology and research design

3.1.1 Informants’ Pathways as Life Stories

3.1.2 Learning from the voices of women

3.2 Document review for recruitment

3.2.1 Recruitment process

3.2.2 Ethics

3.3 Interviews

3.3.1 The data

3.4 Data Analysis

3.4.1 Initial Exploration: Thematic Analysis

3.4.2 Defining the social context

3.4.2.1 Perspectives on community of practice

3.4.2.2 Learning theories

3.4.2.3 Bourdieu’s theoretical constructs

3.4.4 A conceptual framework fit for the themes

3.4.3.1 The application of analytical concepts to the research questions

3.5 Research limitations

Chapter 4 - Pathways into College

4.1 Introduction

4.2 Making sense of the social context (Community)

4.2.1 Formal, non-formal and informal learning experiences

4.3 Practices of pre-CAE learning experiences (LPP)

4.3.1 The family-home, churches and peripherality

4.3.2 Participation in instrumental music tuition

4.3.3 Legitimation within tertiary music education

4.4 Unique pathways: where did they go? (Identity)

4.4.1 Identities in formation

4.5 Discussion: Pathways

4.5.1 Duality of learning experiences: Musicians and teachers (Meaning)

4.5.1.1 Formation of identity in layers

4.5.2 Key conclusions

Chapter 5 - The College Experience

5.1 Introduction

5.2 Training and knowledge constructed from the CAE music courses

5.2.1 Specialist instrumental music teacher/performer (Graduate Diploma in Arts (Music) (Magill)

5.2.2 Specialist instrumental music teacher /performance (Graduate Diploma in Arts (Music)) (City)

5.2.3 Classroom music teacher (Graduate Diploma in Education (Music))

5.2.4 Educator focus of the class music teacher (Graduate Diploma in Education)

5.2.5 A new way of looking at music education -Jazz (Graduate Diploma in Teaching (Jazz Education)

5.3 Part two: Analysis of Case Studies

5.3.1 Ability to think (of self) as performer, as teacher constructed with cultural capital

5.3.2 The Emotional Dimension of learning to be a (music) teacher: Love of music

5.3.2.1 Case Study: Lenore

5.3.2.2 Case Study: Helen

5.3.3 Knowledge of music theory and practice

5.4 Discussion

5.4.1 Layers of music educator identity through a Bourdieusian frame

5.4.1.1 Applied understanding from the conceptual framework

5.4.2 Final conclusions

Chapter 6 - Destination-post-tertiary pathways of music teacher graduates

6.1 Introduction

6.1.1 Completion of pathways

6.2 Pathways to music teacher destinations

6.2.1 Instrumental Music Teacher as Destination

6.2.2 Classroom Music Teaching as Destination

6.2.3 Tertiary class music teaching as Destination

6.3 Part two: Summary data from the informants’ complete pathways

6.3.1 An update on the conceptual framework

6.3.2 Integrating concepts across chapters

6.4 Professional pathways in music education: Two cases

6.4.1 Case Study 1

6.4.2 Case Study 2: A ‘Proper’ Teacher

6.5 Discussion

6.5.1 Defining characteristics, skills, and traits into layers

6.5.2 Networking for social capital

6.6 Key conclusions

Chapter 7 - Final Discussion and Conclusion

7.1 The rationale and purpose for this study

7.2 An emergent community of practice

7.2.1 Duality of layers for music educator identity

7.2.2 Importance of peripherality

7.2.2.1 Relationship to other concepts in education

7.2.3 Music education settings

7.2.4 Churches and music: sustaining mutual engagement

7.3 At CAEs: Knowledge acquisition and Bourdieu’s habitus

7.4 Post-CAEs and final considerations structured by the conceptual model

7.4.1 Peripherality, formality and social capital

7.4.2 Music education philosophy

7.4.3 Talking about changing ability

7.5 Women’s perspective of pathways in music education

7.5.1 Narrative data in the second wave

7.5.2 Applications for the layered education pathway model

7.6 Final Conclusions

Bibliography

Appendices

Appendix 3.1: Interview questions for former students and staff of the CAEs in Adelaide 1973-1990.

