The Politics of Care in the Education of Children Gifted for Music : A Systems View

Abstract

In educational practice, children gifted for music often become showcases for enhancing institutional prestige, rather than being seen as thriving agents of their own lives. In this chapter, we approach the education of children gifted for music as a special case in terms of social justice and children’s rights, by calling for teachers and educational institutions to adopt a transformative politics of care in order to better recognize the moral space for these children to develop, as well as to expand the normative professional frames of entire music education institutions and society at large. By adopting an approach of ethics of care with systems reflexivity, the education of children gifted for music can become a healthy test for the whole educational system’s understanding of democracy, social justice, and fairness, and for the very purpose of music education in contemporary societies.