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Through their song: a case study in social perspective taking with a community college choir
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Through their song: a case study in social perspective taking with a community college choir
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Content
THROUGH THEIR SONG: A CASE STUDY IN SOCIAL PERSPECTIVE TAKING
WITH A COMMUNITY COLLEGE CHOIR
By
Irene Apanovitch-Leites
A Dissertation Presented to the
FACULTY OF THE USC THORNTON SCHOOL OF MUSIC
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
In Partial Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree
DOCTOR OF MUSICAL ARTS
(CHORAL MUSIC)
MAY 2019
1
Approved by
First reader ___________________________________________________________
Beatriz Ilari, Ph.D
Chair, Department of Music Teaching & Learning
Second reader ____________________________________________________________
Jo-Michael Scheibe, DMA
Chair, Department of Choral & Sacred Music
Third reader ____________________________________________________________
Tram Sparks, DMA
Associate Professor of Practice, Department of Choral & Sacred Music
Fourth reader ____________________________________________________________
Elizabeth Cassidy Parker, Ph.D
Associate Professor
Boyer College of Music & Dance, Temple University
2
Abstract
The purpose of this case study was to investigate the process of perspective taking within an
SATB-mixed choir at a community college in southern California. Using Wenger’s Communities
of Practice (1998) theory and Gehlbach’s (2004) Social Perspective Taking research as
theoretical lenses, I aimed to answer two research questions: (1) How do participants describe
their process of taking each other’s musical and non-musical perspectives in the context of their
participation in choir; and (2) What consequences result from the singers’ process of taking on
others’ perspectives? Data collection occurred over a three-month period and consisted of
observations, individual interviews, and field notes. Triangulation and member checking were
used as verification procedures. Findings suggested that perspective taking was a key
characteristic of this Community of Practice, and that students engaged in both academic and
interpersonal forms of Social Perspective Taking. I also found that (1) the text of choral
compositions contributes to students’ engagement in perspective taking, (2) the conductor’s
teaching philosophy plays an important role in engaging students in perspective taking, and (3)
the social learning environment impacts the extent to which perspective taking develops in a
choir. Implications from this research highlight the importance of cultivating students’
perspectives in choral rehearsals, building in time for social bonding, and creating a social
learning environment that is inclusive of different viewpoints.
Keywords: choir, perspective taking, COP, education, community college
3
Dedication
I would like to dedicate this dissertation to my hero, and father,
Victor Apanovitch.
4
Acknowledgements
I would like to thank many people for supporting me on my journey. First, I want to
thank my first reader, Dr. Beatriz Ilari, for countless hours of her time. I have not only learned
how to be a researcher from her, I have also learned how to be a compassionate and
understanding teacher. She let me find my path on my own terms, and for that I am sincerely
grateful. Thank you for believing that I could do this, Dr. Ilari!
I want to also say a heartfelt thank you to Dr. Jo-Michael Scheibe, whose insight into
choral music, pedagogy, and passion for teaching inspired me to seek out and recognize those
things in others. His mentorship and guidance will have a lasting impact on me for decades to
come. I am so grateful that he took a chance on this young Canadian and accepted her into his
incredible program!
Thank you to Dr. Tram Sparks and Dr. Elizabeth Cassidy Parker for being an integral
part of my dissertation committee. Your feedback has contributed to my growth as a writer,
researcher, and person. I owe much to your insight and expertise in crafting this document.
There are many music educators that have shaped who I am today: Dr. Debra Cairns,
Mary Mattei Scheibe, Lucia Petrea, Ivars Taurins, Dr. Nick Strimple, Dr. Leonard Ratzlaff,
Lydia Adams, Dr. Doreen Rao, and Agnes Grossmann are just few of the people that have had
impact on my as a teacher and as a person.
On a personal level, I would like to thank my family and friends for all of the love and
support that they have given me throughout my pursuit of this degree. I am especially thankful
for the encouragement of my mom and dad, who never questioned my decision to pursue music,
who trusted me in my choices, and supported my goals from near and afar. I am thankful also for
my sister, who has been my cheerleader throughout this undertaking, and to so many of my
5
friends who have helped me achieve my goals. Lastly, I want to thank my incredible husband,
Alex, for his invaluable insight, limitless patience and unconditional love.
Finally, this dissertation would not have been possible if Jenna Dahl (pseudonym) and
her students at Ashgrove Singers (pseudonym) did not permit me to enter their community and
let me study their program during the fall semester of the 2018-2019 academic year. I can
honestly say that coming to Ashgrove College and witnessing Jenna work has been an incredibly
important experience for me both on personal and professional levels. Thank you, Jenna, for
being so welcoming and generous with your time, resources, and support. I am also deeply
grateful to each student who was willing to give up hours of their time to speak with me–our
paths crossed for what seemed like a brief moment, but your stories will be in my heart forever.
6
Table of Contents
Abstract .......................................................................................................................................... 2
Dedication ...................................................................................................................................... 3
Acknowledgements ....................................................................................................................... 4
Table of Contents .......................................................................................................................... 6
List of Tables ............................................................................................................................... 10
List of Figures .............................................................................................................................. 11
Definition of Terms ..................................................................................................................... 13
Chapter 1: Introduction ............................................................................................................. 14
Background ............................................................................................................................... 17
Rationale and Significance ........................................................................................................ 18
Statement of the Problem .......................................................................................................... 19
Purpose ...................................................................................................................................... 20
Research Questions ................................................................................................................... 20
Theoretical Framework ............................................................................................................. 21
Communities of Practice ....................................................................................................... 21
Social Perspective Taking (SPT) ........................................................................................... 23
Combining COP Theory with SPT ........................................................................................ 24
Chapter Summary ...................................................................................................................... 24
Chapter 2: Literature Review .................................................................................................... 26
Chapter Overview ..................................................................................................................... 26
Social Perspective Taking ......................................................................................................... 27
Overview ............................................................................................................................... 27
Definition ............................................................................................................................... 27
Perspective Taking Research in Music Education ................................................................ 33
Communities of Practice ........................................................................................................... 35
Overview ............................................................................................................................... 36
Practice .................................................................................................................................. 37
Meaning ................................................................................................................................. 38
Mutual Engagement and Joint Enterprise .............................................................................. 39
7
Identity in Practice ................................................................................................................. 40
Music Education studies utilizing COP ................................................................................. 43
Community College Education ................................................................................................. 49
Historical Context .................................................................................................................. 49
Music Education Research in Community College Settings ................................................. 52
Chapter Summary ...................................................................................................................... 57
Chapter 3: Method and Context ................................................................................................ 58
Chapter overview ...................................................................................................................... 58
Research Strategy ...................................................................................................................... 58
Rationale and Research Design ................................................................................................. 60
Research Setting & Context: Ashgrove College ....................................................................... 62
Sampling ................................................................................................................................ 63
School achievement and demographics ................................................................................. 64
The music program ................................................................................................................ 65
The choral program ............................................................................................................... 65
Participants ................................................................................................................................ 67
Primary Participants .............................................................................................................. 68
Secondary Participants .......................................................................................................... 70
Gaining Entry ............................................................................................................................ 73
Human Subjects......................................................................................................................... 74
Timeline .................................................................................................................................... 74
Data Collection .......................................................................................................................... 75
Interviews .............................................................................................................................. 75
Nonparticipant observations .................................................................................................. 78
Limitations to nonparticipant observations ........................................................................... 80
Field notes.............................................................................................................................. 80
Audio recordings ................................................................................................................... 81
Video recordings.................................................................................................................... 81
Artifacts ................................................................................................................................. 82
Researcher positionality ........................................................................................................ 82
Data Analysis and Interpretation ............................................................................................... 84
Coding and emergent themes ................................................................................................ 84
8
Triangulation ......................................................................................................................... 85
Chapter Summary ...................................................................................................................... 85
Chapter 4: Primary Participant Profiles .................................................................................. 86
Chapter overview ...................................................................................................................... 86
Student Participants ................................................................................................................... 88
Anayah: “Hey, I have this degree. This is me.” .................................................................... 88
Gwen: “I want to be everyone’s cheerleader because no one was mine.” ............................ 99
Silvia: “I have a friend. His name is Danny, but he was born Dayna.”............................... 110
Section summary: Anayah, Gwen and Silvia ...................................................................... 116
The Director ............................................................................................................................ 117
Meeting Jenna Dahl ............................................................................................................. 118
Jenna’s journey to Ashgrove College .................................................................................. 122
Jenna’s teaching philosophy: “I’m hell-bent to given them an experience” ....................... 126
Parting words ....................................................................................................................... 147
Chapter Summary .................................................................................................................... 152
Chapter 5: Findings and Discussion ........................................................................................ 153
Chapter Overview ................................................................................................................... 153
Ashgrove Singers: Meet the Community of Practice .............................................................. 154
Practice ................................................................................................................................ 154
Negotiation of Meaning ....................................................................................................... 160
Participation and Reification ............................................................................................... 161
Identity Formation ............................................................................................................... 165
Section Summary ................................................................................................................. 173
Social Perspective Taking in Ashgrove Singers ..................................................................... 174
Social Perspective Taking (SPT) through choral repertoire ................................................ 174
The Role of the Director: Engaging Singers in SPT ............................................................... 185
Academic SPT ..................................................................................................................... 186
Interpersonal SPT ................................................................................................................ 191
Returning to the Research Questions ...................................................................................... 204
Conclusion and Implications ................................................................................................... 208
Limitations of the Current Study and Directions for Future Research ................................... 212
Final Thoughts......................................................................................................................... 214
9
References .................................................................................................................................. 215
APPENDIX A: Information Sheet for Non-Medical Research ............................................ 226
APPENDIX B: Participant Recruitment Email ..................................................................... 227
APPENDIX C: Focus Group Protocol .................................................................................... 228
APPENDIX D: Student Interview Protocol ........................................................................... 229
APPENDIX E: Director Interview Protocol ........................................................................... 230
APPENDIX F: Accompanist Interview Protocol ................................................................... 231
10
List of Tables
Table 1. Participant Data.......................................................................................................... 69-70
Table 2. Interview Schedule ......................................................................................................... 77
11
List of Figures
Figure 1. Three areas of study and their intersections. ................................................................. 26
Figure 2. Milestone in the interaction of a choir with corresponding level of SPT .................... 203
Figure 3. Development of perspective taking ability within the COP of Ashgrove Singers.......206
12
List of Abbreviations
ACDA.................................................................................American Choral Directors Association
COP..............................................................................................................Community of Practice
CPEC...................................................................California Postsecondary Education Commission
LPP............................................................................................Legitimate Peripheral Participation
NAfME...........................................................................National Association for Music Education
NASM.............................................................................National Association of Schools of Music
SPT...........................................................................................................Social Perspective Taking
13
Definition of Terms
Community College: A two-year government-supported college that offers an associate degree.
Community of Practice: A social learning theory established by Wenger (1998) that is founded
on four premises: (1) humans are social beings, (2) knowledge relates to competence in
social enterprise, (3) to know is to engage actively in the world, and (4) meaning is a by-
product of learning and is linked to the way we experience the world in a meaningful
way.
Researcher Positionality: The stance or positioning of the researcher in relation to the social and
political context of the study—the community, the organization or the participant group.
Sectionals: Rehearsals for individual sections of the choir (e.g., soprano, alto, tenor, bass) that
occur outside of regular rehearsal time and that are led by section leaders.
Section Leader: A designated leadership position within a choir in which one student is
responsible for planning and teaching excerpts from choral repertoire to their voice
section (e.g. soprano, alto, tenor, or bass), track attendance at sectional rehearsals, and
report progress to the choir’s director.
Social Perspective Taking: A process through which a perceiver attempts to discern the thoughts,
feelings, motivations, and/or point of view of one or more targets. SPT is also an aptitude
consisting of ability and motivation to perceive others’ perspectives.
14
Chapter 1: Introduction
When I moved to California to pursue doctoral studies in the fall of 2015, I was assigned
as the coordinator of the university’s Invitational Choral Festival. In my first year on the job, I
met Jenna Dahl and the Ashgrove Singers. They were one of the participating choirs in the
festival who attended the festival annually. Although I met over 20 choirs that year, the
Ashgrove Singers remained in my mind even after the festival was over. There was a different
“vibe” about them. One thing that stood out for me was the closeness that the students seemed to
have with their director. There was a kind of attachment and reverence in the way that they spoke
and listened to her. Of all of the choirs that attended the event that year, the Ashgrove Singers
were the only ones that seemed relaxed, even happy, to be performing in a seemingly high-stress
environment (although the festival was non-competitive, many of the groups were “regulars”, so
a kind of unsaid competition formed.) More importantly, their happiness seemed genuine, not
“put on” in any way. When I watched the Ashgrove Singers perform on stage, there was nothing
contrived about their performance: their vulnerability as human beings was on display for all to
witness as they sang with their whole selves, not just their voices.
When I saw the Ashgrove Singers the following year, despite evident changes in their
membership, their collective demeanor was the same. In fact, after seeing the group perform for
three years in a row, I heard the choir’s sound improve irrespective of how many new members
they appeared to have. I was too shy to speak to their director at the time, fearing that the
intersection of my roles of coordinator and doctoral student would be confusing. What I
desperately wanted to ask is, “How do you get them to be open and vulnerable on stage like
that?” or even “How are they so clearly connected to each other despite it being so early in the
15
semester?” I was convinced that as a seasoned professional, the director had many “tricks” to get
the singers to convey such a high level of authenticity on stage.
As my studies continued and I became more interested in educational psychology, and by
extension, research on empathy and perspective taking, I found myself asking deeper questions
about the human experience of choral singing. After completing a quantitative pilot study on
empathy and choral singing, I realized that this approach was not fully able to grasp the “how”
and the “why” questions that I had about the development of empathy in choirs. What I really
wanted to know is whether singing in choir actually has an effect on our identities outside of
choir, as coworkers, bosses, friends, siblings, and peers.
The topic became even more important to me after the 2016 presidential election. I
remember walking into rehearsal the day after the results were announced and experiencing
profound grief and fear around me. As a Canadian citizen who has been largely unaware of
American politics and their implications, I was astounded by just how visibly my friends,
teachers and colleagues were affected by what had happened the night before. That day, our
choir director had us sing “Earth Song” by Frank Ticheli (2007) as a way to heal and recover
from the blow of the previous night. For me, singing that piece of music while holding hands
with my friends who were visibly suffering was just as painful as witnessing the results of the
elections unfold. For several days after leaving that rehearsal, I felt confused about that particular
singing experience. I realized that, as singers, we had to use music as a tool to confront our pain
and support each other. (Personally, I wanted to process what happened on my own terms; to
sing the songs that I usually do and pretend like nothing really changed.)
About a week after that strong experience, I found myself chatting with a fellow choir
singer about that day in rehearsal. To her, holding hands with her friends and singing was indeed
16
healing. She even noted that in looking around the room, she did not see anyone visibly upset.
Her comment caught me completely blindsided. I only saw the people who hurt, not the people
who were neutral, or even content. Was it really true that some of my peers perceived this
experience completely differently? The melting pot of perspectives present in the room on that
day floated to the surface. I began to see the outcome of the election as an opportunity to dig
deeper and find out whether in a community of choral singers, there really is opportunity to voice
one’s opinions and share perspectives with others. I knew that the only way to find out is to talk
to different people in a group, and to find out whether what they do in choir affects the ways in
which they are able to relate to each other and by extension, to their communities.
When I spoke to one of my dissertation advisors about my interest in the topic of
perspective taking with choirs, she happened to mention Ashgrove College as a possible research
site. She had visited a neighboring university to deliver a lecture a month prior, and remembered
the fine choral program that the director, Jenna Dahl, had there. My memory immediately
jumped to witnessing the Ashgrove Singers on stage. The dots connected: could the vulnerability
that I witnessed on stage be a byproduct of being open and accepting of each other’s viewpoints?
Were the singers actually taught to relate to each other in a special way? And is that why their
bond on and off stage seemed so authentic? Or was it the fact that the diverse nature of the
experiences they had as community college students resulted in the inevitable task of connecting
despite different viewpoints?
At the time, I knew nothing about the community college experience. Having been raised
in Canada after emigrating from Belarus, I knew that I wanted to go to university and become a
professor very early on in life. Both of my parents were teachers and I wanted to follow their
path. Because I attended a university in Canada for my undergraduate education, I knew of only
17
a few friends who attended community college. Furthermore, I knew very little about the
difference between their experience in college and mine in university. When I moved to
California and saw just how many community colleges had choral programs, I realized that I
may have missed out on something unique.
This quest to investigate perspective taking in community college, specifically, stemmed
from my own desire to understand an educational experience and consequently, perspective,
different from my own. How do groups of people of different ages, financial circumstances,
political views, socio-economic statuses come together and learn from each other through music?
My research journey with the Ashgrove Singers attempts to bring some of these questions to
light.
Background
The ability for human beings to take each other’s perspective is especially important in
today’s increasingly divisive social environment. Perspective taking is a process for gaining
interpersonal understanding that may facilitate building of social bonds and fostering mutual
understanding. As choral ensembles are comprised of individuals from diverse backgrounds,
choirs are places where perspective taking can potentially develop. Whether it be through
musical interaction or non-musical interaction, taking part in a choral ensemble requires
participants to actively consider other participants’ opinions, emotional states, and intentions.
What is not clear is how participants actually perceive these choral experiences. To shed some
light on this issue, I have used the theory on Social Perspective Taking (Johnson, 1975; Davis,
1996; Gehlbach, 2004, 2011, 2017; Gehlbach et al, 2008; Gehlbach & Brinkworth, 2012) and
Wenger’s (1998) Communities of Practice theory to examine how students in a mixed-voice
community college choir engage in perspective taking.
18
Collegiate choirs are especially vibrant spaces for exploration of different attitudes and
opinions on social issues. What makes college students a unique age group to study is the fact
that they are in a transitional stage in life: they are moving away from social cliques, establishing
independent thought and opinions, developing critical thinking skills via mentorship of
professors and fellow students, managing free time on their own terms, and learning how to
relate to diverse populations of students from varied socioeconomic, ethnic, racial and cultural
backgrounds (Santrock, 2011). To date, much of the research on community college music
programs has focused on curriculum (Benson, 1994; Abel 2018) and the capacity for these music
programs to meet NASM standards (Lamb, 1980; Kesling, 1982; Turner, 1999). Community
college music programs have seldom been studied following a qualitative research approach.
Recently, two doctoral dissertations have used qualitative research methods to investigate student
and faculty experiences in a community college music program (Peeters, 2015; Dixon, 2018).
While research on choral music education in this particular educational setting is lacking,
community college choral programs are gaining more recognition of their excellence at the
national and regional levels. A careful examination of the experience of students in choral
programs at the community college may mend the gap in literature that exists, and provide
valuable insight into aspects of the students’ choral experience in this specific educational
setting.
Rationale and Significance
The rationale for this study stems from the importance of understanding the non-musical
benefits of choral music education. Students involved in their collegiate choirs gain more from
the experience than just musical skills and new friendships. Choirs are spaces where social
learning occurs, and as such, are places where singers develop interpersonal skills, empathy, and
19
aptitude for prosocial behavior (Vickhoff, 2013; Seighman, 2015). Considering choral education
from this standpoint is an emerging construct. By their nature, choral programs have focused on
preparing students for performance-oriented outcomes–tours, competitions and festivals, etc.
Assessment in choral ensembles is still largely participation-driven. This study aims to shed light
on a different kind of learning that can be facilitated in choral music education: teaching social
cognition and interpersonal skills along with performance skills. By isolating perspective taking,
this study may lead to an enriched curriculum in choral teaching–a curriculum that is focused on
using repertoire to develop prosocial skills that students can use in different contexts of their
lives. Understanding interactions and collaboration between students and their director paves
way for educators to have a more nuanced way of looking at what singing in choir really entails.
By enriching educators’ concept of choral music education, this study also aims to shift
conductors’ perspectives from looking at choral repertoire as being a tool for teaching musical
concepts to seeing it as a resource for social learning.
Statement of the Problem
Researchers have not focused their attention on perspective taking in choirs; no such
research was found at the time of writing. Furthermore, Wenger’s (1998) Communities of
Practice theory has not been applied to analyze social learning within a collegiate choir.
Additionally, community college choral programs in the United States have largely neglected by
researchers. This study aims to address this serious gap in the literature by addressing these three
issues: perspective taking, choral music programs, and community colleges. By engaging in an
in-depth examination of how these three topics intersect, this study aims to enrich the
understanding of non-musical implications of participation in choir, transmit the experiences of
community college students in a choral setting, and offer suggestions for choral pedagogy.
20
Purpose
The purpose of this study was to examine the process of perspective taking with
Ashgrove Singers (pseudonym), a mixed (SATB) choir from Ashgrove Community College
(pseudonym). Specifically, this study aimed to (1) describe the experiences of select members of
Ashgrove Singers, and their director, Jenna Dahl; to (2) analyze how interactions among
members of the choir could potentially foster perspective taking using the theory of Community
of Practice (Wenger, 1998) as a theoretical lens, and to (3) investigate the potential role of the
director in helping students engage in perspective taking, and building of the community of
practice of Ashgrove Singers as a whole.
Research Questions
Primary research questions:
1. How do participants describe the process of taking each other’s musical and non-musical
perspectives in the context of their participation in choir?
2. What consequences result from participants’ process of taking on others’ perspectives?
Secondary research questions:
1. What strategies to college choral singers use to develop their ability to take each others’
perspectives?
2. How do college choral singers describe their process of taking on the perspective of the
conductor in their interpretation of choral repertoire?
a. What role does the conductor play in facilitating or obstructing perspective taking
between singers?
b. What role does the conductor play in facilitating or obstructing perspective taking
between the singers and the text of the composition?
21
Theoretical Framework
Communities of Practice
Wenger’s Communities of Practice (1998) stemmed from Lave and Wenger’s Legitimate
Peripheral Participation (1991) theory. Wenger and Lave (1991) viewed learning as an activity
that happens in communities of practitioners. They coined the term Legitimate Peripheral
Participation (LPP) to designate the interconnections between persons, activities, and knowing.
Within LPP theory, learning is not seen as simply internalization of knowledge. Rather, it is
viewed as an evolving process with a “renewed set of relations” (p. 50). Lave and Wenger
explained that this theory:
Emphasizes the relational interdependency of agent and world, activity, meaning,
cognition, learning, and knowing. It emphasizes the inherently socially negotiated
character of meaning and the interested, concerned character of the thought and action of
persons-in-activity. This view also claims that learning, thinking, and knowing are
relations among people in activity in, with, and arising from the socially and culturally
structured world. (pp. 50-51)
In other words, the mere process of participating in an activity with others defines how we make
sense of an activity and what we take can away from it. How we look back at our participation
also shapes our perception of our culture; considering the social implication of what we do paints
a wider picture of what our participation means in the context of society as a whole. Legitimate
Peripheral Participation is, therefore, a “conceptual bridge” (p. 55) that is meant to help us
understand how the person changes through participation, and so do the environment and the
community. That is, the transformation happens in multiple ways.
22
In constructing the theory of Communities of Practice or COP, Wenger (1998) continued
to explore social learning by observing a community of insurance-claim workers. The findings of
his research established the foundation for COP theory, which is a respected social learning
theory through which different collective enterprises can be analyzed. Wenger ascertains that the
theory offers a “coherent level of analysis: it yields a conceptual framework from which to
derive a consistent set of general principles and recommendations for understanding and
enabling learning” (Wenger, 1998, p. 4).
Communities of Practice is a social learning theory integrating four key components—
meaning, practice, community and identity—that are necessary to characterize social
participation as a process of learning and knowing (Wenger, 1998). Each of these elements is
intrinsically interconnected and continues to evolve over time. A Community of Practice, then, is
defined as a “group of people who share a concern, a set of problems, or a passion about a topic,
and who deepen their knowledge and expertise in this area by interacting on an ongoing basis”
(Wenger et al., 2002, p. 4).
I used Wenger’s COP theory to provide a more nuanced understanding of the stories,
experiences, and observations of the learning environment of Ashgrove Singers. More
specifically, I used COP as a theoretical lens when explaining how the social learning
environment of the choir changes as roles, practices and rituals in the choir evolve over time. In
my own practice as a choral conductor, although I have conducted in many different settings, I
have never really considered how the mechanism for social learning manifests itself in an
ensemble. Singers come together, acquire knowledge, form friendships and share experiences,
but what is the underpinning mechanism behind this? Wenger’s COP theory helped me organize
the phenomenon of “choral participation” into a clear framework. As will be seen ahead, in my
23
analysis of data from a case study, I used Wenger’s theory to consider in more detail, how
participation in a choir affected the construction of identities in singers. This was done by
examining how multi-membership and trajectories of participation intersected to form a
community of practice.
Wenger’s theory is also helpful to shed light on the ever-changing nature of the social
learning environment within choruses. Individuals bring with them their stories, past
experiences, hopes and aspirations to the practice of choral singing. As individual characteristics
intersect, a choir becomes something unique, being completely shaped by the one-of-a-kind
combination of the identities. These identities may morph into new iterations of themselves
within a COP. Consequently, this process of identity transformation challenges choral directors
to teach in a way that accounts for the development of the person as much as for the development
of the musician. Wenger’s theory was a useful lens to gain a deeper understanding of the
community of singers at Ashgrove College.
Social Perspective Taking (SPT)
Within this study, I use the terms perspective taking and social perspective taking to
describe (a) process of individuals imagining or inferring other’s attitude or perspective “from
another's vantage point or imagining oneself in another's shoes” (Galinsky, Ku, & Wang, 2005,
p.80), or (b) a cognitive capacity to view the world in another's position (Galinsky, Maddux,
Gilin, & White, 2008). Researchers have investigated perspective taking from many different
angles. Gehlbach (2004) examined perspective taking in educational settings. Given that this
study is situated in music education, I use the term perspective taking to describe the
phenomenon, and reserve the use of Social Perspective Taking (SPT) when describing the
phenomenon as it occurs in the classroom, in alignment with Gehlbach’s work.