Appendix 3.2: Interview questions for former music staff of CAEs in Adelaide 1973-1990

Appendix 3.3: Consent Form

Appendix 3.4: Invitation

Appendix 5.1: Graduate Diploma Arts (Music)

Appendix 5.2: Graduate Diploma in Education (Music) SATAC Code TGMS

Appendix 5.3: Graduate Diploma Arts (Music) City

Appendix 5.4: Graduate Diploma Teaching (Jazz Education)

Appendix 5.5: Graduate Diploma Education

About the Author

List of Figures and Plates

Figure 1.1: Adelaide’s location relative to other State Capital Cities of Australia

Figure 1.2: The social context of this study is the Australian music education system, which is comprised of music education settings.

Figure 2.1: Locations of Colleges of Advanced Education (adapted from Aitken 1979, 1982).

Figure 3.1: The social context for this study and the three focal areas of the data analysis.

Figure 4.1: The social configuration of music education settings prior to the informants’ attendance in a Graduate Diploma in Music at a College of Advanced Education.

Figure 4.2: Specific activities that (i) are elements of instrumental music education, (ii) form a cyclical process to advance music grades and (iii) interact with music education settings.

Figure 4.3: Conceptual model of identity development from the dual learning experiences that are associated with music education settings from life stories of the informants who attended Colleges of Advanced Education in Adelaide 1973-1990, South Australia.

Figure 5.1: The level of expertise achieved by performers on the musician field and the hours of instrumental practice (accumulated or weekly) over time.

Figure 5.2: Layered Music Education Pathway Model; along their pathways the informants individually constructed cultural capital from practices on the musician and teacher fields constructed in layers and grades.

Figure 6.1: The social context of pathways in music education are framed by Bourdieu’s social field from his theory of practice to explore the informants’ life stories through the lens of social capital.

Figure 6.2: Simplified diagram of Bourdieu’s economy that links cultural capital to economic capital with centrality on symbolic practices of social classification.

Figure 7.1: The social context of this study is the Australian music education system, which is comprised of music education settings.

Figure 7.2: The Layered Music Education Pathway Model depicts identity development of music educators and is based upon the life stories of the informants who attended Colleges of Advanced Education in Adelaide 1973-1990, South Australia.

Figure 7.3: Identity development from learning experiences that are associated with music education settings from life stories of the informants who attended Colleges of Advanced Education in Adelaide 1973-1990, South Australia.

Figure 7.4: An example of the interconnections among concepts of Feminist Theory; noting the particular relevance of Women’s experiences to the present study that utilizes life stories (adapted from Grant and Osanloo, 2014).

Plate 4.1: Adelaide College of Advanced Education, circa 1975. (University of Adelaide Archives (UAA), Series 838, Item 110).

Plate 4.2: Adelaide College of Advanced Education, circa 1975. (University of Adelaide Archives, Series 838, Item music area).

Plate 6.1: Aerial photographs of Colleges of Advanced Education (CAEs) in Adelaide in 1973, including (a) City, (b) Salisbury, (c) Magill (d) Sturt and (e) Underdale (University of Adelaide Archives (UAA), Series 838-SACAE, Items (a) to (e)).

List of Tables

Table 1.1: Selection of definitions and orientating concepts from published studies that considered the theoretical basis for the term community of practice (CoP) (* denotes the application of a concept in this study).

Table 2.1: Contrasting the likely characteristics and traits of Instrumental Music Teachers (IMT), Instrumental Musicians and Classroom Teachers (generalist). References cited include Atterbury and Richardson (1995), AMEB 1982, TCL 1983, Harrison (2004b; 2008) and, Bourdieu and Wacquant (1992).

Table 2.2: Teachers’ Colleges in Adelaide 1927 to 1979 (adapted from Aitken, 1979, 1982; Chapman, 1988; SA Yearbook, 1985, 1988) (* South Australian College of Advanced Education).

Table 4 1: The analytical approach explores the themes that were evident within the transcriptions of the informants’ life stories using constructs of Wenger’s (1998, p.4) social learning theory, and Lave and Wenger’s (1991, p.29) legitimate peripheral participation.

Table 4 2: Music education settings prior to attendance in a Graduate Diploma in Music at a College of Advanced Education (CAEs). (Note1: numbers denote the sum of different informants who named a music education setting at least once) (Note2: * indicates a denominational school).

Table 4.3: The orientating concept of formality explained in the context of different community of practice (CoP) models (Note: excerpt copied from Table 1.1).

Table 4.4: Aspects of formal, non-formal, informal learning associated with music education settings (adapted from Veblen, 2012). (Note: Virkkula, 2016, this study).

Table 4.5: Summary of person histories for the informants’ pathways prior to their attendance in a Graduate Diploma in Music at a College of Advanced Education (CAE).

Table 4.6: Definitions from the literature on musician, teacher and music teacher identity development (Note: adapted from Benn, 2017).

Table 4.7: Relating characteristics of identity forming music student and musician to their changing ability.

Table 5.1: The contact hours, pre-requisites and duration of Graduate Diploma music courses at CAEs.

Table 5.2: Attendance in a Graduate Diploma in Music course at a College of Advanced Education (CAEs) (Note: numbers denote the sum of different informants who named a music education setting at least once).

Table 5.3: Instruments studied by the informants (where R Reed; E Electronic; Rr Recorder; C Cello; T Tenor; Co Contralto; M Mezzo; S Soprano; O Oboe; Sx Saxophone).

Table 5.4: The analytical approach explores traits that were evident within the transcriptions of the informants’ life stories using constructs of Bourdieu’s theory of practice.

Table 5.5: Person histories of the informant’s music education pathways including at CAEs.

Table 5.6: The level of expertise achieved by performers on different fields and their age when they began practicing.

Table 6.1: Complete person histories of the informant’s music education pathways.

Table 6.2: Music education settings post-attendance in a Graduate Diploma in Music at a College of Advanced Education (CAEs).

Table 6.3: Differences in music education pathways between informants with post-tertiary destinations categorized as classroom teachers and instrumental music teachers.

Table 6.4 Music education settings prior to and post attendance in a Graduate Diploma in Music at a College of Advanced Education (CAEs).

Table 6.5: Layers of music teacher educator developed over time derived from the complete person histories of the informants in this study.

Table 6.6 Aspects of formal, non-formal, informal learning associated with social capital of music education settings

Table 6.7: Informants’ participation in church music education settings.

Glossary

Abstract

This thesis concerns music educators’ pathways leading up to, through and beyond their teacher training in Colleges of Advanced in South Australia. These pathways took the informants from local and familial contexts of musical training in their early lives, through a range of musical training contexts, and into practice as music educators in studios and classrooms. The Colleges of Advanced Education were formed out of six existing Teachers’ Colleges in Adelaide during 1973 and took over their role as teacher training institutions with a focus on vocation.

The methodology employed in this study was life story research. The conceptual framework combined the notion of contextualising music education pathways as social learning experiences with a Bourdieuian perspective on practices to explore the fields traversed by music teacher educators. The methods employed for data collection were interviews and document study. Nineteen informants were interviewed, comprising 14 music teacher graduates and five music staff at the Colleges of Advanced Education in Adelaide 1973-1990. The range of ages of the informants in 2011 for the interviews was from forty-eight to eighty-two years of age. Documents examined included program and course syllabi and the records of professional organisations.

The analysis is presented in terms of three key periods in the trajectories of music educators: early education and training; college teacher education; and professional practice post-graduation. From analysis of the accounts of the informant’s life stories it was found that multiple social learning experiences across musician and teaching settings provided the practices from which they could reify and construct their professional identity as classroom teachers or instrumental music teachers. For example, from the accounts of the 19 informants interviewed, their life stories spanned participation in the practices of 23 music education settings, prior to their enrolment in a Graduate Diploma course at a College of Advanced Education.

With evidence of an accumulative and asynchronous process in the life stories of the informants, the conceptualisation presented in this study represents the relationship of educators and musician identity as an interdependent duality. I present the case for my concept of music teacher educator identity as a process of developing layers (skill, knowledge, and attributes) through participation and reification of practices at music education settings. These identity layers included a music student, musician, teacher education student (in music), independent music teacher, class music teacher, music teacher educator. As well as socially constructed enablers and constraints, the agency of the informants in their life stories was equally important in their accounts of striving to reach their professional destination as music teacher educators; for many of the informants in this study, their pathway in music education demonstrates a lifelong commitment to music.

Declaration

This thesis presents work carried out by myself and does not incorporate without acknowledgment any material previously submitted for a degree or diploma in any university; to the best of my knowledge it does not contain any materials previously published or written by another person except where due reference is made in the text; and all substantive contributions by others to the work presented, including jointly authored publications, are clearly acknowledged.