24
Gehlbach defines SPT as both “a process through which a perceiver attempts to discern
the thoughts, feelings, motivations, and/or point of view of one or more targets” and “an aptitude
consisting of ability and motivation” (Gehlbach, 2004, pp. 312). Gehlbach drew on earlier
research by Davis (1996) and Johnson (1975) to arrive at this definition of SPT, which was
further explored in his recent work investigating the social perspective taking process through
mixed-methods and experimental research approaches (Gehlbach, 2017, 2011; Gehlbach, Young,
& Roan, 2012; Gehlbach, Brinkworth & Wang, 2012; Gehlbach & Brinkworth, 2012; Gehlbach,
Brinkworth, & Harris, 2012; Gehlbach et al, 2008). Particularly appealing to me is the emphasis
on the interaction between teachers and students in Gehlbach’s work. Gehlbach’s research on
teacher-student interaction and engagement in SPT was helpful to analyze findings of my study.
Combining COP Theory with SPT
In this study, I combined the writings of Wenger (1998) and Gelhbach (2004), to first
analyze how members of Ashgrove Singers create a community of practice and second, how
within that community, Social Perspective Taking takes place. While Wenger’s theory served as
a window into community and social learning within Ashgrove Singers, Gehlbach’s work was
used to probe more deeply the issue of perspective taking within this choir.
Chapter Summary
In this chapter, I described the personal context in which the idea for the study developed.
I proceeded to state the rationale for my research, highlighting the need for research in choral
music education on perspective taking. Having outlined my research questions, I described how
the theoretical framework of Social Perspective Taking theory and Wenger’s Communities of
Practice (1998) theory is applied in this study. In the following chapter, I will review literature
25
that is closely related to Social Perspective Taking, Communities of Practice theory, and music
education in community college settings.
26
Chapter 2: Literature Review
Chapter Overview
The purpose of this chapter is to review literature closely related to this study. In the first
section of the chapter, I review theoretical literature on social perspective taking to help clarify
its definition and place it within the context of education research. In the second section of this
chapter, I offer an overview of Wenger’s (1998) COP theory, which I have used to frame this
study. Here, I include empirical literature from music education research that employs Wenger’s
theory in studies looking at undergraduate, graduate and faculty populations. It should be noted
that I have made a concerted effort to select and describe studies that used Wenger’s COP theory
in educational settings that were similar to that of community college environments. In the final
section of this chapter, I provide a historical overview of the development of community colleges
in the United States and discuss studies that have been conducted in community college music
programs, including two recent studies that have used qualitative research methodology. By
organizing this chapter into three sections, I contextualize three areas of study that were used to
frame the study, analyze and discuss collected data. These areas and their intersections are
depicted in Figure 1.
Figure 1. Three areas of study and their intersections.
Social
Perspective
Taking
Community
College
Education
Communities
of Practice
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Social Perspective Taking
Overview
Social Perspective Taking is defined as both “a process through which a perceiver
attempts to discern the thoughts, feelings, motivations, and/or point of view of one or more
targets” and “an aptitude consisting of ability and motivation” (Gehlbach, 2004, pp. 312).
Neuroscientists, psychologists, and education researchers all have enhanced our understanding of
perspective taking beyond common sense definitions that people might instinctively have (see
Spreitzer, Cameron, & Williams, 2011). In this section, I discuss research on SPT specifically,
and review selected studies that focused on perspective taking in music education.
Definition
In the dissertation, A new perspective on perspective taking: A study of social perspective
taking and its association with conflict resolution, historical empathy, and social studies
achievement (2004), Gelbach drew on earlier research by Davis (1996) and Johnson (1975) to
arrive at a definition of Social Perspective Taking (SPT). Gehlbach’s research focused on
understanding how SPT may work in a classroom settings, where students can: “(1) accurately
discern the cognitions and emotions of the teacher, (2) make inaccurate inferences, (3) conclude
that they do not know what the teacher is thinking or feeling, or (4) disengage from the attempt.”
(Gehlbach, 2004, pp. 5). In the study, Gehlbach investigated SPT ability and propensity within
240 high school students in grades nine and 10, respectively. SPT ability was measured using
performance tasks, while SPT propensities were assessed using survey instruments. Findings of
the study indicated that performance tasks best predicted SPT aptitude, and that SPT aptitude
was related to educational outcomes (conflict resolution, historical empathy, and social studies
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achievement). Gehlbach further acknowledged the limitations of the study design, stating that a
multidimensional assessment of SPT was necessary to better understand how SPT aptitude was
linked to educational outcomes and how SPT ability and propensity could be cultivated in the
classroom.
Since completing his dissertation, Gehlbach has researched SPT in the general classroom
(Gehlbach, 2017; Gehlbach, Young, & Roan, 2012; Gehlbach, Brinkworth & Wang, 2012;
Gehlbach & Brinkworth, 2012), the social studies classroom (Gehlbach et al, 2008; Gehlbach,
2011), and specifically, within student-teacher relationships (Gehlbach, Brinkworth, & Harris,
2012). Three of his articles bear particular relevance to my research and are discussed in more
detail.
The first of these articles describes two types of SPT: academic and interpersonal
(Gehlbach, 2011). While academic SPT refers to “forming theories as to the thoughts, feelings,
and motivations of the targeted individual” (Gehlbach, 2011, p. 314), interpersonal SPT is
defined as the process by which perceivers form theories as to the thoughts, feelings, and
motivations of another by considering their words, behavior and physical gestures (Gehlbach,
2011, p. 314). This theoretical article is particularly useful to my research as it provides a
succinct overview of Gehlbach’s theory on academic and interpersonal SPT and how both forms
manifest themselves in educational settings. To illustrate both examples, Gehlbach created two
hypothetical student characters: Sammy and Samantha. Sammy “reads their facial expressions,
makes inferences from their tone of voice, studies their gestures or posture, and so on”
(Gehlbach, 2011, p. 313). Sammy can “ask questions to clarify meaning, monitor responses to
his comments and behaviors, and even disclose his own opinion so as to encourage his peers to
reciprocate by revealing more about their point of view” (pp. 313). On the other hand, Samantha,
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another invented character, engages in academic SPT. She is “learning to reconcile divergent
points of view that she reads about historical figures” in her social studies class (p. 313). By
extension, she “lacks a visual sense of who they are or how they behaved; she has no facial
expressions, tone of voice, or gestures to rely on. Instead, she will likely need to consult written
sources.” (p. 313). Gehlbach used the characters of Sammy and Samantha to illustrate the
different perspective taking processes used by students in social studies classrooms to better
understand and relate to content presented in the class. Social studies exposes students to a
variety of historical figures, much in the same way that choral education does. Gehlbach
explained that “through both forms of SPT, perceivers better understand who is friendly (or
fearsome), who might hold shared values, and whose behaviors might provide social support. In
short, SPT is the capacity that allows perceivers to screen others as potential candidates for social
relationships” (p. 315). Gehlbach’s research on academic SPT is especially relevant to choral
music education, as much of choral repertoire was composed by people who are no longer
available to answer questions and engage directly with the students. Teachers and conductors
provide opportunities for students to develop both types of SPT by way of collaborative SPT,
humanizing history, and cultivating students’ perspectives.
Engaging students in collaborative SPT creates multiple ways to motivate students to
engage with contents (Gehlbach, 2011). For example, in academic SPT, the teacher could ask
questions such as “Why did this particular historical figure act as she did?” or “What
circumstances led to a certain culture adopting a particular belief or point of view?” (p. 315)
Gehlbach outlined the following as advantages of facilitating collaborative SPT: “(1) the
hypothesis as to what happens is developed with two or more minds versus one, (2) to the extent
that one person succumbs to a particular bias with respect to a given SPT target, others may be
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able to counterbalance that bias by providing a more objective perspective, and (3) as various
hypotheses and explanations of a target are averaged and/or synthesized, the resulting
explanations are more likely to be accurate” (p. 315). According to Gehlbach, teachers who use
the humanizing history approach capitalize on “students’ intrinsic need for social relatedness” (p.
316) and introduce historical figures in a way that is not only interesting for the students, but that
resonates with their day-to-day lives in some small way. Finally, teachers who cultivate their
students’ perspectives utilize an approach that allows their students to hear their peers’
viewpoints. Gehlbach explained that “opening the class up to student opinions will likely
broaden the range of perspectives to which students are exposed. This broader array of views
should bolster student engagement—students are now more likely to resonate with at least one or
two of the views presented.” (p. 317). Furthermore, Gehlbach suggested that students may be
able to relate to a peer’s description of a particular perspective better than the teacher’s
description because the former would use less formal language to illustrate the same idea (p.
317). Finally, “hearing the perspective of others allows students to better understand their
classmates and help them evaluate the extent of their mutual connectedness on issues” (p. 317).
As students become more comfortable with using academic SPT strategies, they can transfer
their abilities to other domains of their lives, outside of the classroom.
Gehlbach and Brinkworth (2012) continued to investigate the processes and motivations
involved in SPT by conducting a mixed-methods study. A group of 13 high school students and
18 adults were asked to watch 2 videos in which two people were having a conversation. The
first conversation depicted a disagreement, the second showed one member of the conversation
speaking about an embarrassing moment that they have experienced in a lip-synching contest
(p.8) The researchers conducted semi-structured interviews in which the participants verbalized
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insights that they had about the target’s experience of the situation. The objective of the study
was to ascertain SPT strategies the participants were using while discerning the thoughts,
feelings, motivations, and points of view of targets, as well as trying to understand how these
targets view the situation. The study identified various strategies that participants used when
engaging in SPT. First, instead of putting themselves in “another person’s shoes”, participants
projected themselves or “reminded themselves of a situation that paralleled the one that the target
was experiencing” (Gehlbach & Brinkworth, 2012, p. 11). Furthermore, perceivers compared
targets against a generic person (e.g., how “most people” would act in a situation). They were
also asked to compare targets against other members of a group to which they belonged (e.g.,
classmates), and also to compare target’s present behavior with past behaviors in other contexts
as a way to infer what his or her thoughts and feelings might be. In the process of relating to
targets in the video footage, participants went through two interrelated processes: anchoring and
adjusting. In Gehlbach and Brinkworth’s words:
Participants often imaginatively projected themselves into the target’s situation but then
made adjustments based on known differences between themselves and the participant.
This variation of the strategy can be thought of as an “anchoring and adjusting” approach
in which perceivers anchor with their own experience and then make adjustments from
that anchor. (p. 13)
Part of the anchoring process involves different strategies for gathering information about
the targets. Cultivation of information occurs through attention regulation (i.e., by consciously
focusing on the target), emotion regulation (i.e., trying to stay calm amidst interactions with
target), increasing modalities (i.e., shifting communication modality from text to voice to visual),
and open-mindedness. In the latter strategy, participants made explicit efforts to keep an open
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mind and entertain multiple possibilities as to what the target might be thinking or feeling. On a
more effortful level, participants sometimes deliberately delayed or withheld judgment in order
to remain open to new information before forming an opinion about the target’s perspective (p.
16). Gehlbach and Brinkworth found auditory (i.e., taking words at face value, conversational
patterns), and visual cues (i.e., facial expressions, eye movement, body positioning, gestures,
proximity) confirming that SPT was occurring. Ultimately, the researchers stated that
engagement in SPT is a “complicated interaction between the perceiver’s cognitive abilities and
motivation, characteristics of the target, how well the strategy was executed, and a host of
cultural and situational factors” (p. 22-23). This study shed light on some human interactions
within a controlled, experimental environment. Their findings are pertinent to the current
research, as I have observed similar processes, albeit using a qualitative approach.
More recently, Gehlbach, Marietta, King, Karutz, Bailenson, and Dede (2015) conducted
an experiment to examine the extent to which the type of SPT affected conflict resolution
outcomes. In their study, Gehlbach and colleagues assigned 842 participants from Amazon’s
Mechanical Turk to five different perspective taking treatments or a control condition. In this
experiment, participants had to “walk in another’s shoes” by way of a virtual simulation on a
computer. The virtual environment featured members from opposing groups representing those
who prioritized business development (i.e., a golf-course owner) and those who prioritized
conservation (i.e., a park ranger). All participants assumed the role of the golf-course owner.
Throughout the game, participants negotiated with the park ranger about six issues that had to do
with land conservation surrounding the golf course. During part of the simulation, participants
had the option of reading pop-up descriptions detailing the ranger’s views on the topic. Other
participants engaged in SPT one step further and, for a brief moment, switched “shoes,” learning
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the ranger’s views on the issue by becoming the character in the game. Findings of the study
revealed that the more participants learned about the ranger’s views, the more likely they were to
take his perspective. Experiencing the park ranger’s perspective, as opposed to passively learning
about it, resulted in a more positive relationship with the character. When individuals were
instructed to take the perspective of someone else, but given little or no information about who
this person is, no actual perspective was taken.
These findings bear significance in my research. First, the “virtual environment” that is
simulated on the computer could be replaced with the music-making environment. Arguably,
each choral composition, by way of its usage of text and its unique meanings, creates a small
“world” of its own. Second, students in a choral setting often have to use their imagination to
impersonate the character that they are trying to convey through their performance, which often
differs from their own selves. Each entity (i.e., the character and their own selves) entails certain
viewpoints and perspectives. Finally, a choir conductor has the option of instructing singers to
take the perspective of others or not. Thus, the study by Gehlbach and colleagues (2015) helped
to contextualize the conductor’s role in engaging students in SPT in the current study.
Perspective Taking Research in Music Education
Perspective taking has been studied in other ways as well. Researchers have considered
perspective taking to influence one’s accuracy of interpersonal interactions (Eyal, Steffel &
Epley, 2018; Kim, Cohen & Au, 2010; Goldstein, 2014; Bruk, 2018), ability to negotiate (Neale,
1983; Trotschel, 2011), and reduction of interpersonal bias (Galinsky, Wang & Ku 2008;
Galinsky, Maddux, Gilin & White, 2008; Galinsky & Moskowitz, 2000; Sun, 2016; Surtees et
al., 2013; Surtees & Apperly, 2012; Surtees, Butterfill & Apperly, 2012; Todd, 2011, 2013).
Perspective taking has been an object of research in music psychology and music education.
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Researchers have investigated the associations between empathy (Greenberg, Rentfrow &
Baron-Cohen, 2015; Keller, 2014; Novembre, Ticini, Schütz-Bosbach & Keller, 2012;
Rabinowitch, Cross & Burnard, 2013) and prosocial skills (Kirschner & Tomasello, 2010;
Schellenberg et al., 2015) with music teaching and learning.
In their study on cooperation, Kirschner and Tomasello (2010) investigated the role
music training plays in promoting prosocial behavior. In their study design, pairs of four-year-
old children participated in a three-minute episode of interactive play. With an adult present, the
children danced, sang or played percussion instruments to a children’s song. In the control
condition, participants interacted without music activities. Immediately after the manipulation
phase, each pair participated in two social interactions designed to test their willingness to (1)
help their partner and (2) cooperate on a problem-solving task. Kirschner and Tomasello (2010)
found that children who participated in a joint music activity involving singing were more likely
to help other students in the second phase of the experiment. They concluded that prosocial
behavior was encouraged through the children’s participation in the music activity because it
required them to coordinate voice and action “thereby highlighting the shared intention of acting
as a ‘we’ unit” (Kirschner & Tomasello, 2010, p. 363). While this study did not investigate
perspective taking directly, the process by which participants arrived at a “we” unit mentality
resonates to the process involved for considering the viewpoint and motivation of others.
Greenberg, Rentfrow and Baron-Cohen (2015) used the empathizing-systemizing (E-S)
theory to examine whether music training can increase empathy toward participants with autism.
According to the researchers, empathizing allows individuals to "predict and to respond to the
behavior of agents (usually people) by inferring their mental states and responding to these with
an appropriate emotion," where systemizing is the drive to "predict and to respond to the
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behavior of non-agentive deterministic systems by analyzing input-operation-output relations
and inferring the rules that govern such systems" (Baron-Cohen et al., 2005b, p. 819). Although
the process of empathizing does involve similar processes to perspective taking, the study did not
measure perspective taking ability directly. Nevertheless, it is a widely-cited contribution to
literature on non-musical benefits of musical training.
Interestingly, studies examining perspective taking as a main element in choral settings
were not found at the time of writing. Instead, scholars have typically focused on select aspects
of perspective taking such as discerning thoughts, feelings, motivations, point of view of others
in prison choirs (Cohen 2007a, 2007b, 2008a, 2008b, 2009, 2010a, 2012a, 2012b; Gromko &
Cohen, 2011; Menning, 2010; Roma, 2010; Silber, 2005), multicultural choirs (Bradley, 2006),
and single-day choral events wherein two different racial/ethnic social groups sang together
(Kuchenbrandt, 2014; Luhrs, 2015; Robertson, 2010; Zelizer, 2003, 2004). Social Perspective
Taking (Gehlbach, 2004) was not found to be linked to choral music education. As noted, my
research aims to address this gap in the literature by connecting what happens in social learning
contexts within choirs to SPT.
Communities of Practice
Human beings’ need to organize themselves into collective entities precedes any
researchers’ need to give this phenomenon a label. When people come together with the intent of
achieving something that they cannot do on their own, some form of collaboration emerges. Each
member of a collective with a shared purpose brings along different skillsets and levels of
expertise, from novice to expert. As members contribute their ideas and efforts to a common
goal, the group takes on unique characteristics and evolves. Wenger’s (1998) Community of
Practice (COP) is a social learning theory that provides a useful framework for understanding the
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inner workings of collaborative efforts of people in educational and workplace settings,
including in choirs. In this section, I offer an overview of the theory and discuss music education
studied that used it as a theoretical lens.
Overview
The theory of community of practice (Wenger, 1998) is rooted in the notion that learning
is a social phenomenon. Wenger’s idea of learning is based on four basic assumptions: (1)
people are social beings; (2) knowledge is a matter of competence with respect to valued
enterprises; (3) knowing is a matter of participating in the pursuit of such enterprises, through
active engagement in the world; and (4) meaning, which derives from our ability to experience
the world, is ultimately the product of learning (Wenger, 1998, p. 4). COPs exist everywhere;
they can be formal or informal. COPs encompass stories, histories, routines, rituals, conventions,
and artifacts. Participation in a COP signals to individuals that they belong to a place where they
can “develop or preserve a sense of self they can live with” (Wenger, 1998, p. 6). COPs can be
observed in everyday life, in places of work, schools, churches, and anywhere else where
individuals come together to engage in an activity. Wenger believes that the methodic
exploration of COPs creates a kind of “systematic vocabulary” (pp. 8) that enables one to make
sense of the world. His theory articulates what social learning is, pushing institutions to
reconsider the idea of learning as solely an individual process. Furthermore, Wenger believes
that as people advance toward maturity, it becomes increasingly important to look back and
figure out what perspectives shaped their actions. “We reflect on learning all the time,” Wenger
shared, “we wish to cause learning, to take charge of it, direct it, accelerate it, demand it” (p. 9).
When humans participate in their own learning and in the learning process of others, they forge
new meanings. Participatory learning, therefore, involves action, discussion and reflection.
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Members of COPs pay attention to and value other people’s contributions. Our participation in
social learning shapes us, and by extension, shapes the communities in which we learn. As a
social learning theory, COP falls somewhere between philosophy, social sciences and the
humanities. In his own words,
Learning as participation is certainly caught in the middle. It takes place through our
engagement in actions and interactions, but it embeds this engagement in culture and
history. Through these local actions and interactions, learning reproduces and transforms
the social structure in which it takes place (p. 13).
As COPs develop, so do the communities around them. Learning becomes more than just
a vehicle for obtaining knowledge, but is also a “vehicle for the evolution of practices” (pp. 13)
in society. This aspect of Wenger’s theory is of particular interest to this dissertation. Wenger’s
theory allows the examination of how different social learning theories of collectivity, power,
meaning and subjectivity (see Wenger, 1998, p. 14-15) are connected in a setting such as a music
classroom, whereas social learning is at the core of all activities and meaning-making. In the next
section, I discuss key aspects of COP theory: practice, meaning and identity.
Practice
The practice of engaging in a COP constitutes all of the tasks that need to be completed,
the relationships that have to be worked out, the situations that need to be interpreted, and the
conflicts that have to be resolved (Wenger, 1998). In a choir, this could mean arriving to
rehearsal on time, singing the right pronunciation in a foreign language, or interpreting the
gestural vocabulary of a conductor, among many others. The process of practice also means
sorting out how institutional demands (i.e., concerts, participation policies, knowing your music)
can be negotiated within shifting individual situations. As Wenger explains, social practices have
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both explicit rules (e.g. documents, images, language, tools, etc.) and tacit rules (e.g., implicit
conventions, subtle cues, untold rules of thumb, specific perceptions, and underlying
assumptions). These rules guide participants to discern when to ask questions, what to include
and what to omit when sharing stories, or whether or not one needs to “correct” the person next
to you. For Wenger, “practice is about meaning as an experience of everyday life” (1998, p. 52).
Within the theory of COP, practice characterizes the community, providing context for what
happens within it, including the negotiation of meaning and the formation of identities (Wenger,
1998).
Meaning
When people participate in a community, they take what is gained from social
interactions and then reify these “gains” into an abstraction that helps them make sense of it.
Negotiation of meaning, therefore, is a “duality of participation and reification” (Wenger, 1998,
p. 53). Through participation, people recognize themselves in each other. Through reification,
people “project [their] meanings into the world and then [they] perceive them as existing in the
world, as having a reality of their own” (Wenger, 1998, p. 58). When people participate in an
event, their experiences turn into “frozen moments that disappear on their own time” (p. 60). As
they go back and reflect on their experiences, such process can be seen as reification. In a choir,
for example, video-recorded footage of a concert cannot capture the richness of the lived
experience of that moment, but the videotape itself becomes a physical object that reifies a
performance after it has happened. A discussion on participation and reification is not just a
discussion about people and things, however, as participation and reification are a duality, and
not a dichotomy. According to Wenger, “a duality is a single conceptual unit that is formed by
two inseparable and mutually constitutive elements whose inherent tension and complementarity
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give the concept richness and dynamism” (p. 66). Singers that perform choral repertoire
experience this duality as they engage in both participation and reification. As an example, a
choir that performs poetry by Walt Whitman conveys the text to an audience (i.e. participation)
but those words become “shortcuts to communication” (p. 62) that bring with them abstract ideas
(i.e. reification). Choral compositions, then, become a kind of shared repertoire among the
community of musicians and the community of listeners. A music score can reify a “complex
web of conventions, agreements, expectations, commitments, and obligations” (Wenger, 1998, p.
59). For Wenger, shared repertoire is an umbrella term that comprises words, gestures, stories,
tools, ways of doing things, concepts and symbols in a COP. It reflects the history of mutual
engagement.
Mutual Engagement and Joint Enterprise
Each COP is construed of mutual engagement and joint enterprise. Mutual engagement
refers to the inner workings of practice–a kind of “community maintenance” (Wenger, 1998, p.
74). Each person in a COP brings with them specialized knowledge, unique ideas and beliefs.
For this reason, mutual engagement often means that “it is more important to know how to give
and receive help than to try to know everything yourself” (Wenger, 1998, p. 76). The process of
giving and receiving help to creates forms of competence that overlap, leading to mutual
engagement. Based on human relationships, mutual engagement is made up of mixtures of power
and dependence, expertise and helplessness, success and failure, trust and suspicion, authority
and collegiality, attraction and repugnance, resistance and compliance, and other forms of
contrasting behaviors and emotions. According to Wenger, COP members’ “responses to
dilemmas and aspirations are connected by the relations they create through mutual engagement”
(Wenger, 1998, p. 75).
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Joint enterprise, in turn, refers to mutual accountability within a COP. People determine
what participation in a community of practice means to them. Consequently, they respond to
situations in that community based on their understandings. Mutual accountability implies that
power is “always mediated by the community’s production of its practice” (Wenger, 1998, p.
80), and that such enterprise is not mandated by external forces or by an individual participant. In
practice, mutual accountability manifests itself in acts such as “not making life harder for others,
figuring out what matters and what does not, what to do and not to do, what to talk about and
what to leave unsaid, what to justify and what to take for granted, what to display and what to
withhold, and sorting out when actions are good enough and when they need improvement”
(Wenger, 1998, p. 81). Thus, mutual accountability leads individuals in a COP to “develop
specialized sensitivities, an aesthetic sense, and refined perception that [is] brought to bear on
making judgements about the qualities of a product or an action” (Wenger, 1998, pp. 81). In
choral music education, this can manifest itself in an understanding of behavioral norms in
rehearsal or simply discerning a successful performance from a not-so-successful one.
Identity in Practice
Wenger’s theory does not only focus on the collective. The author also positions the unit
of analysis on the individual by examining how social learning settings impact the formation of
identity. Individuality is an important aspect of understanding how communities of practice work
because “even our most private thoughts make use of concepts, images and perspectives that we
understand through our participation in social communities” (Wenger, 1998, p. 146). Our
assumptions about how society works, political ideas, and biases are all brought along upon
entrance into a COP. Interactions with others can shift those assumptions, biases and ideas
slightly, causing a new facet of our identity to emerge. In sum, to create a community of practice
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is to acknowledge that everyone in the community is negotiating their identity. There are those
who are “newcomers” and those who are “full participants” (Wenger, 1998).