Helena Raymond Lauer

February 2020

Acknowledgments

I wish to thank my principal supervisor Dr Sue Nichols for her unfailing help and patience during the writing of this thesis. I also wish to thank my associate supervisors for their help, Dr Sue Shore who helped at the beginning of the project, Dr Janet McDowall who helped in the middle part of the study, Dr Victoria Watts who assisted at the three-quarter point, and Dr Hannah Soong for her contribution.

I also wish to acknowledge the informed assistance of my youngest son Peter who helped me during this long journey.

I acknowledge the assistance of librarian Andrew Cook in provision of photographs of the Adelaide Teachers College and Colleges of Advanced Education from the Mortlock Library of South Australia.

I would like to acknowledge the Commonwealth Government funding that I received under the Research Training Program (RTP), without which this research would not have been possible.

Chapter 1

Introduction

1.1 Introduction

This thesis examines the musical education pathways of a cohort of 16 women and three men who studied or taught teacher training in Colleges of Advanced Education (CAEs) in Adelaide, South Australia (Figure 1.1), during the period 1973-1990. Collectively, their musical education pathways took these women and men from local and familial contexts of musical training in their early lives, through a range of learning experiences, and into their professional lives as music educators. These paths of music education also traversed many different social settings, comprising recognized training institutions such as the Elder Conservatorium (EC), and more domestic, intimate or localised places such as a regional community’s church or the family home. At some point in each of the informants’ journey, they attended a Graduate Diploma course at a College of Advanced Education during the period from 1973 to 1990.

Figure 1.1 Adelaide’s location relative to other state capital cities of Australia.¹

The reader will follow the life stories of participants’ music education pathways from their earliest recollected experiences, through their training to be musicians and teachers training in CAEs, and into their professional lives as music educators. Significantly the collective life stories of the informants in this study span decades from the 1950s to 2011². As such, the chronological context for this thesis is as much about what happened before, and after college as it is about what happened at college.

The multi-disciplinary roots of this study place it at the intersection of teacher education, music education and sociology. Noting that previous research has shown that women have unique (sometimes gendered) opportunities and restrictions along pathways in music education (Gould, 2004), the cohort of informants for this study was purposefully recruited to research music education settings from predominantly a woman’s perspective. Their experiences speak to broader issues of women’s development as musicians and educators, and how they navigate the often-competing demands of these two commitments.

In this study, life stories of the informants were transcribed from interview data. The informants’ life stories were analysed to trace the music education pathways which they individually traversed through various music education settings. Whilst acknowledging the inherent variation among music education settings, the informants’ life stories were explored with regard to the social construction of these settings and their account of learning experiences that were encountered. Their pathways also intersected with music education settings outside South Australia, nationally and internationally, by virtue of the influence of global institutions on music credentialing.

Music education is defined here in its broadest application, to include all forms of music training, teaching, and learning. To clarify some frequently used terms within this thesis, I frame tertiary education here as inclusive of higher education beyond the high school (Karmel, 1982; Chapman, 1988). Training in the context of this thesis refers to the disciplining of mind and body in instrumental music playing (Sagiv and Hall, 2016), as well as theoretical learning in the pursuit of musical excellence. This definition was arrived at by consultation of usage in scholarly texts on music education such as Last (1972) and, Ahrens and Atkinson (1955). In other music education research texts, although training was referred to as early music learning (Stowasser, 1983b; Bennett and Hannan, 2008), it was more usually employed in reference to teacher education (Ballantyne, 2005).

For the purpose of this study, learning experiences are understood in terms of events in the informants’ life stories that are part of the informants’ musical education pathways. It is in this framing that learning experiences are further contextualised in the broader frame of lifelong learning, as I will explain further. Learning experiences were also examined with regard to the development of the informants’ identities as music teachers. In the latter regard, examination of identity development as music teachers was not constrained to identifying the various skills and attributes associated with the practice of music teaching, but consideration was also given to the impact of learning experiences throughout an individual’s professional life on their coming to see themselves as music educators (or not, as occurred in some cases).