Identity is different from self-image because it is not just how we see ourselves, but it is
also who we become through participation in a shared event. Wenger elaborates:
Identity, then, is a layer of events of participation and reification by which our experience
and its social interpretation inform each other. As we encounter our effects on the world
and develop our relations with others, these layers build upon each other and produce our
identity as a very complex interweaving of participative experience and reificative
projections. Bringing the two together through the negotiation of meaning, we construct
who we are. In the same way that meaning exists in its negotiation, identity exists–not as
an object in and of itself–but in the constant work of negotiating the self. It is in this
cascading interplay of participation and reification that our experience of life becomes
one of identity, and indeed of human existence and consciousness. (p. 151)
As noted, the theory of COP can be easily applied to the choral setting. Each time a person joins
a choral ensemble, a new layer made of up their past participatory experiences forms within their
identity. While singers may join a choir without necessarily thinking whether it will impact their
sense of who they are, according to Wenger’s theorizing, it undoubtedly will. This aspect of the
theory resonates with me personally, as I have experienced changes in my own identity through
participation in choir. In fact, it is by way of singing in choir for the first time as an
undergraduate piano major that I learned how to engage in social perspective taking with others.
Although this occurred within a single community of undergraduate music majors at the
University of Toronto, stepping away from piano playing to singing in choir constituted what
Wenger (1998) termed an intersectional experience.
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Intersectional experiences refer to different trajectories that shape identity. Wenger
specifies five different trajectories that impact identity formation, namely, peripheral or one that
does not require full participation but can still contribute to one’s identity formation; inbound, a
peripheral trajectory that signals an investment in future participation; insider or all new events
and practices that lead to new identities; boundary or an identity that spans two communities of
practice; and outbound or the “leaving the nest” trajectory (Wenger 1998, p. 154-155). As an
example, over the course of one’s involvement in choir, the person will experience intersections
between different trajectories. How a singer’s identity changes from the start of an academic
semester to its end is shaped by the trajectory that they were on before, during, and after the
experience. Each singer’s story is told as they engage in choir, and it becomes possible “to enter
these stories through one’s own experience” when part of a COP (Wenger, 1998, p. 156)
When different trajectories become a part of each other, whether by clashing or
reinforcing each other, they form a nexus of multi-membership (Wenger, 1998). This means that
when people come together, their identities combine. Thus, there is more than one trajectory at
play with any single person. Within communities of practice, individuals have to figure out how
to make different identities work together. By extension of this process, they find ways to make
multiple forms of membership coexist. As identities are negotiated, perspectives change. In
Wenger’s words:
As we engage our whole person in practice, our identities dynamically encompass
multiple perspectives in the negotiation of new meanings. In these new meanings we
negotiate our own activities and identities, and at the same time the histories of relations
among our communities of practice. The creative negotiation of an identity always has
the potential to rearrange these relations. (p. 161)
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Imagination plays a key role in helping members of a community of practice negotiate the
identities within their nexus of multi-membership. Imagination can help participants envision
what the community of practice can be rather than what it is. According to Wenger, “mutual
engagement creates a shared reality” (pp. 177), and imagination shapes that reality.
Consequently, a community of practice can have a shared imagination (Wenger, 1998). As
Wenger postulates, through the use of imagination, “we can locate ourselves in the world and in
history, and include in our identities other meanings, other possibilities, other perspectives” (p.
178). From this standpoint, imagination serves as a conduit for SPT within a COP. If members of
a COP intentionally engage in SPT, this mode of practice will require them to use imagination to
put themselves in the “shoes” of another person. Imagination requires individuals, if only for a
brief moment, to transport themselves into another person’s reality and imagine their own
identity as someone who is able to understand that person’s experience (even if at the time, that
understanding is limited). Whether or not the imagined reality accurate reflects the lived
experience of that person is not as important as the actual engagement in imagining another
person’s perspective. In today’s increasingly complex society, teaching students how to relate to
others is more important than ever. Understanding that imagination is an important characteristic
of any COP empowers teachers to help students develop their proposed, imagined identities as
compassionate and empathetic people. By integrating purposeful activities and discussions that
engage students in SPT, teachers may contribute to creating a COP that is characterized by the
emphasis it puts on relating to others.
Music Education studies utilizing COP
The theory of COP has been used as a framework in music education research. In this
section I review music education studies that have been based on Wenger’s COP theory (1998).
44
These studies are divided into two categories: Repertoire-specific studies and Music teacher
education research.
Repertoire-specific studies. One of the ways in which Wenger’s COP theory has been
used in music education research is through analyses of music-making communities of specific
repertoires. Hewitt (2009) discussed social learning within the framework of teaching various
musical styles to students in higher education settings in the United Kingdom. Although
Wenger’s theory is not discussed in detail in this article, the author looked at how “stylistically
situated norms of practice” (Hewitt, 2009, p. 333) posed challenges for learning, teaching, and
assessment in music education. This theoretical piece discussed how the term “community” has
been described in settings where different musical styles are practiced. Hewitt asserts that the
traditional Western classical tradition is being replaced by a “multiplicity of musical styles”
(Hewitt, 2009, p. 335) and warns readers of forthcoming challenges to higher education music
programs if re-evaluation of the concepts of “practice” and “community” does not take place.
Bennett (2005) contributed a literature review that looked at how COPs have been
applied to analyze children’s music-making communities. In the article, Bennett (2015)
connected core characteristics of Wenger’s theory to practices of music communities all over the
world, from Fiji to Ghana. Bennett’s work focused more on describing the different musical
communities than on deciphering how the communities reflected Wenger’s notion of a COP.
While the aforementioned articles by Hewitt (2009) and Bennett (2015) were literature reviews,
Brashier (2016) contributed a case study of an informal music community at a Greek Orthodox
Church. In the study, Brashier investigated what happens when a group of people gather together
to learn Byzantine chant informally. A large portion of the study discussed the stylistic aspects of
Byzantine chant, focusing less on applications of Wenger’s theoretical framework. Brashier
45
found echo and embodiment to be the permeating themes in the study. As each participant
echoed the Byzantine chant in the process of learning it and as a result, they felt that the chant
became a part of them, that it was embodied. Although Brashier’s case study involved a group of
singers, the setting was not a choir but an informal collective of individuals that performed
monody. Still, this is likely the only study to bear some resemblance to the current study.
Music teacher education studies. Wenger’s (1998) theory has been applied to many
settings in which individuals engage in social learning. Naturally, researchers in education have
been drawn to it. In reviewing literature that used Wenger’s framework, I focused on studies that
were conducted in higher education settings. As my own study was conducted in this context, I
selected literature that described similar environments and could therefore be used in comparison
to my research site.
Fitzpatrick (2014) and Virkkula (2016) studied communities of practice of undergraduate
students in the United Stated and in Finland. Fitzpatrick (2014) conducted a case study in which
9 undergraduate music majors participated in an interactive blog as part of their coursework.
Fitzpatrick analyzed the contents of the blog in light of COP theory (Wenger, 1998), and
determined that although the blog was virtual, students engaged in (a) developing their
community through social interactions, (b) identity shifts as they explored new roles as students,
and (c) reflective thinking. Fitzpatrick (2014) concluded that although the virtual blog
environment did not impede a creation of a community of practice, teacher educators need to be
thoughtful in structuring a learning experience in this setting and create opportunities for
dialogue and sharing of ideas in a meaningful way.
Virkkula (2016) examined COPs at a music conservatory in Finland. In the case study,
Virkkula examined participation of 62 students ages 17-24 in 11 popular and jazz music
46
workshops that were part of the vocational education in the Conservatory of Oulu. The author
drew connections between what happened in the workshops and aspects of Wenger’s COP
theory by highlighting the importance of a shared sociocultural repertoire.
Using narrative inquiry, Ilari (2010) investigated how Musicalização Infantil, a music
education program in Brazil, transitioned from being a “temporary solution for pre-service
teacher placement” (Ilari, 2010, p. 44) into an established program and a community of practice.
The purpose of the study was to examine and discuss the experiences of music teachers in the
program. Ilari presented three narratives of pre-service teachers and their experiences. Findings
of the study suggested that a community of practice emerged at Musicalização Infantil and that
through their positions as pre-service teachers, members of the COP engaged in key
characteristics of Wenger’s theory: negotiation of meaning, sense of community, shared
enterprises and emergence of identity. Implications for practice emphasized the importance of
considering identity development in teacher training, and highlighted the utility value of
Wenger’s COP theory in thinking about teacher training in music.
Shin (2013) used Wenger’s theoretical framework to study music education majors and
their communities of practice. The study was conducted with pre-service teachers in music
education at a summer teacher education program. The author examined how different pre-
service teachers perceived their experiences in the program with consideration to their
backgrounds, the structure of the cohort and other factors. Shin discussed the dynamic of
supporting and refuting each other’s ideas in the class, stating that in one class, “students had
developed a high comfort level that facilitated openness toward one another” (Shin, 2013, p.
126). While Shin did not address perspective taking directly, findings of this study suggested that
an important aspect to teaching experience is engaging in perspectives that one might not
47
necessarily agree with. Since Shin’s focus was on investigating professional development, no
further inquiry was made into the process involved in establishing a “high comfort level” through
discussion of different perspectives. Ultimately, Shin’s findings indicated that a community of
practice evolved within the pre-service classes for graduate students at the research site.
Two recent studies investigated collaborative learning with graduate students studying
music. Gaunt and Westerlund (2013) compiled a collection of chapters co-authored by various
scholars in their book on collaborative learning in higher music education. In the introductory
chapter of their book, Gaunt and Westerlund recognized Wenger’s COP theory as an important
theory in research on collaborative learning. As their chapter is a theoretical piece and does not
feature original research, Wenger’s COP theory was used a point of reference into the
development of scholars’ understanding of what collaborative learning entails.
Hentschel, Mars, Nyberg, Von Wachenfeldt, Gullberg, and Almqvist (2017) also
investigated collaborative learning in their study. Their article considered how collaborative
learning manifested itself in a course with four PhD students in music education. By analyzing
the course material, logbooks and online chat discussions of students in the course, Hentschel
and colleagues found that adequate course structure and clear outline of roles within class
participation contributed to effective collaborative learning. The researchers cited Wenger’s
(1998) theory within their theoretical framework on collaborative learning.
The theory of COP was also utilized to examine faculty-related issues. Zaffini (2016)
conducted a self-study of music education faculty at a university in which the worked. Using
Wenger’s theoretical framework, Zaffini set out to examine how two full-time and two part-time
contingent faculty of which she was part negotiated their work, and how her faculty identity was
shaped through participation in the group. Findings of the study revealed that members of the
48
researcher’s COP had rich histories of membership in other COPs, and knowledge and identity
from those COPs were constantly reconciled with new understanding and identity. Thus,
discussions of identity development were a major focus of Zaffini’s research, with Wenger’s
theory being the sole framework in which findings were contextualized.
To date, Dixon (2016) remains the only scholar who has investigated communities of
practice within a community college setting. Using Wenger’s COP theory (1998) and Lave and
Wenger’s theory of Legitimate Peripheral Participation (1991), Dixon examined how members
of a music department in a community college in the Midwest constructed their COP. By
considering unique aspects of the community college experience, Dixon investigated how
practices of this COP helped or deterred students from participation in the music ensembles of
their choice. Findings of this study suggested that faculty members struggled to meet
expectations of students who wanted to experience more diverse course offerings within the
music curriculum. Further challenges were brought on by the fact that the music majors at the
institution did not have clear career goals or academic expectations. Implications of Dixon’s
research suggested that dialogue among different types of COP members (students, faculty and
administration) was a key to the process helping resolve issues of curricular offerings and student
and faculty goals and expectations. Dixon’s use of Wenger’s COP theory, specifically his
analysis of the music program, its practices and its negotiation of meaning and identity, connects
to this research study because it employs the same theoretical framework within a similar
educational context–a community college music program. Dixon and I both used Wenger’s
theory, but unlike Dixon who researched goals and expectations of students and faculty within
the program, I focused my research questions on investigating how Social Perspective Taking
evolves within a COP.
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Community College Education
Historical Context
To better understand the educational setting in which this study was conducted, it is
central to understand the historical context in which community colleges emerged in the United
States. Many of the first junior colleges in the country were established in California in the
twentieth century (Beach, 2011). In 1907, Alexis Lange, Professor and Dean of the School of
Education at University of California-Berkeley, established preparatory classes for high school
students. At the time, the University of California was the most developed system of higher
education in the country and these classes were intended to prepare students interested in
attending the institution (Beach, 2011a). Together with colleagues, Lange formed a curriculum
that was equivalent to first- and second-year undergraduate courses in the UC system. This
curriculum thus became the basis for “junior” colleges. Between 1907 and 1921, a total of 18
junior colleges were formed in California. By 1930, junior colleges “became the primary point of
entry for all first-year students to higher education in California.” (Beach, 2011a, p. 72). The end
of the Second World War caused further expansion in junior college system: between 1948 and
1959, junior college enrollments increased by 80% (Beach, 2011a, p. 75). By 1966, there were
76 public junior colleges serving about 460,000 students across the country (Beach, 2011a, p.
83). The UC system continued to be selective in their recruitment process, expanding their
enrollment marginally.
As a consequence of expanding enrollment numbers, the junior college system
experienced several challenges, the first of which concerned lack of clarity surrounding entrance
criteria. Community colleges were intended provide the American public access to
postsecondary education and contribute to economic development, yet the answer to the question
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of who gets access and who gets to contribute was not clearly stated. In the second half of the
twentieth century, during social and political strife surrounding racial segregation, this question
became especially relevant in American. In the 1960s, community college environments faced
criticism of being a “social environment for structuring the failure of nonwhite students” (Cohen,
2009, p. 94). In California, segregation in the state impacted enrollment of nonwhite minorities.
Cohen (2009) explained:
The evidence available seems to suggest that California junior colleges, like other public
institutions of higher education in California, were legally open to both sexes and all
ethnic groups. However, junior colleges were often built in segregated school districts
and disproportionately served the majority race of the local area. And while these
institutions would have mirrored the integration policies of most local high schools, they
surely fostered norms of social segregation and curricular segregation by race and sex,
determined by the larger social segregation of the local population and regional labor
markets. (p. 55)
Naturally, an intersecting issue with segregation was funding. In the 1970s, local governments
funded community colleges by using money collected from property taxes. Thus, funds available
to any college reflected the wealth (or lack thereof) of the area in which it was located. When the
recession occurred in 1983, politicians saw community colleges as “cash cows” that could
remedy the economic crisis. Cohen explained that “the policy movement for institutional
accountability was never an educational priority; it was always a political and economic priority
that developed largely as a response to economic crises and constricted financial support from
the state” (p. 108). In California, students’ fees rose from $120 in 1990 to $390 in 1995 (Cohen,
2011). Today, California Community Colleges have more than 2.1 million students on 114
51
campuses, which amounts to three out of every 10 Californians ages 18-24 being enrolled in a
community college (California Community Colleges, 2019). One of the primary funding
resources for students are Federal Pell Grants, which contribute an average of $2,000 in support
funding per year (Office of U.S. Department of Education, 2018). For students who attend
colleges in low socio-economic areas, relying on government funding is not enough. Many
students balance going to school with working full or part time jobs. According to Cohen (2009),
61% of students attended college part-time, taking one of two courses per term, and most are
employed for 25 to 40 hours per week. Sharing one’s time between two important
responsibilities–school and work–impacts another level of statistics: attrition and transfer rates.
When community colleges were booming with students, the California Postsecondary
Education Commission (CPEC) was established to assess student success. CPEC attempted to
understand why students who claimed intent to attain the associate’s degree would drop out
before doing so. This commission also investigated why two thirds of the community college
student population declared intent to transfer to a four-year university, while less than one third
actually did (Cohen, 2009). CPEC was not particularly effective in providing clarity surrounding
these issues, and the commission was closed in 2011.
Today, policy makers, faculty and administrators debate a slightly different angle on the
issue: the purpose of the community college. Some policy makers believe that colleges are
partners in state economic development plans and are therefore responsible for providing
students with vocational training. Others see community colleges as gateways for students to
transfer to universities. Students who are not enrolled in the most common occupational
programs (health professions, business, management, computer and information science, security
and protective services, etc.) but that want to transfer to university are likely to study humanities.
52
Supporting these students can be challenging in an educational system that is focused on
vocational training. For students studying music in community college, the primary challenge is
to bridge the gap between their high school education and the expectations of an undergraduate
music program. This means helping students complete any necessary remedial course work in
music while encouraging them to complete their general education (GE) requirements. In the
next section, I review studies that have looked at how music programs in community colleges
have addressed questions surrounding attrition and transfer rates, expectations, as well as faculty
and student experiences.
Music Education Research in Community College Settings
Despite the fact that community colleges constitute a large part of the educational system
in the United States, research on music programs within this setting has been lacking. Since the
emergence of community colleges is a relatively recent phenomenon, researchers started to
examine music programs within this setting in the second half of the twentieth century. In the
next section, I review selected studies on two topics that are relevant to this study that have been
investigated within community college music programs: program structure and curriculum.
Analysis of music programs at community colleges. Following the boom in enrollment
at community colleges in the 1970s and 1980s, new research on music programs in these settings
emerged. Researchers began to analyze statistics showing low transfer rates to four-year
institutions with the intent of better understanding the reasons behind them. In Florida, Lamb
(1980) investigated the differences between community college and university music programs
by comparing entrance requirements, applied music offerings, and jury examinations within both
types of institutions. Lamb (1980) asked whether, given the differences in structure between the
aforementioned educational settings, community colleges were willing to follow NASM
53
recommendations. His findings indicated that while some community colleges were willing to do
so, few had clarity as to how to best implement NASM’s guidelines. He made several
recommendations, including instituting admission standards which will assure that students are
ready to being freshman work, strict grading of students and “if necessary, failing them” (Lamb,
1980, p. 237), drawing up requirements for a “2-year theory sequence” (p. 239), and repairing of
vast differences between NASM’s recommended program for instrumental techniques and that
of community colleges. The general tone of Lamb’s dissertation is that of criticism toward
community colleges rather than understanding.
Similarly, Kesling (1982) analyzed music programs in public community colleges in
Tennessee that were accredited by The Southern Association of Colleges. The study involved
surveys taken by 207 department heads at various institutions. Like Lamb (1980), Kesling
investigated the condition and structure of music programs with the intent of making
recommendations for improvement. Both studies can be historically contextualized within a
period when policy makers and researchers around the United States were trying to understand
the community college phenomenon. Kesling (1982) provided 16 pages of recommendations and
strategies for improving music programs in Tennessee and the Southern region of the U.S. His
lists of recommendations applied to different departments–independent study, continuing
education, terminal education, music major transfer program, counseling and articulation,
institutional resources, state level committees, as well as members of student and faculty
members.
Many years later, Turner (1999) followed a similar research path to Lamb (1980) and
Kesling (1982), examining whether community college music programs in Kansas met the
academic standards set by NASM. Like the aforementioned researchers before him, Turner
54
aimed to uncover why music students at community colleges were not transferring to four-year
institutions and whether the colleges’ reluctance to implement NASM’s recommendations
contributed to this issue. Turner found that while Kansas public community colleges followed
NASM’s guidelines, there were limitations to them doing so. These limitations included not
having the educational and faculty resources to offer individual instruction to students, and lack
of integration of humanities courses with music courses. Turner recommended that Kansas
community colleges offer general education courses in music at off-campus sites and through
distance learning, as to be available to more students. He also addressed the lack of funding
commonly encountered by community colleges in Kansas and suggested alternative sources that
may be available.
Taken together, these studies illustrated a trend in research during the 1980s and 1990s
when scholars examined macro issues such as infrastructure and effectiveness of community
college music programs. Researchers who investigated music programs on a micro level
analyzed the curriculum offered and implemented in community college music programs.
Music curricula. Two studies were found on the analysis of community college course
offerings with the intent of understanding how music curriculum is prioritized within this type of
educational setting. In the first of these studies, Benson (1994) interviewed chief academic
officers, academic division chairs, music program heads and music faculty at five community
colleges in Arkansas, Kansas, Missouri, Oklahoma and Texas to find out what each institution
thought was most important for its students. Benson’s findings revealed the following priorities
(in order of importance) of community college programs involved in his study: collegiate
education, general education, community education, career education and compensatory
education. Benson also found that programs included in his study “did not have the human
55
resources necessary to support comprehensive music programs” (Benson, 1994, p. 5). The author
suggested that further research be conducted to investigate what resources are needed to sustain
community college music programs in Arkansas, Kansas, Missouri, Oklahoma and Texas.
Using a similar design, Abel (2018) examined how curriculum was prioritized in music
departments across the state. The study investigated how curricular managers prioritized music
curricula at three community colleges. Abel assessed different levels of stakeholders within
music curriculum and described the kind of influence and direction each stakeholder wished to
have on their community college. Findings of this study indicated that curricular managers
“selected stakeholders whom they believed influenced the development of curriculum or the
inclusion of various activities in the music program” (Abel, 2018, p. 218). Like Benson (1994),
Lamb (1980), Kesling (1982) and Turner (1999), Abel (2018) did not collect data from students
but instead interviewed college administrators. The aforementioned studies contributed to
literature on community college music programs in the United States by highlighting practices
for curriculum design, implementation of NASM standards, and recommending directions for the
growth and development of music education in this setting.
Voices. Two recent studies have used qualitative approaches to give voice to students and
instructors of community colleges. Peeters (2015) conducted a case study to examine teaching
pedagogy used by music faculty in three community colleges on the West coast. By analyzing
teaching methods used at these schools, the author aimed to determine whether these practices
fostered creativity in music students. Peeters found that music instruction is not the defining
factor when it comes to fostering creativity. The author recommended for college administrators
to see music curriculum as central to student learning, for faculty to implement a “creativity
practicum” (p. 7) as part of their end-of-the-year assignments, and for future researchers to
56
conduct action research to understand better ways for combining music courses from across
different disciplines. The dissertation did not feature voices of the students, however, focusing
primarily on faculty practices.
Dixon (2018) incorporated student narratives in his case study. The aim of his research
was to determine how one community college in the Midwest promotes curriculum within its
music department. He also compared the college’s course offerings with what the students said
they wished to study at the college. He interviewed all 10 student music majors, four music
faculty (one of which was a choir director), the department chair and the Vice-President of
Academic Affairs to investigate student expectations for learning and participation. To address
his research questions, Dixon (2018) used Wenger’s (1998) Communities of Practice (COP)
theory and Lave and Wenger’s (1991) Legitimate Peripheral Participation (LPP) theory. Dixon
investigated whether the practices found in the studied research site enabled or constrained
student participation in their desired musical communities of practices. Findings of this study
suggested tensions in four areas of the students’ experience: sense of community, enrollment,
leadership, and career trajectory as a non-traditional music major. Dixon’s research highlighted
the importance of open dialogue as a means of aligning learning goals and expectations among
students, faculty members and administration.
Of the literature on community college music programs outlined in this section, Dixon’s
(2018) dissertation study bears closest resemblance to my own research. It uses Wenger’s COP
as a theoretical framework and presents voices of students and faculty. Interestingly, both studies
by Peeters (2015) and Dixon (2018) have been recently conducted, and both used a qualitative
approach. Perhaps their emergence signals a rising trend in music education research that focuses
not just on statistical data but on narrative experiences of music students and faculty in the
57
community college setting. As illustrated by this review, research in community college music
education pales in comparison to research on the same topic in universities. My own research
attempts to address these issues by contributing qualitative research that puts student experiences
at its forefront, and considers how a community of practice (Wenger, 1998) is formed through
participation in a collegiate choir.
Chapter Summary
In this chapter, I discussed the theoretical framework of this dissertation through a
presentation of Gehlbach’s concept of Social Perspective Taking (SPT), Wenger’s (1998)
Communities of Practice (COP) theory, and an overview of research concerning the educational
contexts in community colleges.
This review of literature highlighted gaps in research that this study aims to fill including:
lack of research on SPT within choral education settings, lack of research on choral education
within a community college context, and lack of research that applied Wenger’s Community of
Practice theory to choirs. To my knowledge, this study is the only one of its kind to connect SPT
theory with COP theory within research on a community college choral program. In the next
chapter, I describe the methods and context of the current study.
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Chapter 3: Method and Context
Chapter overview
In this chapter, I describe the method and context of the present study. The chapter begins
with a description of the research strategy and rationale for using a qualitative research approach
in this study. I then provide an overview of the context in which the research was conducted,
descriptions of the primary and secondary participants, and my own positionality as a researcher.
Finally, I describe methods of data collection, data analysis and interpretation.
Research Strategy
As part of my coursework in Music Teaching and Learning at the University of Southern
California, I enrolled in a class on quantitative research methods in music education. As a final
project for the class, I conducted a pilot study. In this pilot study, I used a quantitative research
approach to examine connections between choral singing and empathy (Apanovitch, 2017).
During this process, I became most interested in perspective taking and wanted to further explore
how it manifests itself in choral singing. The pilot study had significant limitations: I was not
able to examine the process of perspective taking because the research design did not address the
participants’ experience. Based on the pilot study, I arrived at the conclusion that a qualitative
research approach would be more appropriate to answer my research questions. A qualitative
research strategy is needed in order to (1) account for the nature of my research question; (2)
move away from the limitations of the quantitative approach and present findings through the
participants’ voices and narratives; and (3) present findings from my own lens, given my beliefs
that perspective taking is a socially constructed, subjective, and contextualized phenomenon.
Approaching my research questions using qualitative method falls outside of the common
psychometric measures that have previously been employed to investigate perspective taking
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(Bruk et al., 2018; Davis, 1980; Deutsch & Madle, 1975; Eyal et al., 2018; Galinsky, Wang &
Ku 2008; Galinsky, Maddux, Gilin & White, 2008; Galinsky & Moskowitz, 2000; Surtees et al.,
2013; Surtees & Apperly, 2012; Surtees, Butterfill & Apperly, 2012). Most studies conducted to
date have employed measurement-based approaches (experiments and surveys) to measure
perspective taking. These studies have looked at perceptions of self and other, how such
perceptions overlap and intersect, and whether understanding perspective taking can reduce
prejudice and stereotyping to produce more positive evaluations of in-group and/or out-group
members (Galinsky, Wang & Ku 2008; Galinsky & Moskowitz, 2000; Sun, Zuo, Wu & Wen,
2016; Todd & Burgmer, 2013). Whereas quantitative researchers have constructed rigorous
experiments within laboratories to examine the process of perspective taking in general, this
study is rooted in understanding perspective taking in a more ecological setting, in a specific
place with a specific group of participants. Importantly, this study was not designed to measure
perspective taking or to develop perspective taking to achieve a set outcome (such as reducing
stereotyping, etc.) in participants. While understanding perspective taking is central to this study,
the conclusions drawn from this research are made through an interpretive lens.
Epistemologically speaking, interpretivism is a philosophical approach to qualitative
research which “allows its descriptions and explanations of human beings and their concerns to
be subtly and thoughtfully imbued with human values” (Mills & Birks, 2014, p. 4). In this study,
I view perspective taking through an interpretivist lens, focusing on its emergence within a
collective of singers with distinct identities and human values.
By choosing a single choir and selecting participants from one Community of Practice
(Wenger, 1998), I examined how perspective taking takes place in one specific cultural context.
At the time of writing, no research that investigated the process of perspective taking in music
60
classrooms was found. In this study, I used my positionality as a researcher and a choral
conductor to better understand how the process of perspective taking occurs within a community
of singers, their director, and their academic environment. Using qualitative methods enabled me
to draw on my own knowledge as a choral conductor while considering unique contextual
aspects of the choral community at Ashgrove College.
Rationale and Research Design
In order to understand how students from a community college engage in perspective
taking within the context of their participation in choir and examine the consequences that result
from this process, I conducted observations of the participants’ behaviors and social interactions.
My observations occurred over the span of two months, when I observed forming and changing
social interactions between participants in Ashgrove Singers, their director, their accompanist,
and other members of the music faculty at Ashgrove College. Inspired by Parker’s qualitative
inquiries into choral singing and choral education (Parker, 2011; Parker 2016; Parker & Draves,
2017; Parker, 2018), I chose the instrumental case study as my research design.
The methodology of a case study permits assumptions about perceptions of reality and
knowledge to align with the researcher’s area of inquiry (Mills & Birks, 2014, p. 5). A case study
is an “exploratory form of inquiry, providing an in-depth picture of the unit of study” (Stewart,
2017), which, in this study, was the social learning environment within the Ashgrove Singers.
Creswell (2012) defines an instrumental case study as “a type of qualitative case study in which
the researcher studies a particular issue and finds one or more cases that illuminates the issue” (p.
622). In this research, the issue was perspective taking and the cases that illuminate the issue
were the practices and patterns of behavior in the specific context that is Ashgrove Singers.
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As I conducted and engaged with data from both observations and interviews (Creswell,
2012, p. 218) understanding and analyzing the social interactions that I witnessed was not a
simple task. There are many possible interpretations and implications of the behaviors that I
observed, and assigning intentions from those behaviors required a solid methodology. I had to
rely on my own participation in choirs, as well as my professional experience as a choral
conductor to interpret what I was observing. The end result was that the collected data were
filtered through my own lens as a researcher. As interactions unfolded around me in real time, I
became a kind of “analytic instrument” (Coppolla, 2018), filtering what I was observing and
hearing through my own epistemology and lived experiences. Ruth Behar (1996) employs the
same type of research approach in her collection of essays titled The Vulnerable Observer:
Anthropology that Breaks Your Heart. In it, Behar presents four “case-study-like” narratives.
Behar’s positionality is embedded in each narrative, and as such, can be personal, and not stiffly
academic. She further emphasizes the fact that researchers cannot pretend to be impartial,
invisible observers of a phenomenon. By their presence and interaction with participants, they
become an intrinsic part of the process. Similarly, I became a part of the research process at
Ashgrove College. The works of Behar (1996) and Parker (2011; 2014; 2016; 2018) grounded
the methodological approach employed in this study. Specifically, the methodology used in
Parker’s (2014) study on the process of adolescent choral singers’ identity development informed
my own methodology for examining the process of perspective taking. I used Parker’s criteria of
examining the process by considering “identifying actions and interactions, intervening
conditions, a central phenomenon, and consequences.” (Parker, 2014, p. 20). As Parker’s (2014)
study used a grounded theory design and my own study used a case study design, I did not
follow grounded theory, but found select techniques used in Parker’s study useful. I drew from
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Parker’s (2014) three-phase data collection method to structure my own data collection in a
similar way. Additionally, when establishing a plan for data analysis, I drew from Parker’s clear
and succinct description of data collection and analysis.
Research Setting & Context: Ashgrove College
Ashgrove College (pseudonym) is a public community college located in San Joaquin
Valley, California.
1
According to the college’s website, its enrollment was 24,377 students in
2017-2018. Ashgrove College is historically significant. Established in 1910 as a six-year high
school with an annexed junior college, it became the first community college in California. Since
then, new community colleges have sprung up in its neighboring areas. The development of
other institutions in more affluent neighborhoods impacted enrollment at Ashgrove College. The
perceptions of the neighborhood that the college is in have also changed. Back in the 1980s,
Ashgrove College was considered to be located in the center of the city. As the real estate
developed further north (where the wealthiest areas have been, historically), Ashgrove College’s
location was reassigned as the poorer south. A former professor of music at the school spoke
about this issue, quoting one of his students as saying to him: “My mom doesn’t want me to go
to City College ‘cause my car will get stolen.” (Interview 1). The administration at Ashgrove
College is fully aware of the problem. The aforementioned professor also shared:
Two or three weeks ago there was a seminar that they were holding on the weekend that
we had our big arts fundraiser, so I would see people coming and going, and it was,
“Let’s get people from north and south Ashgrove together to talk about their perceptions
1
Some details about the college, district, and surrounding neighborhood were deemed inconsequential to the
study and have been changed to protect the identity of the school.
63
and experiences of this divide,” because there really is a divide here. And there’s
a...there’s a big east-west street here called Tam Avenue, and it used to be if you were
south of Tam, that was kind of shady, and now that ‘shady’ delineation is a street called
Coleston, which is even farther north. But, I know people that won’t drive to the part of
town, um, where my wife and I live, which is called the Snow District, and Ashgrove
College is right next to the Snow District, but they won’t come down here to go to a
restaurant or a club, because “Oh, it’s not safe down there.” Crazy! You know?”
(Interview 1)
The median home prices in the areas surrounding Ashgrove College are roughly $250,000.
Considering this, many students are likely to be of lower-middle to middle-class backgrounds. In
the next section I describe the sampling strategies used in this study, followed by detailed
characteristics of the school and the choral program.
Sampling
For this study, I employed purposeful sampling: a strategy used in qualitative research in
which “researchers intentionally select individuals and sites to learn or understand the central
phenomenon” (Creswell, 2012, p. 206). I had personally observed Ashgrove Singers perform at a
choral festival prior to engaging in this research. The manner in which they performed,
specifically, the extent to which each member of the choir appeared wholly engaged in
conveying the message of the music and connected to each other, led me to identity Ashgrove
Singers as an optimal sample for this study. These observed features inspired the research
questions in this research. Additionally, Ashgrove College was selected because it a) had a
mixed (SATB) ensemble, b) had at least 12 singers at any given academic semester, c) had
regular rehearsals (twice a week, weekly sectionals), d) comprised music majors and non-music
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majors, e) had some members who are first-generation college students, f) included members of
varied socioeconomic backgrounds, and g) a had director who fosters social learning, inclusive
and diverse programming, as well as regular community outreach performances.
I chose to conduct this study in a community college choir because this population of
students is particularly under-studied in academia. As seen in chapter 2, while some studies have
been conducted on curriculum design within community college music programs (Abel, 2018;
Benson, 1994; Kesling, 1982; Lamb, 1980; Turner, 1999) only a few have employed qualitative
methods to investigate social learning within this population (Dixon, 2018; Peeters, 2015).
By way of my studies and work at USC, I came to know many outstanding community
college choirs in southern California. Witnessing their high level of musicianship at various
festivals ignited a personal interest to investigate this particular population of singers.
Furthermore, I had no exposure to community college education while growing up in Canada.
Pursuing research with a community college choir was a way for me to understand a larger
educational phenomenon and how choral education may fit into it.
School achievement and demographics
According to Ashgrove College’s website, of first-time new students (N=5,245) in 2017-
2018, 68% reported persistence (percentage of degree, certificate and/or transfer-seeking
students who initiated studies in 2011-12 and who were tracked for six years through 2017-18).
Of those students, 50% obtained a BA/BS degree after completing an AA/AS degree. According
to the California Community College’s 2018 Student Success Scorecard, Ashgrove College
“strives to be a premier learning community whose students, graduates, and staff will be among
the best prepared citizens to meet the challenges of an increasingly complex environment.”
(reference redacted here to preserve the identity of the community college). In terms of ethnic
65
makeup, in 2017-2018, 56% of the students were Hispanic, 22% were White/non-Hispanic, 8%
were Asian/Pacific Islander, and 5% were African American.
The music program
Ashgrove College’s music program is housed within the Fine, Performing, and
Communication Arts Division. The college’s website lists 28 faculty members, five of which
belong to the Department of Music. Based on my fieldwork, however, there are more than five
full-time music faculty at the college, so it is possible that the information on the website was out
of date.
The music department offers degree programs in piano, vocal, guitar, instrumental (brass,
woodwinds, strings, percussion). It also offers eight performance certificate programs (brass,
woodwind, strings, percussion, vocal, guitar, piano and jazz), as well as commercial music
certificate programs.
2
The choral program
Ashgrove College is home to three choirs: College Choir, Ashgrove Singers and the
Ashgrove Jazz Choir. All three of these ensembles are directed by Jenna Dahl (pseudonym).
College Choir is a non-auditioned group open to any student on campus. Ashgrove Singers is the
“premiere” group comprised of 20-24 students, many of whom (not all) are music majors.
Ashgrove Jazz Choir is a vocal jazz group that Jenna Dahl co-directs with her husband, Martin
Dahl (pseudonym). Some of the students I met sing in all three choirs, while others also perform
in the college band and guitar ensemble. Due to the overlap in student participation, the faculty
frequently have to ‘share’ the performers. Martin Dahl explained:
2
The college’s website does not list enrollment figures for each degree program.
66
The bigger of a group of people you have, the more chance for conflict there’s going to
be, but I think for a long time here, we had a lot of people that [pauses] appreciated the
fact that we need to share stuff. Like, I can’t tell you how many times there’ll be that
really, really great flute player in the wind ensemble that’s also one of Mrs. Dahl’s top
sopranos, and the kid is doing fine. The kid can totally handle being in both groups,
except for that one time where there’s a festival out of town that’s on the dress rehearsal
of the big choral concert, or vice versa, and what do you do with the student? You know,
how do we work that out? And, I know at some other institutions that I know, it’s like,
“No. You have to be here,” and the other professor, same thing. Well, the kid can’t do
that. So, then, should that student not be in one of those ensembles? Or, should the
professors put on their big boy or big girl pants and go, “Okay, look, this is a festival, she
has a solo. She’s one of five flute players. Could you not have her for the dress
rehearsal?” You put it that way, it’s a no-brainer (Interview 1)
Ashgrove Singers are known on campus as the “face” of the college. Their performance
schedule each semester can entail anywhere between 8-15 concerts. Aside from singing on
campus, the group attends festivals, and performs at memorial services, weddings, and other
community events. Ashgrove Singers tour on a regular basis, both locally and internationally.
The latter has become more and more difficult over the years for the group as the rising cost of
living, paired with the students’ need to support themselves while paying tuition, has made
travelling abroad less feasible. To continue the tradition of travelling abroad, Jenna Dahl engages
the singers in numerous fundraising initiatives, from selling gift cards and baked goods to
singing Valentine-grams for local businesses. Ashgrove Singers has a very demanding
performance schedule, even by university standards.
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The choir rehearses in a lecture auditorium. Singers sit in the seats facing the front of the
room, while Jenna and the choir accompanist, Aaron (pseudonym) is situated on stage slightly
below them. The capacity of the auditorium is approximately 150 seats. It is dimly lit, but
equipped with a large projector, a mid-sized grand piano, and a few small tables. The room is
used by several instructors in the department.
Jenna Dahl’s office serves as a secondary meeting location for singers. Located on the
second floor of the music building, it is the middle office in a row of rooms occupied by full-
time music faculty. The door is almost always open, even when Jenna is trying to finish
something quickly. The space outside of Jenna’s office serves as a kind of hub for students of all
majors to periodically connect with her and continue on with their day. Students pass by her
office frequently, chatting about various topics, music related and otherwise.
During my visits, Jenna spent time preparing for an upcoming tour to New York City.
Ashgrove Singers had been invited to perform a short set and sing alongside other choirs at
Carnegie Hall. The trip was scheduled for June of 2019 and would cost approximately $2,000
per student. Jenna’s desk was covered in paperwork for the trip–forms, schedules, information
packets, and fundraising letters. Her office was a living and breathing space where things moved
forward, not back. Information about the choir’s trip to New York hung outside her door, and I
heard several students chatting about it outside in the hallway.
Participants
In this section, I introduce six participants in this study: four primary and two secondary.
Primary participants are individuals with whom I conducted two or three interviews over the
course of my fieldwork. Of the four primary participants, three were members of Ashgrove
Singers. These individuals shared unique insights into their process of relating to their peers in
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choir, the choral repertoire that they studied, and their director, Jenna Dahl. The fourth primary
participant was the director. I chose to highlight these four individuals and their stories in
Chapters 4 and 5 of this dissertation. Secondary participants are individuals with whom I had
conducted only one interview. Their role in the study was to offer a more contextualized
understanding of the choral program at Ashgrove College, and to assist with member checking
and other forms of triangulation (Creswell, 2012). The names of all study participants have been
changed to pseudonyms to preserve their identities.
Primary Participants
The director. Jenna Dahl has been the Director of Choral Activities at Ashgrove College
since 1999. She is an alumna of the school, having received her Associates Degree in Music
there. Later on, Jenna went on to receive her Bachelor of Music at San Diego State University
and Master of Music Education from the University of Northern Colorado. In addition to
conducting three choirs at Ashgrove, Jenna also serves on departmental committees, and
performs a myriad of administrative tasks required of her to keep the choral department running
smoothly. As one of the most senior faculty members by rank, Jenna helps mentor incoming
instructors at the college. When Jenna and I sat down for our last interview together, she spoke
about an important aspect of her role:
We have two new faculty members, and I’m the senior-most faculty member, so I have
the most institutional memory of how we’ve managed to operate in a positive way, and I
kind of feel obligated to make sure that everybody’s settled, and you know, whoever the
new person is in the spring. I kind of feel it’s my duty to my department, to the school, to
make sure that people are well taken care of, and, you know, somebody took care of me
when I got there, you know? (Interview 3)
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In addition to serving her community of colleagues and students, Jenna also contributes countless
hours to leadership roles within the American Choral Directors Association. On occasion, she
adjudicates local festivals in Southern California and leads clinics and workshops with high
school, college and university choirs in the Ashgrove area.
Student participants. Over the course of my fieldwork, I conducted interviews with
five singers in Ashgrove College. These students volunteered to be in the focus group and met
with me for a one-on-one interview during my second visit to campus. Table 1 displays
biographic data for each participant. All names are pseudonyms to protect the identities of the
participants. Three of the participants (Anayah, Gwen and Silvia) will be introduced in more
detail in Chapter 4 of this dissertation.
Participant
Age
Musical background
Choral experience
Life Circumstances
Future goals
Anayah* 19 Played in high school
band. Quit
participation in all
extra-curricular
activities due to a
depressive episode in
freshman year in high
school.
Started to sing in high
school because a
friend encouraged her.
Struggled to find her
voice (literally) but
with the
encouragement and
coaching of her high
school director, was
able to sing again.
In college, was a
member of symphonic
choir for one year,
then moved up to
chamber choir in Fall
semester 2018.
Is one of the first people
in her family to attend
college and graduate from
high school.
Works full time at a local
cell phone retailer.
Self-professed introvert
who is usually too shy to
make first contact with
peers.
Wants to receive her
teaching credential
and work with high
school or community
college choral groups,
perhaps even one day
taking over for the
director at Ashgrove
College.
Emanuel 20 Was initially
uncomfortable with his
singing voice, but
became more
accepting of it when a
supportive partner
encouraged him to
become a
singer/songwriter.
Informally ‘picked up’
various instruments
(guitar, violin).
Did not sing in choir
in high school due to
severe anxiety and
apprehension
surrounding his voice.
Joined college’s
symphonic choir and
sang there for one
year.
Auditioned and was
accepted to chamber
choir in Fall semester
2018.
Grew up not knowing his
mom or dad. Was raised
by his grandparents but
moved out of their home
at a young age.
Has severe social anxiety,
but is using choir to work
through that with the
support of the director and
his peers.
Works as a piano and
theory tutor on campus.
Wants to build up a
studio of private
piano students and
become a music
teacher.
70
Gwen* 32 Did not speak about
musical experience
outside of barbershop.
Did not sing in choir
in high school. After
high school, she sang
in a women’s
barbershop chorus for
ten years prior to
joining the choral
program at the college.
Has been in the
chamber ensemble
since arriving at
college. Is now a
section leader with the
choir, as well as
coordinator of choir
uniforms.
Worked at a home
hardware store after high
school. Decided to go
back to school to pursue
music. After several years
at the college, she will be
applying to four-year
university programs close
to her mother, who is
aging and for whom she is
the primary helper.
To get accepted into
the state university
that is closest to her
home so that she can
go to school and get
her degree in music
education. Down the
road, she would like
to teach choir at the
middle school level.
Mai 20 Was introduced to
music in her home
country (Vietnam).
Sang pop songs as a
lead singer in an
acoustic band.
Currently studying
voice in community
college.
First time singing in
choir happened when
she joined the
chamber choir in
community college.
Parents moved to the
United States from
Vietnam. She is an
international student at the
college.
Wants to return to
Vietnam to teach
music there and
conduct choral
ensembles. Her
mission is to share
what she has learned
in the United States,
and encourage
Vietnamese
musicians to stick to
their profession
despite the hardship
of doing so.
Silvia* 19 Participated in high
school theatre
productions.
Sang in choir in high
school, along with her
sisters. Also
participated in honor
choir programs and
choral leadership
academies. Continued
to sing in choir in
college, while also
working as an
administrative support
aid to director.
Raised in a large family
with numerous siblings.
Education is considered
important in her family,
and she plans to continue
to a four-year institution
after college. In addition
to working as an aid to the
director of the choral
program, she also works
as a sales person at a local
shopping mall, selling
children’s clothing.
Wants to matriculate
and go on to a four-
year university to
study music education
and eventually
become a college
choir director.
*denotes primary participant
Table 1. Participant Data
Secondary Participants
Martin Dahl. Jenna’s husband, Martin Dahl, served on the music faculty at Ashgrove
College for 28 years. He retired in May 2018, but continues to volunteer his time working with
the Ashgrove Jazz Choir. An experienced choral arranger and guitarist, Martin frequently
arranges for Ashgrove Singers, occasionally accompanies the group in performances and also
71
travels when the group is on tour. I spoke to Martin to triangulate the findings and understand
some of the context behind the learning culture at Ashgrove College.
Aaron. One of the integral members of music-making with Ashgrove Singers is Aaron, a
full-time faculty in collaborative piano and choir accompanist. Prior to coming to the college,
Aaron maintained an active private studio of students in Ashgrove. He also accompanied various
high school performances, community recitals and other events. He joined the faculty at
Ashgrove College in 2012 as an adjunct professor. Aaron’s role in Ashgrove Singers is that of a
safety net. Jenna rehearses the group without accompaniment almost exclusively (unless
accompaniment is present in the score), so Aaron spends much of rehearsal ‘shadowing’ the
choral parts on the piano as the students sing. He is ready to jump in anytime but is hesitant to
intervene in Jenna’s mission to have the students rely on their inner ear rather than the piano.
When I sat down to interview Aaron, the topic of being less involved as a pianist came up. He
shared his thoughts:
Jenna has a philosophy to have the students really using their ears and not using the piano
to learn notes. But I think I could give more chord shapes to them so that they can find
where they fit into the court structure a little bit better. So that's from the piano, um,
itself. I think I could do a little bit more as well as maybe verbally. I have...a little bit
more to contribute. Not that she never invites it, but there could be more opportunity.
(Interview 1)
While it took some time for Jenna and Aaron to adjust to each other’s style of working, Aaron
feels like they have hit their stride:
My relationship with Mrs. Dahl has really evolved since the beginning. At the beginning
it kind of hit me like cold water. I was so used to just being able to walk into a rehearsal
72
and just sight read and be fine. And her expectations were higher than I had been used to.
And so...I wasn't used to her style. And it hit me. It was rough. We had a rough first
couple of years. The third year is when I felt like things started to turn the corner. The
fourth year it was like we were really connecting. There were things happening in my
fourth, fifth year, and now this year is just a dream. I just love it. My dream job finally
became the dream I thought it would be. (Interview 1)
Aaron is respected and admired by the students. When I observed Aaron’s interactions with
them, he was playful and gregarious. His disposition seemed to be more like that of peer than
professor. The students joked and laughed with him. He seemed happy to be where he is.
David. A freshman at Ashgrove College, David was new to choral singing. Although he
had an extensive background in musical theatre, Ashgrove Singers was the first choir that he had
ever joined. David and I met when he volunteered to be a part of the focus group. He was quiet
and not very talkative in that setting, but I have observed a different demeanor in rehearsal. He
was attentive and not afraid to try solos when asked. His musical theatre background served him
well, but he admitted to having “a lot of catching up to do” when it came to music literacy.
David was friendly and smiled a lot. From my observations, it became clear to me that he was
well liked and that many students found him entertaining. He loved to make people laugh and
cracked jokes when appropriate.
Albert. Now at Ashgrove State University (pseudonym), Albert is a graduate of the
music program at Ashgrove College. I spoke to Albert about his experience in college over a
phone interview. He shared: “I attended from 2010 to 2018, um, uh, I didn’t really decide what I
wanted to do with my life until I joined the choir program at Ashgrove College.” Albert
struggled with depression in college and was looking for something that would “stabilize [him]
73
as a person.” He attended a choral concert performed by the Ashgrove Singers and heard a
composition that really moved him. He had played double bass in an orchestra in high school but
had never sung in a choir. His entrance into the choral program was by way of the Jenna Dahl’s
jazz ensemble. Albert sang with this group and later moved on to sing with the Ashgrove
Singers. He became a section leader within the choir and later, an administrative assistant to
Jenna. Together with the choir, he travelled to France. Since leaving Ashgrove College, he has
decided to pursue a Bachelor of Arts in Music, with a focus on Music Education. His long-term
goal is to become a choral director.
Gaining Entry
I had been familiar with Jenna Dahl and her work with Ashgrove Singers by way of my
position as coordinator of the USC Invitational Festivals. She and her singers participate in the
festival on an annual basis. After developing the research proposal and identifying Ashgrove
Singers to fit the selection criteria, I approached Jenna Dahl via email to ask if she would be
interested in participating in the research. Since I had known Jenna previously through
professional networks, she had prior knowledge of my role at USC both as a student and as a
teaching assistant. I notified Jenna that I was interested in exploring the “social dynamics of
Ashgrove Singers” and how singers “relate to one another”. She was concerned, initially, as to
whether I would be evaluating her choirs’ music-making. After one or two exchanges, I assured
her that I would not be discussing technical aspects related to choral singing and would be
looking at social interactions instead. Jenna agreed to participate in the research after seeing the
Information Sheet (Appendix A) for the study. Following IRB approval (see below), I applied for
permission to conduct research with Ashgrove College’s Office of Institutional Research,
74
Assessment, and Planning. Once this process was completed, Jenna Dahl granted me access to
the site and I scheduled my first visit for the week after Labor Day weekend.
Human Subjects
Permission to conduct this study was obtained by the Institutional Research Board (IRB)
and by the Office of Institutional Research, Assessment, and Planning at Ashgrove College in
June 2018. Prior to starting fieldwork, I distributed the Study Information Sheet (Appendix A) to
Jenna Dahl, who passed it on to the students in Ashgrove Singers via email.
Timeline
I conducted field work during the months of September and October of 2018. Since the
calendar year in a typical academic music program consists of 10 months (August-May), I was
present for a portion of the fall semester. The remainder of the term (November-December) was
devoted to data analysis and writing, with occasional conversations with Jenna Dahl via
Facebook messenger.
There were two main reasons for my visits being set up for two months instead of 10
months, as I would have preferred. Firstly, it was not financially feasible for me to have it any
other way.
3
Secondly, as someone who is a choral musician and conductor myself, I was familiar
with the choral culture of post-secondary ensembles. Becoming acquainted with the routines and
practices of a community college choir was something I had to get used to, yet felt comfortable
with these practices following my first visit in September. Although I was not able to observe the
students’ behaviors on a regular basis as much as I would have liked to, certain actions and
patterns of behavior aligned with my previous experiences of being in choir, which facilitated
3
The cost of travel prohibited me from visiting the research site more than I had.
75
my fieldwork. In total, I have spent 35 hours with my study participants in rehearsals and
interviews, one hour in sectionals, and two hours in performance at a festival.
Data Collection
I employed multiple tools of data collection, including interviews, nonparticipant observations,
field notes, audio and video recordings, and analysis of artifacts. Each tool is described in detail
and presented in order of relevance to the present study. Data collection for this study occurred
in three phases. In the first phase, I conducted nonparticipant observations, one-on-one
interviews and one focus group. In the second and third phases, I conducted nonparticipant
observations and one-on-one interviews.
Interviews
Along with observations, in-depth interviews constituted the main tool of data collection
in this study, as they provided most of the insights into perspective taking in singers and their
relationships with peers and faculty. Interviews involved asking general, open-ended questions to
one of more participants and recording their responses (Creswell, 2012). For this study, I
conducted one focus group interview and 19 one-on-one interviews. A focus group interview can
be defined as “the process of collecting data through interviews with a group of people, typically
four to six” (Creswell, 2012, p. 218). In one-on-one interviews, I asked questions and recorded
responses from only one participant at a time. Data collected through focus group and one-on-
one interviews were later triangulated with my own observations.