Through participation in the process of training in music and teaching in various professional and cultural contexts established at musical education institutions, a music education philosophy is developed (Barcan, 1993) and this forms part of the identity and professional development of the music teacher (Hookey, 2002; McClellan, 2014). Participation not only involved the adherence to curriculums that were implemented by various institutions which an informant attended (McPherson and Welch, 2012), but also the woman’s individual perspective from a viewpoint established by their socio-economic circumstances (Burnard and Hofvander-Trulsson, 2016; Singh, 1997) and unique set of learning experiences along their musical education pathway.

1.1.1 The purpose and significance of this study

It is a reasonable expectation that, for those people who choose to pursue a career in the professional music realm, there remains a requirement to follow a musical education pathway through an accredited music education system. However, given that the music education system comprises numerous settings, such as classroom music lessons, music schools, conservatoria and instrumental music teaching studios, there are many different pathways from which to choose. Furthermore, the alignment of these musical education pathways to destinations that relate to specific professional roles is sometimes unclear particularly upon comparison with other professions (Colwell, 2006; Ilari, 2010).

For women in particular, the lack of clarity regarding established pathways through the music education system to specific professional roles may be further hampered for sociologically derived reasons including gendered opportunities and restrictions (Charmaz, 2007; Chase, 2008). Documented evidence from learning experiences of those that have successfully traversed music education pathways, such as my participants, may be used to enlighten those that choose to follow, so as to make more informed decisions regarding their own professional goals and the music education pathway they may choose. It is with this purpose that this study explores how musical knowledge is acquired among women and men who traversed their own unique pathways into and through the South Australian music education system. This study focuses upon the musical education setting of CAEs between 1973 and 1990, with an emphasis on the women’s perspective.

Exploring women music educators’ life stories can assist us to understand the social relations involved in music and teacher training. This includes an analysis of how learning experiences are produced, and in what context (Smith, 1987) and how learning experiences can affect the identity development of women educators in the music field (Smith, 1990; O’Neill, 2012). In considering identity formation among undergraduate music students McClellan (2014) highlights several relevant points, drawing on the work of Froehlich (2007) and Bouij (2004). Firstly, individuals are socialised by their choices to participate in specific cultures, which also entail cultural codes, values, and subculture practices (Froehlich, 2007). Secondly, socialisation is a central concept for elucidating the process of music teacher education; and further, the educational experience involves learning in both formal and informal settings, as well as the influence of these settings (Bouij, 2004). For example, Bartel (2004) notes that as a consequence of societal power structures, leadership roles within music (e.g. conductors of ensembles) have been dominated by men. However, unlike McClellan (op, cit.,), this study further resolves the lens of investigation to include gender studies (Smith, 1987; Lamb, 1996), as well as identity formed by the individuals in their day-to-day routines and actions (West and Zimmerman, 1987; Wenger, 1998; Ballantyne et al 2012) and in social relations (Bourdieu, 1984).

It has been previously documented that music teachers go through various career phases. The life cycle of the career teacher model of Steffy et al (2000) comprise six progressive and sequential phases: novice, apprentice, professional, expert, distinguished, and emeritus. Much of the available literature researching music educators’ careers is limited to part of this continuum, such as interviewing independent cohorts of pre-service music teachers (Harrison and Ballantyne, 2005; Vannatta-Hall, 2010), or experienced music teachers (Conway, 2008). Therefore, it is of significance to the areas of music education and sociological research that my study explores the whole- of-career life stories from a cohort of informants who have each undertaken a pathway in lifelong learning in music. As such, the unique opportunity of this research is to explore the sociological experiences of the informants at a range of music education contexts, and across a range of life-stages, within which musician and teacher identities were formed. Concomitantly, this study considers the informants’ life stories as pathways of knowledge acquisition (Smith, 1990; Given, 2008) and provides a focus from a woman’s perspective to explore the different learning experiences. In this way, the methodology used in this present study addresses the concern of masking variability in responses by informants when faced with either constraining or enabling experiences that are gender related in their origin. Over the last two decades, the two main paradigms for doing educational research - quantitative and qualitative (Elliot, 2013) - establish an outside-in perspective which tends to ignore their professional outlook (Reimer, 2006).