Interviews were conducted in three phases. The first phase occurred during my initial
visit to campus. In addition to observing the rehearsal, on that day I also conducted a focus group
with seven participants which lasted approximately two hours. The students who participated in
76
the focus group did so voluntarily and were not compensated for their time. I designed a series of
guiding questions for the focus group, occasionally going “off script” into topics that were of
interest to me throughout the conversation, following the logic of the semi-structured interview
(Seidman, 1991, p. 19). The interview was audio recorded and later transcribed and analyzed.
Following the focus group, I conducted a one-on-one, semi-structured interview with Jenna Dahl
in her home. This interview was open-ended (Seidman, 1991, p. 15) and was recorded while we
spoke over dinner with her husband, Martin Dahl, who was present, but not taking part in the
conversation.
In the second phase, I conducted one-on-one interviews with five singers, the
accompanist and the director of Ashgrove Singers. All students were invited to participate in the
interviews, but only five volunteered to participate. The five students who took part in the one-
on-one interviews were also the same ones who volunteered to be in the focus group that had
taken place in the first phase of data collection. Interviews with participants were semi-
structured, lasting between 34 and 78 minutes. These interviews took place in an unused office
across the hall from Jenna Dahl’s office in the music building. Interview data were later
transcribed for analysis.
In the third and final phase, I elected to interview Jenna Dahl and three student
participants. I approached the three participants via email to ask if they would be willing to speak
with me one more time. Having analyzed transcripts from the previous two phases of data
collection, I wanted to return to topics that came up in my conversations with these three
students to get a better understanding of their thoughts and opinions. A list of all interviews and
their dates is outlined in Table 2.
77
Table 2: Interview Schedule
Throughout the data collection process, participants were consistently open and willing to
disclose personal narratives without much inhibition. I was somewhat surprised at this, given
how little time I had spent with them and how reserved the group as a collective seemed upon
my arrival on campus. As the interview process unfolded, I noted that many participants referred
to specific choral works from the repertoire that they were rehearsing with Ashgrove Singers
when discussing perspective taking. It was therefore very important that I be physically present
in the rehearsal and discuss the specific compositions with the students in order to better
understand their process of imagining others’ perspectives through music.
Conducting three phases of interviews led to copious amount of audio files to be
transcribed. I elected to hire two freelancers to transcribe these interviews. To ensure that the
transcriptions were accurate, I listened to all recordings and corrected any transcriptions errors.
In my instructions to the transcribers, I asked them to keep all verbal gestures that would be
78
heard such as singing, pauses, stutters, and laugher, etc., and not remove any filler words like
“um” and “you know.”
Nonparticipant observations
Creswell (2012) defines a nonparticipant observer as someone who visits a site and takes
notes, without becoming actively involved in the activities of the participants. In this study, I
observed the activities and interactions during Ashgrove Singers’ rehearsals and performances
without taking an active part in them, that is, without singing with the group or acting as a guest
conductor. However, I engaged with the singers before and after rehearsals in a casual manner.
This was done to build trust with the participants and their director. During my first and last
visits, their director, Jenna Dahl, asked me to come to the front of the classroom and tell the
choir about my research. Similarly, Jenna Dahl asked me to describe the process of writing a
dissertation during my final visit to campus. When I was not on campus observing rehearsals, I
participated in a private Facebook group with singers in the choir who opted to participate in my
research. Every two weeks, I posted on the Facebook “wall,” inviting students to share updates
about their ongoing experiences performing and rehearsing. Seven members of Ashgrove Singers
joined the Facebook group and periodically replied to my posts. I moderated the responses with
follow-up questions. Three of the participants became my Facebook “friends” and I occasionally
“liked” their posts from events related to their participation in choir (e.g. photos from concerts,
status updates inviting friends and family to come to performances, etc.) This type of
involvement reflects my participation as a peripheral, non-participant member of a community of
practice (Wenger, 1998).
My non-participant role was directly linked to my role as a researcher. According to
Wenger (1998), non-participants are actual participants because “the identities of non-
79
participation that they develop with respect to the institution and to the content of their work are
an integral part of their identities of participation in their own communities of practice.”
(Wenger, 1998, p. 172). From this standpoint, my identity and membership in a community of
practice of academic research intersected with my role as a non-participant in the community of
practice of Ashgrove Singers. Therefore, my self-imposed non-participation did indeed result in
a kind of moderate participation within the environment.
During my first few visits, it was clear that the students were somewhat affected by my
presence in their rehearsal environment. Jenna Dahl introduced me as a researcher from a
university that they were familiar with, given their participation in the annual festival. Although
their assumptions about me and my university were not made clear, I sensed from their cautious
observation of my dress, mannerisms, and speech that I was perceived as an “outsider.” I made a
conscious effort to dress casually in jeans and a casual top, as to not exacerbate the status divide
between myself and the participants. Some of the male students avoided eye contact with me. As
I sat in the back of the room close to where they were seated, their taut posture and tense body
language indicated to me that they may have preferred that I be further away. Still, none of the
students were rude or unpleasant; they simply appeared to have a general disposition of caution
towards me.
In each visit, I sat in the back row of the rehearsal room with a laptop and a recording
device. I switched sides and sat in a different place in each rehearsal, to be able to observe all
singers equally. It was important for me to dress and behave consistently to build trust with the
group. To help the students feel more comfortable around me, I made sure to talk about non-
research related topics with them (e.g., restaurants in the area, places to shop and get nails done,
campus events, etc.) after rehearsal or in the hallways when we intersected. By my last visit, the
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students were visibly more comfortable around me. On my last visit, Jenna Dahl presented me
with a hooded sweatshirt with an Ashgrove Singers logo on it as a parting gift. I was very moved
by this gesture and saw many students who initially avoided interactions smiling as I received
the gift. Later that afternoon, several students to whom I had talked to previously, approached me
to ask questions about USC and my educational journey. Our conversation was full of humor,
leaving me with the feeling that the students had accepted me into their community.
Limitations to nonparticipant observations
Due to logistical and professional commitments, I was only able to observe four rehearsals and
one sectional rehearsal. Although I was privy to some of the activities that the participants were
engaged in outside of the observed rehearsals through my Facebook “friendships”, I did not
witness interpersonal interactions that fell outside of my visits. The data that I collected in situ
does not portray any of the interactions that occurred outside of my being there. These
interactions included gatherings at the director’s home, outings at local restaurants, formal and
informal performances, and private conversations over phone or text, to name a few. Some of the
most talked about bonding moments occurred during weekly sectional rehearsals, for which I
was present only once. Additionally, many of the study participants were also involved in the
Ashgrove Jazz Choir. This means that what I had observed with the group is but a small slice of
a larger social life that the participants lead, one that extended beyond Ashgrove Singers. Thus,
the data presented in this study reflects the limitations of this research tool.
Field notes
During my four field visits to Ashgrove College I took detailed field notes during the
rehearsals, as well as in the time between one-on-one interviews with participants. This process
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amounted to 30 pages of documentation. In my field notes, I created a separate column for
“reflection” where I wrote down my own thoughts on what I observed. Like Parker (2016) I
returned to my field notes several hours after writing them and wrote additional details about my
interactions with the study participants. Occasionally, the “reflection” portion of my field notes
connected my observations to Wenger’s theory of Communities of Practice (1998). Upon
returning from collecting data, I typed all of the field notes into a word processing document.
Audio recordings
I recorded all rehearsals using an EVISTR 16gb Digital Voice Recorder, which was
positioned next to me at the back of the room. The acoustic properties of the rehearsal room were
good enough for the recorder to clearly capture all voices in the room. The recordings of
rehearsals amounted to 8 hours of audio files. These audio files captured commentaries that I
would have otherwise missed had I relied solely on my ability to document all that was said in
rehearsals using only field notes. Recordings typically began 10 minutes before the rehearsals
started and continued until the director instructed the students to clear out the rehearsal space for
the next class. All recordings were stored on a password-protected external hard drive, as well as
a “cloud” based online storage program, which was also password-protected.
Video recordings
During the first rehearsal, I supplemented the audio recordings with video recordings, but
did not continue to record video thereafter. The positioning of the camera did not permit for all
singers to be included in the frame. Furthermore, I realized that the singers were uncomfortable
with the camera. During my first visit, I overheard several students mention the camera as they
moved from one standing formation to another. They expressed concern, mentioning to their
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peers that they did not want to be seen singing on the camera. While I had obtained permission
from the IRB to proceed with video recordings, after the initial taping, I decided to be less
conspicuous and remove the video camera from the front of the room where it was initially
positioned. Given the comments that were made about the camera in the first rehearsal, I opted to
not use the video camera at all, whilst maintain the audio recording. I relied on my field notes to
document gestural behaviors, body language, and other non-verbal forms of communication. The
single video recording that was made was stored on a password-protected external hard drive.
Artifacts
Aside from conducting interviews and observing rehearsals, I also collected artifacts from
past years of the choral program at Ashgrove College. These materials included scans of past
concert programs dating back to 1999 (i.e., the year that Jenna Dahl started at Ashgrove
College), newspaper clippings, notes from students and faculty, letters of invitations to festivals,
certificates of merit and participation at various performance events, and photographs. I also
collected publicly-available enrollment and graduation statistics, information from the Ashgrove
College choral program website, and data from the choir’s Facebook page and private Facebook
group (to which I was invited by their director, Jenna Dahl). Group members posted photos of
their social outings, solo performances, video clips of performances, and reminders about choir-
related events and activities. I refrained from commenting on the posts in order to remain
objective in my role as a researcher.
Researcher positionality
My role as a researcher is shaped by several factors within the context of this study.
Firstly, I came to know Jenna Dahl and the Ashgrove Singers during my tenure at the University
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of Southern California, where I coordinated festivals of which the choir was part. I had no pre-
existing knowledge of any relationships with any of the students, however. I had only observed
the choir perform in 2016 and 2017, but did not get to know any of the students or their director
on a personal level. Having limited knowledge of the choir enabled me to be as impartial as one
could be during fieldwork.
Secondly, I need to acknowledge a degree of positionality as I have performed in many
choirs. My experiences as a choral singer and conductor gave me first-hand knowledge of many
of the customs, technical terms, and behaviors that are common to communities of choral
singers. Thus, my observations were naturally filtered through the lens of my own past
experiences.
Lastly, my role as a researcher on perspective taking is inextricable from my identity as a
university student trying to understand what choral music-making is like in a community college
setting. As I engaged in the topic, I was by default engaging in perspective taking. Thus, many of
the conclusions that I have arrived at while conducting fieldwork reflect my own process of
actively “putting myself in the students’ shoes” and imagining what their experiences were like.
This is important to mention because as a qualitative researcher, I cannot ignore what happens
within myself as I engage with the collected data. My voice in describing the process of
perspective taking emerges from my own process of actively trying to take the perspective of the
participants in this study. I came to recognize this internal process during my second visit to
campus. The awareness I gained during this particular visit impacted the way I conducted the
interviews with study participants; I purposely tried to imagine what it would be like to speak to
a researcher from a university and altered my questions to make the participants more
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comfortable and more open with me. The active process of adopting the perspective of others
had a substantial impact on the way I approached data analysis and interpretation.
Data Analysis and Interpretation
Coding and emergent themes
I used open coding (Creswell, 2014) to analyze field notes and interview transcripts using
a qualitative research software program NVivo 12. I completed two rounds of coding: a first one
immediately following the initial phase of data collection, and a second one after I collected all
of the data for the study. With only a month between fieldwork visits, I had to engage in analysis
as quickly as possible. During the first round of coding, I established six “parent” nodes which
yielded 35 thematic codes.
Following the second data collection phase, I elected to code manually by going through
each interview transcript page by page. I used my notes on Wenger’s Communities of Practice
(1998) theory to organize the data into categories found within Wenger’s theory: practice and
negotiation of meaning. I used interview excerpts, field notes, and artifacts to map out ways in
which my findings connected to these categories of Wenger’s theory. Next, I consulted my notes
on Social Perspective Taking (Gehlbach, 2017; Gehlbach, Young, & Roan, 2012; Gehlbach,
Brinkworth & Wang, 2012; Gehlbach & Brinkworth, 2012) to determine if there were any
examples of students engaging in SPT in my data. I printed excerpts of interviews which
illustrated SPT as well as quotes from Gehlbach’s (2004) research and organized both on a large
bulletin board. Through this process, I was able to map out emergent themes on perspective
taking, connecting each quotation by its relation to SPT theory. Going through each interview
transcript using this level of detail allowed me to view the data from a more in-depth and
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intimate perspective, to then revisit all transcripts and notes from beginning to end as a single
narrative.
Triangulation
Triangulation is a central feature of qualitative research. It refers to “the process of
corroborating evidence from different individuals (e.g., a principal and a student), types of data
(e.g., observational field notes and interviews), or methods of data collection (e.g., documents
and interviews) in descriptions and themes in qualitative research” (Creswell, 2012, p. 629). I
triangulated data collected from Jenna Dahl and the three primary student participants through
member checking, by conducting interviews with a former professor of music at Ashgrove
College, a former student who has since moved on to a four-year institution, and the choir’s
accompanist. Speaking with these three individuals served to interrogate and corroborate
findings from the primary interviews, aiding in the analysis of emergent themes.
Chapter Summary
In this chapter, I described the method and context of this study. An instrumental case
study was conducted to investigate the process of perspective taking with the Ashgrove Singers
within the Department of Music at Ashgrove College. I described the research strategy, rationale
and context for this study. I also exposed the methods utilized to collect data including
interviews, nonparticipant observation, field notes, audio and video recordings, and artifacts.
Data was analyzed using Communities of Practice (Wenger, 1998) theory and Social Perspective
Taking theory (Gehlbach, 2004). I concluded the chapter by addressing issues of validity and
trustworthiness of data through the strategy of triangulation.
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Chapter 4: Primary Participant Profiles
Chapter overview
The premise of this research is that community college students can offer valuable insight
concerning the role that choral music education plays in their ability to relate to others and to
connect to their communities. This chapter offers findings from the study, presented here in the
form of narrative descriptions of experiences of four study participants in the bonded case study.
In the first section of this chapter, I focus on three primary student participants: Anayah, Gwen
and Silvia. As will be seen, the participants described many interactions that they had with others
in Ashgrove Singers, and discussed ways in which these interactions contributed to their lives. In
the second section of this chapter, I focus on Jenna Dahl, the director of Ashgrove Singers. These
narratives tie back to the research questions that framed this dissertation:
(1) How do participants describe the process of taking each other’s musical and non-
musical perspectives in the context of their participation in choir?
(2) What consequences result from participants’ process of taking on others’
perspectives?
(3) What strategies do college choral singers use to develop their ability to take each
others’ perspectives?
(4) How do college choral singers describe their process of taking on the perspective of
the conductor in their interpretation of choral repertoire?
(4a) What role does the conductor play in facilitating or obstructing perspective
taking between singers?
(4b) What role does the conductor play in facilitating or obstructing perspective
taking between the singers and the text of the composition?
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In order to answer my research questions, I had to consider the participants’ experiences
both in and out of choir. Approaching the research questions this way enabled me to look
holistically at participants’ experiences. The aim of this approach was to report participants as
whole beings, depicting not just their ability to take others’ perspectives but also their life
histories.
The participants understood my role as a student–that I was completing this research as
part of a major capping project. From the first set of one-on-one interviews, I explained my
research goal as trying to understand their lives in and out of choir, particularly their experiences
taking other people’s perspectives in and out of rehearsals. The participants were open in
speaking out about their lives, their families, their former teachers, and their friends. They took
pleasure in the opportunity to talk about their experience at Ashgrove College, their reverence
for Jenna Dahl, the conductor of Ashgrove Singers, and the challenges that they have
encountered before and during college. Throughout the interview process, I was cautious to not
offer judgements concerning what they had to say. I encouraged them to speak freely about their
experiences and share their thoughts and beliefs with me without reservation. Often, I restated
their response to make sure that I understood them correctly.
In the next section, I introduce Anayah, Gwen and Silvia through short vignettes that
focus largely on their voices that emerged in the focus group and through two in-depth
interviews. These vignettes describe unique aspects of each participant’s experience with choral
singing, as well as with education in community college in general. In chapter six, I return to
these narratives to pinpoint instances of perspective taking, and how they relate to the existing
literature. The process for creating these vignettes was discussed in detail in chapter three.
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The three participants whose narratives are told in this chapter were selected because they
each had a unique story and shared their experiences performing various repertoire in the choir.
The stories of Anayah, Gwen and Silvia were also relevant for this study because all three
students offered rich descriptions of their lived experiences as college students. Anayah
overcame depression largely because of participation in choir in her high school. As seen in the
narratives presented ahead, Gwen blended two worlds, barbershop and traditional choral music,
to tell her story of overcoming an abusive work environment, going to college, and moving on to
a four-year institution. Silvia connected her experience of singing in choir to stories of standing
up for injustice against a close friend, who was transgender. All three participants attributed their
participation in Ashgrove Singers as playing a central role in their ability to create relationships
with others and stand up for themselves.
Student Participants
Anayah: “Hey, I have this degree. This is me.”
I gather around a large conference table with six participants for our first focus group.
Quiet and observant, Anayah sits to my right. She has a fierce expression on her face, but I can
tell that she is curious about the interview process. I bring out grapefruit-flavored Perrier water
and chocolate-dipped macaroons, a strange combination that proves to be rather unpopular
among the focus group members. Anayah is one of the few students that gave Perrier a try. She
smiles at me as she picks one up and takes it to her seat.
Anayah begins her introduction by talking about the obstacles she faced on her path to
choral music:
My name is Anayah and I’ve been doing choir–this my fifth year, but my one whole year
with Miss D. I started doing choir my sophomore year in high school, because I have like
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a traumatic freshman year, I dropped everything. I dropped theatre, I dropped band, I
dropped dance, because I fell into like, a really deep depression, and I didn’t want to do
anything, and then, a friend of mine was like, “You should join choir, you have like, an
okay sounding voice,” at the time. She’s like, “Join choir,” and it was my teacher’s first
year there too, so his first-year teaching and my first year of being in choir, so he’s like,
“Okay, we both have a lot of things to learn, then.” I didn’t sing for the whole first
semester, um, I refused, so I would just mouth the words, and he caught onto it, because
he put me on the spot and was like, “Sing the parts that you’re supposed to be singing,”
and I couldn’t sing anything, like, I had a very limited range, so anything, like, above an
A would not come out. I couldn’t sing anything above an A, and I refused to even learn
how, and then he was like, “I can’t help you if you won’t let me.” So, I’ve kind of just
like, put my pride aside, and I worked with him and our pianist at the time every single
day for two years until I finally, like, got to a place where he was comfortable with letting
me leave to come here. (Focus Group 1)
We revisit this story later on in the focus group, aiming to understand what exactly happened to
Anayah in high school:
Irene: I just want, Anayah, to follow-up on something you said earlier. When, when you
made a comeback to music, because you said you stopped doing it, how did...did
your friends outside of choir notice anything different about you?
Anayah: They noticed a lot of like, difference in my personality, like, I was a lot more
happier, ‘cause not doing anything performing-wise...like, I had never done choir
before, but I had always done band, theatre, dance, color guard, stuff like that, so
when I dropped all of it, they were like, “Why are you dropping all of your
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performing arts stuff?” I was like, “Oh, I’m just, like, not up for it,” and they could
tell, like, there was a difference in the way I acted, the way I talked, I wasn’t up for
a lot of things, I would barely reply to people, just shut in my room after school,
sleeping all day, and even my mom knew, like, “What’s wrong with you? Is it
about a guy?” and I was just like, “No, like I’m not up for anything,” and literally,
I wasn’t being bullied, there wasn’t anything in my life at that time like really
fracturing me, it’s just like, all of my love for stuff just vanished, and I don’t know
what caused it, but it just all went away. And my sophomore year was when I went
back, my friend was like, “Just join choir, maybe it will make you happy again,”
and it did, like, it definitely...walking into the choir room made me very, very
happy every single day. As soon as you walked in, the choir teacher said, “Okay,
let’s start warming up,” and that was like the highlight of my day, and it was right
in the morning, and I really loved it because it would just set the tone for the rest of
my day. And, even my mom is like, “Ever since you’ve been in choir, you’re
acting a lot differently, like, it’s better, like, you know, you’re more upbeat, you’re
laughing around the house again, you’re walking around doing stuff, bugging your
little brothers,” because for a whole year, just literally me shut in my room. I
bought black curtains to make it as dark as possible in my room, just because I
refused to do anything that was like, joyful, or the way I used to be when I was
little.
Gwen: You make me feel like I want to come over there and hug you.
Anayah: It was a different...like, it shifted a lot. Of course, your friends and family pick it
up, and I don’t think my mom knew how to address me about it, like, how do you
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tell your kid, “Are you depressed?” like, that’s not something a lot of parents want
to discuss with their kids, especially with their 13 year olds, like, and at the time,
like, I didn’t know how to tell her. I didn’t know I was sad, I just didn’t want to do
anything, and she took me to therapy, and we talked about it, and they were like,
“Yeah, you should start doing what you did before.” So, I joined choir, started
doing dance again, got back into theater stuff, and there was just this major shift in
my personality from then to now, and it’s still the same, there are bouts of getting
sad and then I have to like, revisit myself and tell myself why I’m doing this,
because there are some times where I’m like, working on music stuff, and I’m just
like, “Ew, this is so horrible. Why am I a music major?” and then we do a show, or
we perform “Indodona” or “We Can Mend the Sky,” or I listen to the Ashgrove
Singers singing, “How Can I Cry?” and it’s like, that’s why I’m in music, it’s like,
that’s why I’m a music major, like, that’s why I do this, and that’s why I’m never
going to give it up. Like, I will be doing this until the day I die, like, I can’t see
myself doing anything else. (Focus Group 1)
I quickly scan the room and watch for reactions of the other students. I am not able to tell
whether they are hearing this story for the first time or not. It’s hard for me to tell because I have
only known them for a few short hours. I think about how courageous Anayah is in sharing her
struggles with the group, and so openly. I begin to get a better sense for her quiet and reserved
personality. She does not strike me as the typical extroverted, “bubbly” choir student. In a later
interview, she brings up perceptions of choral singers by saying that “the general consensus is if
you're in choir then you're a happy-go-lucky person.” Anayah is not that way. She is introverted,
subdued. According to her, it takes time to make friends, especially in new settings like college.
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She recalls when a she made her first friend in college when a singer in her section helped bring
her into the fold:
Anayah: There was one girl when I first came here, she just had like this really intense look
to her. She has like a really resting face that looks like she's angry all the time, but
she's like the sweetest person you could ever meet. So that kind like played into
like, “Oh, don't judge a book by its cover.” But she was really nice. I love her so
much. She became like my best friend in choir the first semester that I was here.
Irene: How did you get to know her?
Anayah: She was an alto with me and um, she was just like the most outgoing person in
choir. Like always talking to everyone and...I didn't plan on talking that semester. I
kind of reverted back to how it was my first real choir. I was like, “Okay, I'm in a
new environment. New people. Everyone pretty much knows each other.” She
kind of like forced me to talk, but she would ask me questions all the time and I
would like try to give her shorthanded answers but I guess that wasn't good enough
for her because she would keep asking until I explained it all in detail. So I
appreciate her doing that. Like I don't think she was trying to be pushy. I think
that's just her personality is like she's so upbeat and outgoing even though she
looks really intense because she has jet black hair and wears dark black and red
lipsticks and she look really, really intense when you get a first glimpse of her.
Irene: So do you mean that because she's so extraverted, you may not have gotten to
know somebody like that?
Anayah: Mostly yeah. Because I'm generally an introvert for the most part. Like...if you're
not speaking to me and I'm in a new setting and then I'll probably end up staying
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quiet the whole time. So because she was so...out there, it really like made me be
out there with her. Like it definitely helped with me having a voice in the choir.
Irene: Can you think of a time that you and this friend of yours, shared, like, a special
singing moment together?
Anayah: Yes. Uh, she is, she's a good singer. Um, but mostly she plays piano and guitar. So
there will be times where she'd be asking me like, “Oh, I haven't been in choir that
long. What do you do when you're trying to learn notes?” So I would go over stuff
with her and then when I was taking piano I was like, “You’ve been taking piano
for like four years, so what do you do?” So we're just going back and forth, like
sharing tips and then um...there was this one song called If Music Be the Food of
Love and she's not like, used to sing it up higher and there was parts where the
altos would get a little bit higher than the sopranos for some reason. And she was
like “There's no way I can sing this note.” And I was like, “Yeah, you can! If I can
sing this so can you because I have a lot lower of a register than you do.” Um, so
we're just going over stuff like that. And she was very, very helpful and like
bringing me out of the shell because the first day I went straight back into it. I was
like “I don't want to talk to anyone ever again” and she was like “No, no,
everyone's nice here. I've been here for a while. You're going to love the people
here.” And I did like it because of her. She had so many friends here that I started
talking to them. (Interview 1)
Sitting with me that day, Anayah seems comfortable in her surroundings. Her fierce
allegiance to her friends in choir, as well as to the group’s director, makes me wonder if perhaps
her bond with them goes beyond friends. Perhaps in some ways, these relationships “save” her.
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The people who had reached out to help her through singing are kindred spirits to her for they
embrace the very thing that enriches her every day.
Anayah genuinely loves choral music. She describes being “crazy about it.” As I listen to
her gush about what is on her Spotify playlist to her peers, I am impressed by her knowledge of
different choirs from around the U.S. She offers to send me links to her favorite performances of
certain pieces; I tell her that I would love that. Her favorite genre was Gospel, and when I ask her
what she loves about it, she describes the thrilling dynamic shifts and the “really deep meaning
behind Gospel songs.” Anayah explained that she is not religiously affiliated in any way, but that
she values the message found in choral repertoire in general. When she gets excited about a
choral work, she cannot not help but let her friends know:
My friends know that I'm in choir, they expect that I'm in choir. I'm like such a nerd
about it. So when I text them a lyric, they'll say like, “Was that a part of a poem?” and I
was like, “No, it's one of my choir pieces. Come to my show and you'll hear it.”
(Interview 1)
The words of one particular song have a special meaning for Anayah:
When I was in high school, in part of my honor choir, we were singing this one song and
the lyrics were “No inner storm can shake my inmost calm, so how can I keep from
singing?” And it kind of played in, like, nothing that happens in this world can really
shake my faith and stuff. So I'll keep singing on. That was like my favorite piece out of
the four years that I was there that I loved singing.
Experiencing depression in high school affects the extent to which Anayah feels she has control
over her environment. A depressive episode can overcome a person without any warning. Shifts
in mood and mental state can therefore bring about a feeling of helplessness. Participating in
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choir is one aspect of Anayah’s life that she can control and keep consistent. A full-time
employee at a mobile phone network, she has to make sacrifices in order to continue singing
with Ashgrove Singers. On Thursdays, when the choir typically rehearses, Anayah’s work hours
line up minute-to-minute with the rehearsal time. To work this out with her manager, she put it
simply: “I’m going to be late, but it’s either you take me late once a week or I quit, because I’m
not giving up Ashgrove Singers”. She did not give her employer an option. It was clear that
Anayah meant what she said. Nothing that happens in her world such as shifts in work schedule,
switches in management, etc., can keep her from participating in this ensemble. She is going to
continue singing on. Naturally, Anayah has chosen a career path that keeps her connected to
choral music as much as possible:
Irene: When did you decide to be a choral director?
Anayah: I decided it...hmm...probably by the end of my senior year. We were picking
classes and you know, people were telling me things like, “Oh, you can't find a
career in music.” But I think everybody thinks that when you're a music major.
They're trying to get famous and I'm not really looking for that. Um, I just want to
do music for the rest of my life and you know, even though my family was saying
like, “Oh, there's no career in it.” So they kind of like talked me out of it and I
signed on to be a psych major for like the first two weeks of school. I had class
with Mrs. Dahl the first year that I was here and watching her conduct and seeing
how happy she gets when we do something...she's so encouraging. If we mess up,
like she won't...scold us. Like she'll say, “Okay, do this.” And she likes it when we
mess up because then she can correct it and we won't do it again. So I think
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probably watching her work is what made that final decision. Like, “Okay, I want
to be a choral director” or at least something where I'm directing people's singing.
Irene: Yes...And she works with all types of different people.
Anayah: Yeah. She been doing this for a long time. So she's seen pretty much every type of
person that can come through a choir. So she knows how to work it. She knows
how to conform to everyone's needs. She knows every voice type is different. Like
if you are struggling with one part, she's not going to force you to try and sing this
note. She'll say to you “would you like to go to a different note?”, like when you
have to sing the top or bottom part. So she'll work with your voice and work with
you in general. Um, but she is just overall great and she definitely played a part in
me wanting to become a choral director in the future.
Irene: So what would be a vision for you making that happen? Like the rough outline of,
like, becoming one.
Anayah: Uh, the rough outline is...you know...once I spent all my time here transferring to a
four-year, completing stuff there and then hopefully going straight into teaching
choir, whether it be...Preferably either high school or college level. I feel like it's a
little bit easier to work with them because small children get distracted so easily.
But I do, like, want to go straight into it afterwards...because she said that uh, after
she was done with her degree, she worked at a store for like a month because she
hated music after all doing all that stuff.
Irene: Who said that?
Anayah: Mrs. Dahl. She worked at a store because after all of the music stuff that she did...it
kind of like tired her out. So she was at a store, realized that she didn't want to do
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that and then went back into teaching her choir and she's been doing it ever since.
So I want to do something like that: try and get my teaching credentials and just go
straight into it. Um, another thing with it too is that my old high school teacher, he
was originally an English major and the choir director there heard him singing in
the hallway one day and said “join choir.” So he said, “Okay, like I need a general
Music Ed credit anyway.” So he joined it, and it changed his entire mindset and
then he ended up getting another degree in music. So he has two degrees. One he
doesn't necessarily use, but he said he's glad that that teacher heard him that day
and made him join the choir because he couldn't see himself just being an English
teacher for the rest of his life.
Irene: Is your family supportive of this plan?
Anayah: In a sense...yes. Like my mom just a little bit weary because she doesn't want me
to invest all this time and then not be able to find work anywhere or not be happy
with it. But I just keep reassuring her, like I don't see myself doing anything else.
This is what makes me happy, especially since I'm like one of the first in my
family to actually go to college and graduate high school in general. So I told her, I
was like, “If I'm going to do all this, then...20 years down the line I don't want to
be stuck with a degree that I hate and end up hating the job because it's gonna
make me not want to do it.” Like the job I work right now, I don’t like...I don't
mind it, it's not terrible, but I don't like it. But it's what's getting me through stuff
while I'm going through my school endeavors.
Irene: Yeah, of course.
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Anayah: So once I'm done with all that, I really hope that I can find a choral job. Even if it's
part time, I'll still take something. I just want to teach one day to a bunch of
people. (Interview 1)
Learning that Anayah was one of the first in her family to go to college stupefies me.
Admittedly, she is the first first-generation community college student that I have ever met. For
Anayah, going to college needs to have a purpose, a reason beyond just doing what society
expects you to do. This young woman made a decision to follow her passion and to do what
makes her happy. She is willing to traverse new territories and make calculated moves to come
closer to attaining her goals. She looks up to role models who, like her, have made the decision
to pursue music wholeheartedly, and only after trying different paths. The diploma represents her
resilience, a commitment to following through. We return to the notion of having a diploma later
in the same interview:
Irene: Is it important for you to have documentation saying that you're qualified to do this?
Anayah: It's not like the biggest thing that I'm worried about, but once you get a degree then
there’s like this whole consensus like, “Oh, they know what they're talking about”
and then generally you do, because it means you pass all the classes so you know
your stuff. Um, but I do want to get something to show people and say like, “Hey,
look what I'm doing. I'm getting closer to getting this degree. I'm almost there. I'm
almost done.” And then once I finally do get a bachelor's or a master's, I'm going to
blow it up and frame it and stick it on a wall somewhere...because the whole world
needs to see it (laughing).
Irene: You want to blow it up and make it huge?
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Anayah: Make it the size of this board (points to bulletin board hanging in the classroom) and
have it be hanging it up somewhere. That way when they walk in, the first thing they
see is like, “Hey, I have this degree. This is me.” That is what I did that with my
high school diploma. I blew it up and it's now on display on my window. So when
somebody walks by, they see it.
Irene: That's amazing. In your house?
Anayah: Yeah. I stuck it on my window. When you walk by, that's the first thing you see, my
first and last name and that graduated in 2017. My mom was like, “Well why did
you put that out there!?” I was like, “Because I graduated! This is my hard work and
I graduated with 20 extra credits.” It's like, I was taking all those extra classes that I
didn't really need to. So that was good. (Interview 1)
Sitting there, I become painfully aware of how much I take my own education for granted. Years
upon years of attending universities, and I cannot say that any of my diplomas are even hung up
on a wall. Anayah is not planning to hang up her college diploma to boast to others. She wants to
enlarge it to show her community that going to college and graduating is possible, that within her
house, there is a high school and a college graduate all under one roof. The path to being able to
claim this achievement as her own is a long one, but she assures me: “things are gonna change
all around me and they have. I lost friends, gained friends, other stuff has happened...but the
constant thing that's been going for the past 5 years is choir. This never changes.”
Gwen: “I want to be everyone’s cheerleader because no one was mine.”
When I meet Gwen, I immediately recognize a conductor-like figure. Her bold demeanor,
decisive mannerisms and eagerness to answer questions set her apart as someone who is not
afraid to take the lead. Gwen is one of the first students to introduce herself: She seems excited
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about my research and wants to help in any way possible. As I conduct the focus group, Gwen is
by far the most talkative participant. Whenever there was a brief pause, she is quick to add on to
what the others are saying. I notice that she is older than the other students, and visibly more
confident than the typical 18-year-old. Probably seeing that I noticed a difference between her
age and that of the other students, she focuses her introduction on the subject:
I’m 32, I’m probably the oldest member of this choir. Eh...it is what it is. I, um, I started
singing in church when I was really little, and it was, um, more different kind of singing,
but I really enjoyed it. There was a choir in my elementary school, didn’t really get much
involved with it. Didn’t really start going to choir into high school, which for me, was
[makes ahem sound and lowers voice almost to a whisper] back in 2003. So, um, the...the
rumors I had heard about the choir teacher were that he was a big, big jerk, you know,
that he was hard to work with, and that he, you know, didn’t listen, he was just mean. So,
I didn’t get into choir until very late, and I kind of regretted it, because if I had gone in
earlier, then I would have had this experience sooner, which is kind of like the story of
my life: if I had done this sooner, then...anyway. (Focus Group 1)
At first, I am not entirely sure about what Gwen means with her last statement, but my hunch is
that perhaps she is, once again, trying to explain why she is older than her peers. When Gwen
graduated high school, she went straight into the workforce, working various jobs. Her last job
before coming to college was at a hardware store:
I was in sales at Home Depot for a long time and um, I got fired from that job in the
worst possible circumstances. It was basically because I never stood up for myself. Um,
and it kind of got to a breaking point at the end of there and I was under a tremendous
amount of stress with no immediate supervisor to talk to at the time. And management
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was ...very unsupportive and it was a lot of “he said, she said” sort of stuff that made me
look awful. And I kind of walked away from that job going, “That is never going to
happen again.” So the minute somebody wants to squish me, I'm going to fight back.
Nope, no more. No more rolling over. No more saying “Oh, you know, I’m squeaky
clean...no one wants to hear me complain,” but that's never gonna happen again. Never
gonna happen. Because that was a month of really, really, really bad stuff before I went
back to school. (Focus Group 1)
Her voice becomes impassioned and tense when she describes what happened to her before
coming to college. I revisit this narrative in my first one-on-one interview with Gwen a month
later. The trauma of her past experiences informs who she is today, she assures me in our first
one-on-one interview together:
I spent years in a really toxic environment and had no idea how toxic it was until I
walked out of there. It was ...amazing. It was like how I felt after, um, after uh, being on
insulin when I was, didn't know I was diabetic, I was literally starving to death for about
six months and had no idea. I dropped like 45 pounds in two months and it was like really
scary. I lost two thirds of my hair. It was really bad and it wasn't until I didn't feel awful
anymore that I realized how awful I felt. When, when that was gone, it was like, “Wow!”
And it was the same thing when I finally walked away from that job. It was really the
best thing they could've done is fire me. I mean, I wish I quit, you know, a month before
it happened because I really should have, but I didn't. I tried to stick it out. I tried to be,
you know, very stoic, you know, “They're going to notice how hard I work. It's gonna
happen,” but it didn't. And if I'm working hard, I want somebody to tell me, “Oh wow
Gena you're working really hard. It's really great.” You know? And if I have to say, “You
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know what, I did this, this and this, I'm pretty great.” Then I will. And I, and if I see it in
other people, I have to tell them. I have to be like, you walk up to somebody, “You sing
really great in at such and such thing. It was so good. I was so happy!” you know, that
sort of thing. “So proud of you. So great to hear you change,” you know, that sort of
thing. I, I want to be everyone's cheerleader because no one was mine. (Interview 1)
I begin to connect the dots between Gwen’s encouraging demeanor and strong personality. She
finds opportunities to compliment the other students on what they had done in choir, how much
they had grown as singers, or how well they were doing in their voice studio. She is a strong
voice of encouragement to all of them, both in the focus group and in rehearsals. I asked about
the effects that previous work experience had on her:
Oh, it was totally transformative. Utterly transformative. It was like the worst possible
circumstances, but it taught me that if I'm unhappy or uncomfortable in a situation ...I do
not keep quiet about it. I have to speak up. I have to say something. I will document
verbal abuse. I don't care who it is or what they're saying. If it's even, not even if it said to
um, not even to me, you know, somebody's having trouble. I will speak up for them. I
will stick up for them. If somebody tells you, you know, “You're, you're not a good
singer and that you can't learn,” I'm gonna, I'm gonna go Mama Hen–I'm going to go
crazy for you. I'd be like, “No. You are awesome. And here is why! And I won't let
anybody put anybody down in that way anymore.” (Interview 1)
I tried to think if I have ever heard the term “Mama Hen.” Hearing it painted a very descriptive
image in my mind: Gwen spreading her wings and sprinting at the predator, protecting her flock
of chicks. I also thought of a comment that Anayah made in our conversation earlier that day,
when she called Gwen “mom when Mrs. Dahl is not around.” Gwen and the conductor, Jenna
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Dahl, do not always see “eye to eye.” In fact, Gwen’s willingness to stand up and speak up was
tested when she came to college and took on the role of coordinator of uniforms for Ashgrove
Singers. In the first year of being in this position, Gwen felt that she was unfairly blamed for
issues that were not her fault, like students not having proper pieces of uniform in time for the
concert (which she attributed to an incomplete inventory). Together with Jenna Dahl, Gwen had
to work through this conflict and learn how to communicate with her director in a way that
established boundaries within her volunteer role. It took time for Gwen to come to terms with the
nature of her relationship with Jenna. She admits, “When I met Mrs. Dahl, it took me ...at least a
year to be really comfortable around her and there's still some things that I don't discuss with her.
There's still some things that I would hold back on saying rather than tell her.” This distrust of
boss figures is likely a remnant of her prior work experience, and the unfair treatment that she
experienced.
On the other hand, Gwen also speaks about how much she admires Jenna as a teacher. In
listening to her, I see a different side to the young woman who is still hurt from what happened
in the past. Jenna fought with the administration of the college to get Gwen enrolled in the choral
program. She also appointed Gwen as a section leader with the Ashgrove Singers, which is a
coveted position among the choristers; one that bears a lot of trust and responsibility. Gwen is an
ideal candidate for the role as she has over 10 years of experience of singing in a women’s
barbershop chorus, a chapter of Sweet Adelines International.
In describing her experience, she explained how “my barbershop chorus felt like
family...like family. I had an entire chorus full of big sisters and moms and a couple grandmas.”
When I ask what made her barbershop chorus feel that way, Gwen responds:
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Gwen: Well, it was...it was a sense of community. It was a sense...of them wanting
to know what was going on with me. It wasn't just show up and sing your part. It
was social interaction. It was, it was...individual interest.
Irene: Was that built into the rehearsal? It was just more time to do it, or...
Gwen: Well...it wasn't that there was more time for it was we made more time for it.
We, we'd show up, you know, 15 minutes, 20 minutes early to rehearsals, like I sat
up and took down the risers for that group for a really long time and so I was
showing up like, you know, an hour before rehearsal every day to set those up and
make sure everything was settled so it wasn't out of breath when I got back on the
risers you know, so, um, there was time for them to just, when they came early to
just sit down and “what's going on with you, Gwen? What are you up to?” you
know...“Going back to school...” “That's so great!” (brief silence) You know?
(Interview 1)
When I hear this, I start to understand why Gwen may be so involved with Ashgrove Singers: it
is a way for her to try and rebuild what she had in her previous choir. Whereas she was seen as a
daughter in the barbershop group, in Ashgrove Singers she fills the role of a mother to students
younger and less musically experienced than her. Her unquestionable leadership qualities can be
sensed by a stranger like me and by other students like Anayah, who have called Gwen a “mom
when Mrs. Dahl is away.” Being a part of Ashgrove Singers is another way for her to build
friendships and to connect with others–something that she experienced so vividly for 10 years.
The culture of barbershop singing is unique for its emphasis on performance, and more
specifically, acting. When I ask her opinion on what the differences are between directing
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barbershop and directing a traditional college choir, she describes the emotions of the music
being clearly visible on the barbershop conductor’s face:
Gwen: It's also all over their face. Does that make sense? The emotion of it all over their
face. They're going all over the face and it's, it's...You could almost get every
direction, every vocal direction you could possibly need just from the expression
on their faces. Like half the time I'm watching their eyes instead of their hands in a
barbershop chorus. If it's a really good director...they could almost just stand there
like this and do it with one hand. I've seen them do it and it's, it's an amazingly
powerful thing to be standing in front of a really great barbershop director. And
that's kind of what I miss in like more traditional choral directing and like a more
traditional choral setting. There's a lot less emotion than what I'm used to.
Barbershop was, if you were standing still, you stuck out like a sore thumb because
everyone around you was moving and restating so into it, that it was like...if you
were standing still, it was like, there you are! There you are, that guy! You know?
Irene: Yeah. Why do you think that is with traditional choral people?
Gwen: I don't know. I, don't want to say they're disdainful, but I've gotten a lot of that
kind of reaction when I sang barbershop for 10 years. It was, “Oh...barbershop...”
you know? It was like they ...sort of dismissed it. You know Mrs. Dahl has a little
bit of that attitude when she talks about my barbershop. She pokes fun at it, maybe
a little bit, you know “Baaaaarbershop,” you know, that sort of thing. And it's a
little demeaning. But because I learned so much and everything I have that I get
complimented on for my expression, you know, is from barbershop. I did not walk
out of high school knowing how to do that. I walked out of high school looking
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like a lump, you know, looking like a high school student does when they stand on
the riser and sing Ave Maria. And it was barbershop that beat that sort of
expression into me. I say ‘beat’ because my friend Anna was the choreographer at
the time and barbershop up tunes especially the fast paced kind of happy ones, um
...are almost always done with full choreography, full riser choreography. That
includes a front row that literally dances. And um...I have really hard time with it
because you don't move and sing at the same time. No, I had no idea how to do
that. And she literally grabbed me, dragged me into the costume closet behind the
risers and just went through every single move with me and she, she never quit,
you know, until I had it down. (Interview 1)
The experience of being mentored by Anna, and cared for by the other singers in the group,
connected to Gwen’s own desire to contribute to Ashgrove Singers. Gwen has become a part of
the family in her college choir as well:
I feel like there's, there's a little bit of, I don't know, big sisterly feeling toward most of
most of the kids, especially the ones coming in straight from high school, you know? I
feel like that...I can help them, that I can shepherd them. (Interview 1)
Beyond college, Gwen wanted to continue this quest of helping by becoming a music teacher.
But unlike Anayah, who hoped to teach at the college level, Gwen had her sights on teaching
middle school:
I think that will be good for me, you know? Trying to try and take kids that don't really
care and have to take some sort of music or humanities class. Maybe get them...plant the
seed...Get them interested in maybe going on into high school choir and then maybe
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singing in their college choir and then, you know, even if they want to, say, major in
business, you know, but to say, “You know what? Music is fun!” (Interview 1)
During my last month of field visits, Gwen announces to the choir that she has started her
applications to university. There is a resounding cheer for Gwen, and I see some students stay
behind after rehearsal to talk to her about the application process. In our conversation about her
future, Gwen mentions that when she moves on to a different school, she will miss her mom
coming to every single one of her concerts, to which I follow up:
Irene: Is she thrilled, then, about you going to university?
Gwen: Oh, yes. She's so happy.
Irene: What kinds of things does she say?
Gwen: Well, she just...“What do you need?” You know? I'm really concerned about
leaving her alone because I live with my mom and I kind of take care of her, you
know, I do all the heavy stuff around house the house. She just turned 75 and um...
I'm concerned that if I do go to school in say Bucktown and Stanbury, but they’re
my second and third choice schools from Ashgrove State, that I'm going to be
leaving her alone. And she won't hear it, you know, she says “If you want to go to
that school, you're going to go to that school. If they give you a scholarship, you're
gonna go to that school. Don't worry about me, I'll be fine.”
Irene: How do you feel about that? That must be so...
Gwen: It's really hard...I can't imagine her not being there, you know, and a two hour
drive...both of the places I want to go or at least two hours away either north or
south.
Irene: Can she move as well?
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Gwen: She can. She has good days and bad days. I mean she's still walking around, she's
still driving and she's still, you know, doing her own thing, but every once in a
while her knee will get bad and she’ll have pull out the cane. She's got the
handicap placard on her new car and she can park in the handicap area.
Irene: So you're the primary, I guess, caretaker, helper for her? So that, that's a lot of
responsibility for you. Has that impacted your decision to go to university? Are
you applying...when you're ready to apply or you have you kind of been thinking
about it and putting different pieces of the puzzles together?
Gwen: Well, I, I did take my time with, with my community college days because I knew,
I knew that my personal focus tends to stray, you know, especially if I get
overstressed then I have a tendency to just want to walk away, just drop it, forget
it, you know. But...she, she is super encouraging. She’ll say, “don't take too many
GE classes at once,” you know, “if music is what you want to do then then pad
your schedule with music. It will give you a reason to go to school.” That sort of
thing, you know. And every once in a while when my bank account is empty, you
know, she'll drop $100 in it so I can, you know, eat at school and that sort of thing.
Even though she's not on a fixed income and can't really, you know,
manage...(long pause).
Irene: Wow. She’s really...[crosstalk]
Gwen: She's the most supportive woman you've ever met. (Interview 1)
I begin to understand a different source for Gwen’s desire to cheer for others, to encourage them.
The complexity of her situation also becomes apparent: within the next year, Gwen will start
another chapter in academia while concurrently assisting an ageing parent. In our final interview
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together, I asked Gwen what has been on her mind during this transition. She took a long pause
before answering:
Mostly what I've been thinking about lately is the fact that I'm leaving, that fact that I'm
moving onto a different ensemble and it's not going to be here. And I keep thinking about
the general community feeling of this college. Like there's, there's a connection forged
between each student here that's different than I think the kind of...higher cerebral kind of
expectation of a four-year college. Cause you've got a blend of, of the very old coming
back to school, you know, the very young coming into school and they're meeting in the
middle and finding common ground. And...I dunno, I, I get the feeling that a four-year
university has a lot of divides rather than a lot of bridges. You're focused in on your own
major, you know, you don't have a lot of connections with say, a guitar major, you know,
when you're a vocal major and there's a different feeling in a four-year university that's
very closed off and very insular, I think. And I think that sense of community, that sense
of belonging between like even the, the different types of, of...Of majors, not even just
among music majors, but um [long pause] (sighs) Like even being like, going from a
small village to a big city, it's, it's a little daunting. Like here, I know everyone, you
know, I see people in the hall, "hi, you know, you know it's me it's Gwen, you know, it's
you" and it's...familiar. It's happy, it's safe. And when you moved on to the four-year
university, you mean it's huge! It's like six times the size of Ashgrove College and there's
a lot of ground to cover. There's a lot of focus on athletics and there's a lot of...other, um,
other commitments and things that aren't necessarily tied to music. And I know it's a little
...disheartening that I won't be able to do as much as I do here. I won't have as many other
connections to different types of music, like I'm able to be in the Ashgrove Singers and
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I'm able to be in jazz and uh...opera and um, you know. If I wanted to I could go be in the
jazz combos, you know, and sing or play saxophone or anything I wanted to and it
would...it would be okay. But when you get to the four university, I feel like it's like,
"here's your track. You're going to go on your track." And...I don't know. It might be
different when I get there, but that's the impression that I get. So...A little scared (short
laugh). But at the same time, I'm very glad to be moving on because they took away my
money. (laughter) (Interview 2)
Gwen is referring to the college’s funding policy, which restricts funding for students because of
the Repeatability law. She has friends who had moved on to four-year institutions, and I start to
suspect that some of her ideas about what university is going to be like stem from her
conversations with them. I reflect on my own experiences in academia and realize that Gwen is
not far off the mark as there were divides across departments at all of the universities that I have
attended. Aside from a handful of people, I seldom got to know students outside of Music
Education classes or choirs in which I sang. Gwen had pointed out a feature of higher education
in music that is seldom talked about. I wonder if I will ever uncover what makes the experience
at Ashgrove College so unique for students like Gwen.
Silvia: “I have a friend. His name is Danny, but he was born Dayna.”
When I ask Silvia for a recommendation for a restaurant with the best beans and rice in
town, she directs me to a place that she loves going to with her parents. I pull up the listing on
Google maps and look at the menu. Silvia explains that she does not speak Spanish and
therefore, is not able to tell me what the ingredients in the dishes are. Born and raised in
Ashgrove, Silvia lives with her family on the north side of town. As I drive to the north end to
find the Mexican restaurant, I am reminded of the suburbs where I grew up in Mississauga,
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Ontario, with their clean-cut front yards, leveled driveways, and shopping plazas sprinkled on
every intersection. In my route, I see Fashion Mall, where Silvia works. She is a sales associate
at a children’s clothing store. I picture her getting along with mother-shoppers who want the
perfect outfits for their children, using her friendly smile to reassure them that their choices are
good ones. Working at the mall is one of two jobs that Silvia has. She also works as
administrative assistant to Jenna Dahl at Ashgrove College. When I ask if she has time to hang
out with her friends, she assures me that they know how busy she is:
They don't think of it as "Oh, you're busy with work or oh, you're busy with school or
you're busy with choir." They just think of it as a, a whole, as like “you're just busy. You
keep yourself busy a lot.” Because I have two jobs and then school, um, you know...And
then I have a boyfriend so it's kinda, you'd have to make a little time for that too.
(Interview 2)
Silvia’s boyfriend is also attending college. She gleams with pride when describing that he is an
“EMT, certified” who is taking a few more classes at a small community college situated 45
minutes outside of the city. Like Silvia, he holds a job while going to school, working as a
manager at Krispy Kreme Donuts. When I ask her how they manage to spend time together
given their busy schedules of work and school, Silvia admits that it is not easy:
Because if we don't, it can't be like that day like, “Hey, do you want hang out?” unless he
doesn't have like the night shift. Like if he's not working the night shift that night then
maybe we can get away with like, “Oh do you want to go to dinner?” But sometimes it's
like he's tired, he has so much homework. Like I don't have as much homework as he
does. Like I know that he's got so much, so much homework. So yeah, he's always like “I
can't, I have homework. I'm really sorry.” And then a lot of the times I’m like “I can't our
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performance that night,” or “I can't, I go to my other job,” or like “I'm here with Mrs.