Qualitative research is an interpretive endeavour (Scheib, 2014), and the critical requirement for the researcher is to identify and disclose their worldview to allow both the researcher and consumer to appropriately contextualise the study. My previous research into music education at tertiary institutions (Lauer, 1998) focused on the role of men at the Elder Conservatorium. It was in that process when I realized that although I studied both men and women as staff and students within the context of the Elder Conservatorium, I was not able then to research those women in the music education field in greater detail. I since decided to further research tertiary music education with the focus on women at the CAEs in Adelaide 1973-1990; as well as their pre-CAE training and post-CAE destinations. This decision was in response to questioning the sociological influences within tertiary music education institutions (Lamb, 1996; Burnard and Hofvander-Trulsson, 2016) and how the training, or learning experiences, prepared these women for their own careers in music teaching. My later research on Anglican Church Music in South Australia (Lauer, 2004) was also useful in shaping my views when considering the narratives of informants whose pathways traversed religious music settings.

In summary, the information from this study will contribute to the published literature pertaining to Australian music education. More specifically, it is anticipated that this study will improve music education researchers’ contemporary understanding of the development of women’s music teacher identities. The data generated by this research is intended to provide valuable contextual information for aspiring music teacher educators, through a better awareness of the range of musical education pathways that women have traversed, the learning experiences that were encountered and the professional outcomes that were attained. Given this section addressed the significance and broad rationale for this study, the following section provides specific details regarding the conceptual framework that was used.

1.2 Conceptual framework

To explore the music education settings within which women’s musician and teacher identities were formed, and to consider differences in the pathways of knowledge acquisition in the Australian music education system, a conceptual framework was purposefully structured. The theoretical perspectives that drive the direction of this research and thereby form the conceptual framework for this study, are an interconnection of constructs from social learning theory (Wenger, 1998), legitimate peripheral participation (Lave and Wenger, 1991), identity theory (McCall and Simmons, 1966; Steffy et al, 2000; Bouij, 2004), and Bourdieu’s theoretical resources (theory of practice (1977 [1972], 1990 [1980]) and field, capital, habitus (1984 [1979], 1986)). I also refer to theoretical constructs from lifelong learning (Smilde, 2009) and feminist research (Smith, 1987, 1990; Chase, 2008) to provide women a favourable context to access information from phenomenon observed in the data. In the following sections of this chapter I introduce each of these theories and describe their application within the context of this thesis. The research questions that guided this dissertation are listed below.

1How did the informants experience their positioning within musical education settings of the Australian music education system, and what effect did these experiences have on the informants’ development as musicians and teachers?

2What skills and knowledge were acquired from learning experiences, as the informants’ progressed along their music education pathways?

3What were the learning experiences from the informants’ accounts that were associated with continued or discontinued participation in lifelong music education?

Learning experiences are used in this study, and are considered when analysing the transcriptions of the informants’ narrated life stories, as an opportunity to identify the chronology of events from an informants’ life story that was associated, either directly or indirectly, with: (i) the construction and reconstruction of identities, (ii) the way in which informants viewed or positioned themselves within formal and informal music education settings and (iii) whether the distribution of the different species of capital, or gender roles and norms, within the social structures of the music education settings was an enabling or constraining element for the informants to their movement along their music education pathways.

To contain the notion of music education pathways as it pertains to this study, it is necessary to convey an understanding of the social context within which the informants’ pathways are traversed (Figure 1.2). The social context of this study is the Australian music education system comprised of music education settings (i.e. the family home, primary schools, community groups, CAEs) that were spatially separated and existed between the 1950’s and 2011. It is of note (and not presumptuous) that there are many possible music education pathways to traverse, which can (at least in part) be delineated by the attendance at different music education settings. Furthermore, although it may be considered an oversimplification, in brief terms this study seeks to understand some of the sociological and educational processes that were experienced by the informants as they traversed among the music education settings. The following Figure 1.2 shows the music education institutions in which the informants trained and their position within the Australian music education field:

Figure 1.2 The social context of this study is the Australian music education system, which is comprised of music education settings.

1.2.1 Lifelong learning frame

Lifelong learning is defined as a process of transforming experience into knowledge, skills, attitudes, values, emotions, beliefs, and the senses (Jarvis, 2002; Smilde, 2009). The concept of lifelong learning considers the process and context of learning, where learning is viewed as a continuum containing all of the purposeful learning activity throughout a person’s life (Fragoulis, 2002; Smilde 2009). In the context of this thesis, these authors reference to purposeful learning activities (op. cit.,) is considered analogous to the informants’ narrated learning experiences that