Dahl working, you know, filling out this stuff.” (Interview 2)
A pattern begins to emerge before my eyes: Many of the students with whom I have talk to at
Ashgrove College juggle school and demanding jobs. They work all types of hours, from night
shifts to Black Friday sales week. Silvia does not complain, however. On the contrary, her tone is
matter-of-fact, even optimistic. She appears to accept things as they are and moves on.
Silvia’s family supports her decision of going to college. Her grandfather always wanted
to make sure that his grandchildren were “doing well” in school. When she brings up her
grandfather’s passing, Silvia admits, “I still feel like he's watching over me and making sure that
like I'm going on the right path.” Silvia had finished high school, participated in honor choirs in
her local districts, and made it into Ashgrove Singers; her path is steadily moving along. In choir,
whenever appropriate moments arise and a certain compositions bring back memories of her
grandfather, Silvia honors his memory by privately dedicating a performance of a song to him. I
am moved by Silvia’s courage and ability to do this. I too was very close to my grandfather when
he died, but unlike Silvia, am unable to process my grief nor honor his memory through singing.
If anything, I intentionally stifle his memory during performances for fear of being visibly
emotional. Maybe it is not going to hurt as much as I think it will after all, I think to myself, and
maybe it will help. Silvia’s smile reassures me.
As I get to know her better, I become increasingly more confident that she is, in every
sense of the word, an “empath.” Her concern for others is so profound that I am not certain that
she is aware of being this way. In our last interview, for example, she talks about a group of
singers gathering, quite spontaneously, at a local restaurant after a performance–an event that has
not previous happened in such large numbers.
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Silvia: There was a group of eight of us already. We got there, there was another group of
eight people that were there at the same Denny's from our choir. “Like oh my
gosh.” And then the waiter, she was like...she was like, “wow, just my luck.” But
like I was like, "everyone" I was like "please tip big because I feel, I feel so bad"
because it just slows up, you know, like their cooks and stuff like that.
Irene: Yeah big parties.
Silvia: And she, I could tell she was like kind of upset and irritated a little bit. But I was
like, “I understand,” you know, so I was like, “everyone please like tip big.” So
like we all kind of tipped her really big. So I hope that helped her night.
(Interview 2)
Silvia is empathetic toward the waitress and wants to treat her fairly. She assesses the situation
and encourages her friends to act with someone else’s well-being in mind. What surprises me is
that the part of the story about the waitress is what Silvia wants to focus on when I ask her what
is new in Ashgrove Singers. She does not seem to be self-righteous. Thinking about someone
else is what she remembers the most about her experience that evening.
We revisit the subject of empathizing with other people in our first one-on-one interview:
Irene: What would you say, and this might be a big loaded question, but what would you
say contribute to your mindset that you just shared in saying “everybody is a
person”? What experiences have contributed to you believing this, sitting in this
chair today?
Silvia: Um, I have a friend. His name is Danny, but he was born Dayna. I've seen how
nasty people can be in high school. I've seen people, like for no reason...like they
don't even...they know his name and that's it. And they know that he's trans and
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that's it. But they would throw their lunch at him, they would just call him, you
know, like rude, rude names and I'm a very passionate and protective person and
once you're my friend, you're my friend and I'm going to defend you like all of life
no matter what. And he would feel so defeated that he couldn't do anything. He’s
gone to the office. He's gone and talked to people, like, “This is what people are
doing to me and it needs to stop.” But things wouldn't get done there. And so there
was just so much rage, like filled within me that like I would just yell. Like I
would scream at them because I was so mad and I knew that he in that moment
was just stunned and couldn't do anything for himself. He didn't know how to react
because he's like, “They're just going to say more things to me or they're just gonna
throw more things at me.” So, he felt like he couldn't stand up for himself and he
didn't know how to stand up for himself and even told me that he didn't know how
to. And I would just get so mad and scream at them. Like “He's a person and you
wouldn't like it if someone threw something at you on your new clothes or new
shoes! Like you wouldn't like it at all!” It just makes me so mad that because they
don't like...who he is as a person. That's just him as a person. Like me being
straight, I didn't have to come out as being straight. I didn't, you know? That's just
kind the society norm, you know. He...those people didn't have to come out as
straight but it took a lot for him to come out as trans and change his name and
everything. So, it's like, why are you giving him such a hard time? It was really
hard for him. So, I don't, I just don't understand people and how they could be so
rude to someone when they don't think about how hard it must've been for them to
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come out and go through a name change and you know, like a gender change. Like
they don't think about it.
Irene: Wow...It sounds like this was really important experience for you. Is this a friend
that you sang with or?
Silvia: No, it was just a friend that I met in...um...it was my sophomore year of high
school. I had French with him and he also started to do theater and stuff. So that's
where I met him a little bit more and became even more friends with him. But I
would see him around campus too and I would just see people be rude to him. I
don't understand how someone can be so closed minded that they don't realize that
they are still hurting a human, like a person that has, you know, feelings and they
have, you know, they have thoughts, you know, they can, you know, like they can
do everything that you can?
Irene: Yeah, yeah, totally. Wow. Um, in going along with this in your time now, in
college, right? Um, by the way, are you still friends with him?
Silvia: Yeah.
Irene: What's he up to now?
Silvia: He's in the area here in college. He has a girlfriend. They met online and she
moved, I want to say from Texas, over here. I think it was Texas. It was like
around that area. Um, so she moved here and they live together now and they're
like very, very happy, which makes me happy. He says that since being in college
he hasn't really like um ...dealt with a lot of people who have been rude to him or
anything. He says maybe it's just because it's a new setting and a new set of people
where they first meet him as Danny instead of Dayna. So I think he, well he thinks
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maybe that's where like it is, like they don't know that he's trans so they don't treat
him like he's a trans person. (Interview 1)
I try to imagine Silvia screaming at someone, but cannot. I can only see her smiling. Yet her
voice, tense and filled with emotion, reminds me that she too, is a survivor of the abuse. Instead
of idly standing by, she stood up for her friend. Witnessing a person’s humanity stripped from
them made Silvia keenly aware of the slippery slope of not caring for others: what can start as a
difference of opinion can often lead to disregard for others’ wellbeing, and in worst cases,
dehumanizing. I think back on Silvia describing this experience to me as I listen to her discuss
interpretations of choral repertoire. Issues surrounding LGBT rights have special significance for
Silvia. When singing, she thinks about these issues when relating to content in choral
compositions surrounding freedom, equity and justice. She has even developed a process for
putting herself in the “shoes” of the narrator in choral works–an intentional, step-by-step
procedure for drawing on her lived experiences in order to relate to the content in the music.
Knowing about her past experiences offers some insight into her unique ability to take the
perspective of others, which I discuss in more detail in chapter six.
Section summary: Anayah, Gwen and Silvia
In this portion of the chapter, I have detailed the experiences of three participants by
highlighting parts of our conversations that served as examples of perspective taking. The first
vignette described Anayah’s resilience of finishing high school, coming to Ashgrove College and
sharing her hopes of becoming a choral educator. In the second vignette, I have introduced
Gwen, a mature student whose background in barbershop singing has informed the way in which
she relates to her fellow singers and artistic leadership. The last vignette focused on Silvia’s
story, where we hear of her concern for others and compassion toward members of the LGBT
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and transgender community. While this chapter offered mere glimpses into these individuals’
lives, I will return to their thoughts and ideas in chapter six of this dissertation. In it, I will bring
back voices of Anayah, Gwen and Silvia to share their insights into relating to others through
choral repertoire and their participation in choir as a whole. The vignettes featured in this chapter
are intended to introduce the core participants of the study through those participants’ own
words. The next section of the chapter brings out the voice of Jenna Dahl, the director of
Ashgrove Singers.
The Director
In this section, I offer a narrative description of Jenna Dahl, the Director of Choral
Activities at Ashgrove College. I conducted in-depth interviews with Jenna three times over the
course of three months. Additionally, I observed her rehearsals with Ashgrove Singers on four
separate occasions, and spent time having informal conversations with her at her office and
home. Jenna and I met in 2015 by way of my position as Coordinator of USC’s Invitational
Choral Festivals. We maintained a friendly professional relationship for three years thereafter. I
found Jenna to be more approachable than other conductors at the event; she seemed “down-to-
earth” and was easy to talk to. Thus when I approached her about my dissertation, I anticipated
that she would give me a sincere response and hoped that she would agree to participate.
Jenna agreed to be the subject of my research without any hesitation. From the onset, she
insisted that I stay at her house during my overnight visits to Ashgrove. I was wary of accepting
Jenna’s offer for fear of not being able to skillfully negotiate my position as a researcher. After
consulting with my graduate advisor, I came to the conclusion that it was best for me to accept
Jenna’s offer. Over the course of my data collection, I stayed with Jenna on three different
occasions. During this period, I become aware that in addition to being a researcher, I was also a
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student pursuing my doctorate at a university that Jenna deems prestigious, a colleague who
attends the same conferences that she does, a young woman who is looking for mentorship from
someone with her level of experience, and a new friend who is welcome at her dinner table.
This section is divided in two subsections. The first subsection consists of a vignette
detailing my initial meeting with Jenna. It includes excerpts from our first interview which
describes her journey to becoming the Director of Choral Activities at Ashgrove College. The
subsequent subsection of the chapter discusses Jenna’s teaching philosophy. Here, I categorize
Jenna’s teaching philosophy into three main tenets: (1) giving students an experience; (2)
lifelong learning; and (3) teaching with compassion. I conclude this second section with excerpts
from our final interview, which details her plans, hopes and dreams for the future.
Meeting Jenna Dahl
With flowers and a box of pastries in hand, I drive up to Jenna Dahl’s house. I bring these
gifts as a thank you for inviting me to stay at her home. I feel as if I am going over to a relative’s
house for lunch rather than a research site. Jenna’s husband Martin greets me at the door with a
warm smile and invites me in to drop off my bags inside. Their home reminds me of my parent’s
home. It is filled with keepsakes from past travels, photographs of smiling family members, and
gifts from friends and past students. I begin to feel more at ease. One marked difference between
Jenna’s and my parents’ home is the collection of different artifacts from Mexico. Two antique
photos of Jenna’s grandparents, shoemakers from Mexico, hang in beautiful oval picture frames
above the dining table. Jenna’s resemblance to her grandmother is uncanny. They both convey a
warm but tough disposition, unafraid to make eye contact with the person looking at them.
Jenna arranged an elaborate scheme for me to park in the faculty lot on campus. “You
really didn’t have to,” I assure her. Even though I am perfectly comfortable parking in the
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student parking area, she insists that I use her faculty parking pass instead. Martin and I hop in
my car and drive to campus. As we drive up, I spot Jenna waiting for us in the parking lot,
smiling and holding the neon parking pass in her hand. She hugs me as though we have been
friends for a long time, and we chat about my drive in from the city. Martin drives back home in
Jenna’s car. We are scheduled to meet him there later in the evening for dinner. “He loves to
cook,” Jenna adds.
Jenna leads me into an older building, this one constructed in the Mission Revival style.
We are set to meet the Dean of the School of Music there. As we walk in, we are greeted by
three office administrators, who observe me with some curiosity. “This is Irene. She’s doing her
doctorate at USC and is here to do research on our program”, Jenna tells them. We shake hands
and exchange some pleasantries. The Dean greets me with the same kind of polite curiosity as
the administrators had done a few minutes earlier. He explains how pleased he is with Jenna’s
work and the choral program at large. He seems very proud of the fact that the program is
growing. Before we leave, the Dean asks me what I hope to do with my degree, to which I give
my standard pitch about becoming a Director of Choral Activities somewhere. Jenna watches
me, smiling. We say “goodbye” and walk across campus, where Jenna has her office. As we chat
along the way, several students interrupt us to say “hi” to Jenna and exchange a few words. I can
tell that she enjoys these interactions.
When we arrive at Jenna’s office, she introduces me to all of the faculty who are working
in their respective offices that day. Since the full-time faculty offices are all on same floor and in
the same hallway, we get through the “drive by” of greetings rather quickly. I drop off my
recording equipment in Jenna’s office and begin to look around at the myriad of photos,
certificates, newspaper clippings, and notes (both from students and herself) on the walls. This a
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space where little pieces of Jenna’s teaching career are out in the open, visible to anyone. A
couple of students drop by the office to pick up packets of scores that Jenna acquired at a recent
regional choral convention. She chats with each person, encouraging them to look through the
packets and select any scores that they can add to their personal choral libraries. I notice a
screensaver of rotating pictures on her computer of students in choir uniforms enjoying a day
outdoors. Jenna sees me looking at the screen and shares that the photos are from an outreach
event that Ashgrove Singers did with a local high school where one of her former students is
now a director. It is hard for me to tell the college students apart from the high school students at
first.
Jenna’s desk is also covered in paperwork much in the same way that mine is at home. I
recognize a kind of “organized chaos” that we both maintain. She tells me that much of the
materials on her desk are for planning the choir’s future trip to New York City in the spring, as
the Ashgrove Singers have been invited to sing at Carnegie Hall. Actually, Jenna clarifies, they
have been selected as a feature ensemble. This means that they will perform their own set of
music in an event that involves choirs from different community colleges and universities across
the U.S. Many choirs get to perform at Carnegie Hall if they pay to go, but a handful are invited
to be features as a highlight ensemble. Jenna describes the different fundraising efforts that she
has initiated to help the students get to New York City. I think about how much is on her plate
right now, and feel extra grateful for her time.
I pack up my gear and follow Jenna to the rehearsal space. I find a place to sit at the back
of the room and begin to set up my recording equipment. Many students come up and greet
Jenna with a hug, chatting with her about their weekend and other classes. When rehearsal
begins, Jenna dives right into talking about the different fundraising initiatives for their trip to
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New York. The students seem engaged with the topic, asking several questions. As they wrap up,
Jenna invites me to come up and introduce myself. I am more nervous and self-conscious than
usual. I wonder if I am overdressed and how I am being perceived by the participants. (“First
time out in the bullpen,” I think to myself.) I get through the information and ask if there are any
questions. Not a single student raises their hand. I go back to my chair feeling somewhat
relieved.
Following my introduction, Jenna wastes no time and jumps into rehearsing. The group
seems a little tense, probably because I am in the room. I look around and notice that many of the
students seem tired. The music starts to liven up the room. Jenna encourages the students to sing
out. She is enthusiastic, warm, and encouraging on the podium. I watch how the students seem to
enjoy interacting with each other between run-throughs of sections in the music, even though it is
clear that some of them are very shy. The rehearsal ends with the choir rehearsing an upbeat
Gospel composition titled “Witness.” Jenna has different students try the solos, of which the
other students seem extremely supportive, clapping loudly between each soloist’s attempts.
At the end of rehearsal, I stand at the back of the room to recruit participants for my
study. Jenna prepares for her rehearsal with the jazz choir, which meets back to back with
Ashgrove Singers. We make plans to meet later in the evening, after my focus group and her
rehearsal. “Do not to snack on anything because Martin is going to cook a delicious meal for
both of us later this evening,” she reminds me. I drive back to Jenna’s house exhausted, but also
excited. I saw her “in action,” but cannot help but wonder: “What really goes into making the
choral community at Ashgrove College?”
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Jenna’s journey to Ashgrove College
To begin to address this question, I sit down with Jenna to find out what brought her to
Ashgrove. We sit in the living room, nestled among Colonial revival furniture. I compliment her
again on her beautiful home.
Jenna: I grew up in Ashgrove, my hometown, and I attended Ashgrove College, and
replaced my director when I took the job.
Irene: Really?
Jenna: Mhm. Completely accidental. I was at an ACDA meeting in LA, I was teaching in
Router (pseudonym), at Router High School (pseudonym), and a colleague came
up and said, “Hey, your mentor is retiring,” and I said, “What are you talking
about?” you know, and ‘cause, I’m like “Who’s my mentor? I’ve been doing this
for such a long time,” you know?
Irene: (laughter) Who’s my mentor?
Jenna: Yeah, and then he says, “Well, Peter Dunn (pseudonym) is retiring. Ashgrove
College is flying a choral position.” And I went, “What?” My mom had been...I
had been noticing changes with my mom and her age, because she was 40 when
she had me, so, older end of things. So, when I was single and just working,
working, working, all the time, and I thought, “Well, there’s nobody here–my
brother’s here, but you know, he died, so, maybe I’ll throw my hat in the ring.” It
was right before the ’99 Chicago Convention, and so, I thought about it for a little
bit, and then I thought, “Okay.” So I went ahead and threw my hat in the ring and
I finished all of the application and everything, but I didn’t have my transcripts. It
was within days of the deadline, and one of my best friends worked at the district
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office, and so, I finished everything, I did my cover letter, I filled everything out,
and then I took it over on my way to the airport to fly to Chicago, and I put it in a
mailbox. She went and begged and begged and pleaded with HR until they gave
her copies of my transcripts, and she put it in and sent it.
Irene: Oh, man.
Jenna: So, I wasn’t looking for a job, and when they called me for the interview, um, my
choices were day one or day two. Well, I needed day two, because I was going to
be in New York with my students.
Irene: What do you mean day one or day two?
Jenna: They do two days of interviews.
Irene: Oh, okay, mhm.
Jenna: But, day one, I was still in New York with my students. But I could make it on
day two, so I said, “I’d like day two,” and they said, “Well, the only time we have
available is seven o’clock on day one,” and I’m thinking, so... And I didn’t want
them to know what I was doing–I didn’t want my kids to know. I had been
nominated for something, Orange County–I don’t know if they still do this, but
Orange County Performing Arts Center does this educator, you know, Arts
Educator Award, and I had been nominated by somebody for that, and that awards
ceremony was the night before day one, and so...
Irene: So, you had to be there.
Jenna: I told my boosters and I told my principal, and I said, “You know, I need to fly
back for this award that, you know, I’ve been nominated for,” and yada, yada,
yada. And so we made arrangements. And so I went and said bye to the kids the
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night before, and they were coming the next day later, and then I flew in, and my
mom actually drove to Orange County, because she was all about the award thing,
and I was like, “Mom, it’s not a big deal.”
Irene: (light laughter)
Jenna: But, she came down, and then I got in the car with her and she drove home. I
drove as far as I could, but I was still on New York time. But with my interview at
7am, I was like, “Ah, it’s mid-morning already!” you know, in New York. So,
that was kind of a surprising thing, because I wasn’t looking for a job, I just
applied and...and then I came back. A lot of people asked me if I regretted leaving
Southern California, but I swore I would never come back here when I left. You
know, I was 20 years old, and I was like, (high-pitched) “I’m out of here!” My
first job offer was in Ashgrove, and I turned it down and never told my parents
(light laughter). It was in Ashgrove Unified, you know, teaching classroom music.
Irene: What were you thinking at the time?
Jenna: I just didn’t want to move home. I didn’t want to move back with my parents, you
know? I had been in San Diego–I went to San Diego State, and I’d been down
there, and so I just kind of...and, I was long-term subbing in Long Beach. My
sister-in-law called me and said, “I heard they pay better” and sure enough, Long
Beach paid better. So, I moved up there, did this long-term subbing job, and I,
um...I did that. I applied for a job in Spruce, Thunder Hills College (pseudonym),
another community college, and um, didn’t get it. I thought I was going to get it.
Try being like [singing], “I’m going to get it,” you know, I’m 24 years old, right?
(laughter) And, they gave it to somebody else. I wept and I called Long Beach
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and said, “I need to sign up to be a sub,” and about two weeks later, they called
me and said, “Do you want the job still? Because the other person turned it
down.” And I started teaching at a community college when I was 24 (light
laughter) for two years before I went back down.
Irene: Teaching choral?
Jenna: Mhm. My first job was a middle...I had a middle school choir, a high school
choir, and I taught the rest of the time at the college, and I was teaching general
music. I flew by the seat of the pants, baby! I directed the spring musical, I had no
idea what that was about. And you know, I did the choir. I ran a variety show, and
you know, music appreciation, and I did all of the course for early childhood,
‘cause they were starting a child development center. And I was teaching people
to use...because, the person before me had a bunch of the Orff instruments, so I
was just kind of reading and going and reading and going. I didn’t have my
masters or anything, so I got an emergency credential, and I went to the
University of Colorado in the summer. So, I’d finish school, drive to Colorado, do
school, come back, start school, go back (light laughter).
Irene: Wow.
Jenna: Yeah. So, anyway, when I got this job...I was...I was shocked, but I was...I was
not...a lot of people, my sister was really mad that I was moving away because she
lives in San Diego, and we were right there, you know, near one another. But, it
was...it was...the way everything lined up. The house sold, and blah blah blah, all
the timings just worked out, and then I was home, and I was like, “Clearly, this
was what I was supposed to be doing,” So it was...starting at a college after being
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in a high school system for a long time, it was really...wooooh [exhales], like, I’m
learning that right now. (Interview 1)
Later in the conversation, I ask whether Jenna regrets moving back to Ashgrove. She responds
by sharing:
It’s been...it’s been a challenge for me the last few years for me, to be honest, but, um,
we...you know, I’m hell-bent to give them an experience, so. So, moving home was
moving home. It felt...it felt as normal as whatever. I didn’t miss L.A. I missed the beach,
‘cause I used to unwind at the beach, you know. From San Clemente, I lived in Mission
Hill, so I’d drive to Laguna and just sit on the sand sometimes, and just listen to the
waves and watch people walk their dogs and the surfers, you know, I’d kind of debrief
and then head on home, but...so, that part, I miss. I don’t miss anything else about it,
which is surprising, ‘cause it was kinda...it just felt like it was the right place for me to
be, you know? My first class was a music appreciation class, first thing in the morning, 8
o’clock, and the roster of names, I couldn’t pronounce half of them, you know, Russian,
most of the Hispanic ones, I could get, you know, just...it was, you know, and it was just
like a colorful palette of students, and I just thought, “Yeah, let’s do this!” (Interview 1)
I marvel at Jenna’s openness to new experiences. Throughout her career, she has followed her
intuition and accepted opportunities to teach in different contexts. As a result, she arrived at her
teaching philosophy through her own experiences rather than theory.
Jenna’s teaching philosophy: “I’m hell-bent to given them an experience”
During my visits to Ashgrove, I keep coming back to something that Jenna said when we
first met: “I’m hell-bent to give them an experience.” (Interview 1). I want to find out what
constitutes a top-notch learning experience in Jenna’s mind and what are the some of its
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philosophical underpinnings. Through analysis of our interviews, I arrive at three core tenets of
Jenna’s teaching philosophy.
Tenet 1: Giving students an experience
Although I felt that Jenna had been describing her teaching philosophy to me without being
aware of it earlier in our conversation, I address the topic directly to find out how she perceives
it:
Irene: Um, you said so much on this already, so it might be redundant, but the second
question I had was, “What are some core tenants of your teaching philosophy?”
But it sounds like you’re describing a lot of them, if not directly, but sort of
indirectly, I don’t know.
Jenna: I want the kids...to have a passion for music as much as I do, whether they’re
music majors or not. I want to...I want to open their eyes to music, to loving music,
so if they’re going to be an audience later, or if they’re going to go sing at
Ashgrove State (pseudonym) with Sandra (pseudonym), wherever they end up, I
want them to see the beauty in all kinds of music, even stuff that they don’t like.
Irene: Mhm, and do you see that yourself? Is that something that you also see?
Jenna: Yeah, yeah, I do, because you know, one of our best friends is a punk rocker
drummer, like, you know, and so, we hadn’t been to see any of his concerts and
they were playing in L.A. and in Hollywood, the Henry Ford Theater. So we drove
down and bought earplugs (light laughter) and went in. He’s a drummer, so, that
was just loud and craziness, and they’re all doing this thing where they just...
Irene: Just the two of you?
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Jenna: Yeah.
Irene: Oh! (light laughter)
Jenna: We stood backstage with all of these people smoking and stuff, and it was loud,
and you know, and we went, and he was happy we went to see it, and you know,
but one of his other groups, also a punk group, but they do covers. And so they
have this CD called “Diva,” and so it’s them doing only songs—well, Boy George
is one of the Divas, but all of the rest of them, like “I will survive,” and “My heart
will go on,” from Titanic, and you know, (singing). And I listened to this thing and
went like, “This is like one of the most creative things I’ve ever heard, like, I love
this,” you know? It’s just bizarre, you know.
Irene: A combination.
Jenna: Yeah, and so I think the kids need to hear stuff like that, you know? I think I even
played one of them for them, just because...even with my appreciation class when I
used to do, to bring in the “Soulful Messiah,” I don’t know if you’ve
heard...Quincy Jones produced Handel’s Messiah, and I’d play the (singing)
“Hallelujah,” and we’d talk about is this same or different? “Well, it’s different...”
And I’d say, “Well, is the music the same? Are they saying the same?” “Yeah, I
think so.” I’d say, “Yes they are, it’s exactly the same,” you know, “But now it’s
voices doing this, or...” and, I think that’s kind of what...you know what I mean?
‘Cause when I went to Ashgrove, I just knew how to follow the little black dots
and stuff, and then I started doing the jazz, and you have to get out of the box a
little bit and learn how to not just sing the rhythms in front of you, and, and I liked
that thought for education, you know? I mean, we don’t just sing Mozart or
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Randall Stroope, or you know, Eric Whitacre, whoever it is, we sing everything,
and I think the kids need to broaden, ‘cause they find things they love that they
didn’t know existed. (Interview 1)
Jenna’s narrative brings out the fact that a part of her own education occurred outside of the
school setting. Her own curiosity guides what she brings in to share with her students in the
classroom. She acknowledges that exposure to different musical genres was lacking when she
was a student. To remedy this, she shares with her students repertoire that she deems creative,
regardless of what genre it comes from. Her motivation is always student-centered, rather than
self-centered. She is not imposing her taste, but is rather sharing knowledge of different music
with her students.
Another key aspect that emerges in Jenna’s mission to give her students “an experience”
is providing them with the opportunity to travel abroad. Going on tours is not a common activity
at Ashgrove College. Since most of the students at Ashgrove College have financial
responsibilities of caring for themselves and often members of their family, saving money to
travel abroad is not always possible. Nevertheless, three years earlier, Jenna took Ashgrove
Singers on a tour of France. She describes this experience:
Jenna: So, I took them to Spain five years ago, and then three years ago we went to
southern France. It was part of the festival, but it is hosted by this guy that runs this
thing in southern France, so...and, it’s a great deal, because as long as you do
concerts, the kids’ room and board is free.
Irene: What?
Jenna: So, we performed for...we did six nights, I think, six or seven nights of
performances...
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Irene: What about...
Jenna: ...in a different town, and then we stayed in a small little town called Saint-
Affrique and we just stayed...it’s not four star accommodations, let me tell you,
but...but, um, every day, we got on a bus, and we went to another little village, and
the village opened their doors, and they fed us, you know, home cooked meals
most of the time, and then we’d go into these churches, small and large, and
they’re packed with people, and we’d sing, and...it was, it was awesome.
Irene: Wow, that’s cool.
Jenna: And, we...and so, I did all of the arrangements outside of that, so I made all the
flight arrangements, I took them to Paris, and it was...it was, um, what’s their
fourth of July thing?
Irene: Oh, Bastille?
Jenna: Bastille. And so, we got there, we took a long tour, and I...I went and found some
guides, and I found somebody, hired the guide, and the guide took us around all of
Paris, the Louvre, and all that stuff, and then we went to the fireworks in the
big...and we saw the parade, the military parade, and all that stuff during the day,
and then we got on the high speed rail and went down.
Well, that night, going back on the subway, we find out about the Nice attacks,
and I have arranged for us to fly out of Nice in ten days. In less than ten days,
we’re going to be in Nice, and I’m thinking, “Oh my God. What are we going to
do with, you know, this crazy thing?” So, we went down, we did all of those
performances, and I contacted...I hired a guide in Nice for us to...for us to um, get
a, you know, lay of the land there and stuff, and so, I contacted her, you know,
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because we’re getting ready to...I said, “Do I need to change our flight out of Nice
and make it out of, you know, somewhere else? What do I do?” “No, I think it
would be great. I need to see if I can arrange for you to do a concert, I think it
would be healing for our community,” and blah blah blah, so, you know, I just
said, “Let’s go. We’re going,” you know? And the kids, I had the kids email their
parents and make sure that they were okay, and my dean was with us, and so he
had his office people call their parents, which, I was like...but, you know, and...
Irene: What office people?
Jenna: The ladies that you met in the office?
Irene: Oh.
Jenna: He had them call all the parents.
Irene: In addition to email?
Jenna: The kids—I told...you know, you want to hear from your kid, not some other
person.
Irene: Yeah.
Jenna: They called, some other person called every person and said, “The kids are fine,
they’re in Paris, it’s a long way from Nice, you don’t have to be worried about
them...”
Irene: But, they’re going to Nice (light laughter).
Jenna: Right, well...I kind of, you know, we kind of gauged it as we went. So, um, we got
there, and, you know, checked into our hotel and did all that, you know, you saw a
little presence, the guards were kind of milling about in areas, and then there’s this,
along the beach, where this attack happened, which was right on the beach, right?
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They have...it’s kind of like Santa Monica, you know, where the pier is up here,
and the ocean is down, only it’s not so much grass, that’s there and then there’s the
ocean.
Irene: Like a boardwalk.
Jenna: Yeah, and...and, it is just flowers and messages from all over the world and
candles, and stuffed animals, ‘cause a lot of them were children, you know, ‘cause
it’s like the fourth of July, they’re all out there watching the fireworks, and this
guy just brought his truck and just mowed ‘em down. And, and so, she took us to
the...um, the park across the street where they had started these memorials, and
again, there’s a big gazebo in the middle, and it’s just surrounded by flowers and
candles, and the whole outside of it has stuffed animals on it. I can show you
pictures I have, you know...and so we went, and part of the rep that I had taken, we
were doing “Precious Lord” and “Let there be Peace on Earth,” and we had
Richard (Inaudible, Inaudible singing,) that we had done, and it’s part in Latin and
part in English, and we had done that, you know, six times or whatever in these
other churches, but until that day in the park, the kids did not know the real
meaning of that song.
We did “Precious Lord,” and people were coming around and, you know,
and we were standing at this gazebo with all these stuffed animals and signs and
you know, they had sheets out where you could sign it, I mean, just messages from
all over the world, the whole park was just filled with that and people wandering,
and...and then Martin accompanied, so he brought the guitar out and we did, “Let
there be Peace on Earth,” and then they did an encore at the end of it, and the guys
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are going, “Do another! Do another!” and the kids are going, “We can’t. We can’t
do it.” I mean, they were just...they were weeping, and just the magnitude of being
in that place at that time and with that music...
I even contacted Richard and I said, “You don’t know me.” I know him now,
but, you know, “You don’t know me, but we had this experience,” you’re asking
about texts and stuff, “with this piece, and this is what happened,” and I kind of
shared with him what, what went on, and he’s actually met a few of the kids,
‘cause some of them are at universities now, and I got to introduce him to, you
know, a couple of the kids, and it was just, you know, a moment that you can’t
ever plan for. It was...it was just one of the most emotionally charged, amazing
things.
Irene: Wow.
Jenna: And, I actually had...there were people that came up and they were crying through
the session, “Thank you for saying this. I have a little church,” one of the ladies
said, “you know, I come to ECCO every year, and I just feel like I don’t belong to
anybody here. And you know, I have this little, little old people’s choir and we go
and sing at nursing homes in my community, and I have just felt like, you know,
I’m not that group that wins everything, so thank you for...this just makes me feel
so much better,” you know what I mean? And, it was just, it was just me saying,
you know what, I’m not Stan Kerry (pseudonym), I’m not Joshua Lin
(pseudonym), they’re two of my dearest and wonderful friends, I love them both
dearly–I’m not like them. My...my charge is not to win and call attention to me and
the greatness of my program. My...my charge is to give my kids an experience,
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you know, that will change their lives. And that day in that park in Nice, they’ll
never forget it. Their kids are going to know about that trip, you know, and, the
guide, (Inaudible French), so after we did...she took us into the old city. Have you
been to Nice?
Irene: Um, I have been to some of France, but not...no, just Arles and Marseille, not Nice.
Jenna: Okay, so, um, there...Nice has, you know, the city, the big city, and then what they
call the “old city” and it’s kind of more compact, and there’s a beautiful cathedral
in there. So, she took us in, and you know, she said, “You can probably go sing
another song there!” You know, to sing in the cathedral and test all of the
acoustics. So, we get up there, and there’s a little French lady (inaudible shouting),
and they’re back there (shouting) and they’re having this big argument (shouting),
you know. So finally, she just “Hmph!” and so we sang again, and, um, we sang a
couple of tunes, and, and then she called the kids together, and she said, “I’ve been
doing this for 30 years, tour guides,” and she goes, “never in all my career have I
met a group like you that could bring so much healing and love to our community.
I feel like I can open up and start to move forward now,” and she was weeping as
she’s talking to the kids and telling them this story, you know, that, that what you
did out there today, what you have done, I feel like I can begin to heal from this
horrible thing that happened here. You know?
Irene: Wow.
Jenna: That’s choir of the world, right there.
Irene: Amen. Amen.
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Jenna: You know what I mean? That’s the win. That’s the win, ‘cause the kids got to see
her at her, you know, at her rawest, to tell us the history of her town, blah blah
blah, and all that stuff, to just completely take that off, and just, as an affected
member of a community where 80 people were just run down by some nutcase,
and dealing with all of that pain and stuff, and that the kids’ music had an
effect...you know, made her feel a certain way. You know, that, I mean, you know,
you never can, can guess those things that are going to happen, but when they
happen, they happen, you know, and you don’t forget, you remember, and those
kids are kind of tied by that, they still talk about it and it’s been three years.
(Interview 1)
Not every director would decide to take their students to a city where a national tragedy occurs
right after it happens. Jenna saw an opportunity to help her students elevate their understanding
of their role as musicians by bringing their song to a community in mourning. Returning to
Ashgrove would have eliminated the possibility for that to happen and for personal growth to
occur. Jenna took a calculated risk. She did not know what the results of this experience would
be exactly, but she knew that her students would never forget being a part of this moment. Jenna
presented an opportunity for the students to see, first-hand, the impact that their music makes on
a single person (the tour guide) and the general community on that memorial on the boardwalk.
Jenna’s mission to give her students an experience is inextricably connected to her
commitment to giving them opportunities to learn from their peers and other professionals in the
field. She frequently brings the Ashgrove Singers to festivals, clinics and exchanges with other
choirs. During Jenna’s first year teaching at Ashgrove College in 1999, for example, one of the
first things she did was take her students to a workshop in another community college in
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Southern California. This specific college has a highly established choral program in the area–
they have performed at national ACDA conventions on numerous occasions. Stan Kerry
(pseudonym), the director of the choral program at this college, is Jenna’s friend and trusted
colleague. She knew that she could learn from him, as could her students. She explains how this
initial exchange happened:
Jenna: I called my friend Stan Kerry (pseudonym), and I said, “So, can we come down
and do an exchange with your group?” And he’s like, “Well, sure!” (singing) You
know, the holy trinity of choirs, and my 12 on the floor. He had us sit down here
on the floor and they were all up there. And we sang for them our little stuff, and
they got up and sang their hoorah, and then, we kind of encouraged conversation
between the kids. So they started talking while we did the ta-dah, and Stan would
say, “This is what we do, and this is how we do it, blah blah blah, and we have
sectionals, and we do this, blah blah blah,” and my kids are “blah blah blah.” And I
said, “Well, talk to them! How many of you are freshmen?” One, you know, “How
many of you are on the four-year plan?” We didn’t do that, but I wanted to—I kind
of knew the answer.
Irene: (light laughter)
Jenna: But, it was a really good conversation, you know, and we were walking out to the
van, and, and being my first year, they said, “Okay, you have $15 per kid for a
hotel room,” and I’m thinking, “Okay, four is $60, where...” so I stayed at a hotel
that was $60, and it was pretty sketchy. It was great, because they didn’t go out–
once it was night, they didn’t leave their rooms (light laughter) because there was
all kinds of permanent residents at this place (light laughter). They still talk about
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that. But, when we walked out of that rehearsal, one of the kids runs over and says,
“Mrs. Castolano” (pseudonym)–I was Castolano at the time–“Fred says he’s going
to transfer to their school next year!” And he’s going, “I didn’t say that!” And
they’re just goofing off, you know.
Irene: Well, wait...
Jenna: ‘Cause of this (screaming) “Ahhhh!” and then we’re down there with our 12 or 13
singers, or whatever it is...
Irene: So, what was your motivation as an educator...in taking them there?
Jenna: Because they need to see what they can do if they want to go there, you know? If
we’re going to go to this place, they need to know what that place is, and Joshua
Tree College is kind of the pinnacle of the tree. Even though it’s not the same as
my program or my students and stuff, I needed them to see what is the top, and
how...where we want to go. And so, I left it to them to have this conversation.
When we got back to the hotel, I said, “Okay, conference in my room,” you
know. So they all came into my room and we sat around in my room, and I said,
“Okay, so, talk about today.” And they’re like, “God, they’re damn good,” you
know. And I’m like, “Yeah.” And you know, they offered this and that. And I said,
“Okay, uh, are they any different than you, like, individually, are they different
than you?” “Well, no.” And I said, “Okay. So, what makes them sound like that?”
“Well, this and that...well, they have sectionals.” And I said, “Okay,” and you
know, I said, “So, how do we start moving in that direction to take this program
where it needs to go?” “Well, we should have sectionals, blah blah blah,” And that
night, they determined how I ran my program. They, that group of kids said, “We
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need to have sectionals.” And we came back and they started doing their
sectionals, so they’d meet for an hour every week, and they still do, that group.
Irene: So, I’m really interested how you came to like structure all this, like this
experience. Did you think it was going to happen? Did you think you were going
to have a discussion going there and knowing the things that you know, they
haven’t been there before?
Jenna: No.
Irene: I’m really curious how–how you approached that, like...
Jenna: I think that a lot of...I don’t think, I know, I’ve worked with a lot of colleagues,
and you know, different districts that I’ve worked in, who won’t do something
with their students for some pre-fabbed idea in their head. One of my guys would
not do any songs, like, “El Grillo” or these renaissance pieces about animals,
because “My kids won’t sing about animals. I can’t get them to sing that.” And I’m
thinking, “This is important part of the repertoire that they need to know
about, and why it was written, and what techniques were used.” And he would,
“Nope, they won’t, no.” And to me, everything I’ve learned as an educator,
everything I’ve learned as a student, is just because I said, “Okay, let’s go.”
(Interview 1)
I consider how much vulnerability it would take for me to do something like take my choir of
twelve singers to do an exchange with one of the leading community college choirs in the state.
Attempting to understand where Jenna might be coming from with this decision, I ask:
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Irene: Did you have experiences as a singer where you had fearless leadership, that kind
that you’re showing? Because I mean, a lot of the things you’re describing take a
lot of guts, you know?
Jenna: Really?
Irene: They just take an idea and the guts to make that idea happen.
Jenna: Well, I’m just not afraid. I don’t think so. I mean, my teacher at Ashgrove, I can
remember, we would go on trips, vocal tours, and he would teach us...’cause we
were doing vocal jazz and traditional literature, right, and he would have us,
um...he’d teach us a song, you know. “Here’s a note, here’s a song. Okay, start
harmonizing,” and so then, in the band, this whole creative thing is going on in the
band, and then he’d put on a concert, you know?
Irene: So, the...
Jenna: And, when I was his student aid, he would say, “Okay, I need you to pull this and I
need you to pull that. What you need to do is get some index cards, and if there’s a
piece you like, you write it on the card and the information, and you keep that file
for when you’re moving through the thing,” and I was like, “Oh, okay,” and when
we went on tour. He’d say, “Okay, you need to make the calls. Find the hotels,”
blah blah blah. (Interview 1)
I start to see the connection between Jenna’s openness to new experiences and her lack of fear of
what those experiences might bring. While her mentor did not necessarily foster Jenna’s
creativity, he encouraged her to learn the skills necessary to becoming a conductor. Jenna built
on a strong sense of independence by engaging in broad teaching experiences, from early
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childhood, K-12 to higher education. To be able to adapt to different contexts, Jenna also had to
continue her education beyond her undergraduate and graduate degrees.
Tenet 2: Lifelong learning
Not being afraid to put herself out there and continue to learn regardless of where she is
in her career is one of the key features of Jenna’s approach to teaching. In most of our
conversations, she mentions conferences that she has attended and workshops that she took part
in. Sitting in her living room during our second interview together, she shows me a photo album
at the World Choral Symposium in Barcelona. I flip through the pages and see Jenna and Martin
with their friends, established conductors and composers, walking through the church of Sagrada
Familia, enjoying meals at restaurants, and laughing together. She mentions that she will meet
these friends again at the upcoming ACDA National Convention in 2019, where she also decided
to join the ACDA Legacy Chorus. I ask her about it, trying to find out both what exactly the
Legacy Chorus is and why she is interested in being a part of it. She shares:
It's got like this hit parade of all these amazing people from the profession. You know,
I'm getting to a point in my career where I'm going, you know, “I think I could probably
learn something. This might be kind of fun!” you know (laughs). And I'm pretty sure
nobody else is going to do that because they want to go do whatever the social thing or
you know, whatever session. So, I'm going to do it. So, what the hell. So, I'm going to
sing in the thing in rehearsals every morning and then there’s a concert that they sing in. I
guess, I don't know, we'll see. But it turns out to be a leap of faith, but as long as I'm
teaching them to be learning something, I'm assuming I'll learn something in that
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situation when, you know, different conductors watching them work and stuff. (Interview
2)
That evening, I signed up to sing in the Legacy Chorus as well. Jenna’s drive to keep learning
inspires me. It is a part of who she is. There is so much more to learning than what is taught in
school, I think to myself.
Looking at Jenna, I begin to admire her tenacity to keep going. But where does this drive
to keep learning come from for her? When describing an experience participating at a clinic with
a professor from an established university whom Jenna knows well, she admits:
He knows I need to learn to be better, you know. And the students know that I go to
workshops and I do things all the time, because I need to learn, you know, and, and I
think that’s what kind of drives that, because I just...I’m not all that, you know what I
mean? I’m not...and I, I feel like I’ve spent most of my career catching up to my career, if
that makes sense. I just...I have no...I mean, my...I graduated with very little, very little
training, really. (Interview 2)
I probe this further, and ask Jenna about her formal education:
I didn't have a choral literature class. I got out of school, I had no conducting
experience. I had a conducting class where the professor told all the women that we, you
know, we weren't ever going to make it as conductors. That was my bachelor's degree.
Not a choral literature class, not one class that taught me how to be a choral director. Not
one. And it makes me happy for the profession, you know, because you guys have this
training and you’re, you know, you’re working with all these really amazing conductors
and in this new generation, that's in all the CSUs and all these young... Sandra’s 35 and
what Joshua Lin’s maybe close to 50 now and you know, Randy Sim’s barely 40 and you
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know, they’re just, it’s just this young dynamic group of amazingly intelligent choral
directors. And you know, I kind of feel like I faked my way through and through 35 years
of teaching, you know, but I still learning and stuff. (Interview 2)
Jenna’s experience of being discriminated against because of her gender strikes a chord with me.
I do not explore it further for fear of derailing the discussion about her education, but it leaves a
bitter taste in my mouth. Belonging to the “new generation” that Jenna referring to does make
certain things easier for me as a female conductor, but it is not all “daisies and roses.” I
empathize with Jenna but recognize just how much things have improved in way of equality
since she has been in school. When Jenna openly addresses the gap in our education, her tone is
not bitter. She may regret the shortcomings of her schooling, but she knows that the odds were
against her to begin with. Instead of letting that have long-term effect on her, she moves on and
goes after opportunities that are inclusive and available to everyone regardless of gender. In our
last interview, I ask her what she enjoys most about conducting. She answers:
I really enjoy, uh, things that challenge me. I...I don’t pick any music that I don’t like,
and I, you know, like, we did, like the Singers, they did “Set me as a seal,” the Clausen,
into, um, the “Zigeunerleben”, the Schumann, into that “Somewhere” arrangement from
West Side Story into “Witness.” And so I introduced it as, “You know, this is a journey
we’re going to take you on. The first is about love. The second is about a band of your
friends just getting rowdy and having a great time, a big old party. The third is about
hope, something that I wish for all of you, especially you young people, that this carries
the hope of your future. And the last one is about faith.” And then we just went. And, and
I think they did a really great job of, you know, switching from...’cause the styles are so
completely different, and there’s just a lot going on. So, it was fun doing that, where I
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could, you know, play around, and we had worked. We were tied enough to kind of keep
everything kind of where it needed to be, so I don’t know.
You know, it...different pieces challenge me in different ways, and we did a–last
spring, we did a...what’s her name? Joan Szymko piece called, uh...what’s it called? “To
Build a Swing,” I think is what it’s called. But, it’s like the craziest metrical thing I’ve
ever conducted, and it took me forever to figure it out, you know, because the kids are all
fragmented in how they...I don’t think we did it at USC, I can’t remember, but...because
it took us the entire semester to learn it, but I loved it, because it really challenged me. It
wasn’t just in four, you know, whatever. (Interview 3)
Jenna’s passion for lifelong learning is at the intersection of her love for choral repertoire, her
desire to be challenged, her awareness of the deficits in her formal education. As long as she
keeps learning, so will her students. Yet another aspect of her philosophy is to teach students
things that they cannot necessarily learn just from the content matter.
Tenet 3: Teaching with compassion
Jenna’s teaching philosophy is rooted in teaching the person, not just the subject matter.
With that comes a responsibility to account for real-life scenarios that her students may be going
through. Like any choral director, Jenna wants 100% attendance at her rehearsals and classes.
She establishes a clear framework for the rules of participation and sets clear expectations for her
students. Still, in a setting like a community college, where so many students are trying to make
a living while also going to school, attendance often suffers.
Jenna does many different things to help students navigate school and their real-life
situations. Recently, Jenna changed a traditional, in-person concert review assignment to an
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online assignment where students can watch a classical concert on YouTube and contribute to a
discussion. When I ask her about her rationale for doing so, Jenna explains:
Jenna: So, you know, and then the kids that can’t participate in it tomorrow because they
work or whatever. [But they] can, can listen to the video first and send me their
comments, and then I post them in the chat...
Irene: Ah...
Jenna: And then they also get to participate in the chat.
Irene: Oh! I get it. You put their comments in.
Jenna: Well, I just...you know, the idea is to teach them, you know, how to do it, and not
to–not to mess them up because they can’t be there that day (giggling). (Interview
1)
Attendance is one of the most common problems that Jenna has to deal with. Although it
frustrates her, she sees the bigger picture: What is important to her is that the student continues to
go to school. When talking about one of the members of the bass section of Ashgrove Singers,
she mentions:
I don’t think he’s coming to school for anything else, so if I get mad at him and boot
him out, then he’s done with school completely, where I kind of feel like there’s a thread
there, and if I tug at it enough, I might be able to pull him in. (Interview 3)
I remembered seeing this singer come to rehearsal wearing a harness from his job at a nearby
warehouse. It was the same singer that Jenna had talked about a month earlier:
Jenna: If I'm feeling affected by what's going on in the world, I can't even imagine what
they are because I get to come home to this and the husband who cooks for me and
you know, when we can go away on the weekend and stuff. And these guys are
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going home to what? Work and you know, living in the little apartment and you
know, fighting with their family, you know. One of the kids moved out while he was
still in high school, I think, in with his girlfriend because he and his dad who was
also a musician just split. And he's a brilliant musician, but dad said, “Okay, fine.
You know, that's what you're doing–sports.” So he's been working. He comes only
for this class. The kid that came in late [today].
Irene: Oh, with the harness. Wow.
Jenna: I said, “You need to get your butt in school.” He's a brilliant musician, but he's trying
to make a living. (Interview 2)
Jenna knows the circumstances of many of her students. They not only trust her, but also tell her
what happens in their lives. I wonder how she manages to strike a balance between empathizing
with them and doing her job effectively. When I ask Jenna what role empathy plays in her
teaching, she responds:
Jenna: Empathy, hm...well...some of my kids are living by themselves, I think I’ve
mentioned that to you earlier, you know, there’s conflicts at home, they’ve moved
out with a girlfriend, they’re working, they’re living in an apartment, they’re...you
know, and sometimes, you can’t, you know...Or, one of my girls, not the singers,
but one of my girls in another class, they have her grandfather with Alzheimer’s in
the house, so mom stays home full time, and she drives from one of those little
rural towns, south of here, so an hour south is where she lives.
Irene: Wow.
Jenna: So, she drives an hour, which I know on L.A. freeways...
Irene: No, it’s different. Out here, it’s an actual drive, you know?
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Jenna: Right.
Irene: It’s not standing.
Jenna: So, you know, I, I think...as opposed to my kids at Sorrentino (pseudonym), say, I
have to be...I have to be empathetic with the situations, as much as I know–I don’t
always know everything about them, but you know, we’ve got kids who are
severely depressed, and just living, you know, on nothing, and you know, or
parents kicked them out, you know. And I mean, I’ve had those at, at other places
too, but...you know, I think, the first time I heard this, it was Kyle Gunderson
(pseudonym) did a workshop, and he said, “You know, you have to remember to
make the most important thing the most important thing, and sometimes, it’s not
learning the Italian to Mozart’s whatever. It’s making them feel like this is a safe
place where I can be, and I can just be myself and forget about that for a little bit,
but if I can’t make it, that it’s not...I’m not going to be...you know? And I try, you
know, to get on them about not missing class. (Interview 1)
Jenna’s colleague affirms a key tenet of her teaching philosophy: teach with compassion and
discern between which battles to fight and which to let go. More importantly, being kind and
compassionate extends outside of the classroom for Jenna. She notices the general demeanor of
students changing over the years, and wants to continue to be able to connect to them:
I’ve had kids in my appreciation classes, you know, and I’ll have a class of 110,
appreciation classes, and I’ll be walking down and go, “Hey Irene, how’s it going?” and
they’re like, “You knew my name!” You know what I mean? I think it makes a
difference. I think kids are different now, I think from, you know, 20 years ago when I
started, they’re very different. They’re in this...you know, when I walk to school, I try to
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look up any time I’m passing someone and say hello to them, and most of them have
buds in their ears and don’t see me, but some of them will go, “Oh, hi!” you know?
“Wow, you talked to me!” (Interview 1)
Parting words
I sit down with Jenna for the last time to inquire about what’s next in her career. She
mentioned retirement several times in our previous conversations, so I want to know if she is
actually considering it. I end our last interview together with an open-ended question, asking her
to speak about anything that she deems important:
Jenna: I don’t know. I kind of feel like, you know, every year I’m reinventing and this
year, I feel a little more centered and accepting of the situation with...of this thing
that the kids are going through, because it seems like they’ve changed a lot,
especially this year. Um...I’ve noticed a lot more, uh, troubled kids, or kids, you
know, with autistic kind of tendencies. It seems like since last year, that...I don’t
know if I’m more aware of it or I’m looking for it, or they’re just finding their way
to us, or...you know, what that is, but it’s troubling to me, to see troubled kids, you
know? But, they can still come in and kind of do their thing, and then also, on the
other hand–on the other side of that, I’m seeing kids that were like, “Oh, I just
have to take choir because it’s my large ensemble but I play guitar,” and they’re
starting to act like they’re enjoying themselves, and it’s pretty fun, actually, you
know, to kind of see...to kind of see that, so I just have to keep reminding myself
that...I know. I started in this business for them, and when I walk away, it’s going
to be tough, because I’m leaving them, not leaving the work or the job or, you
know, what I’ve been doing. They’re my little family, my little family of music
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people.
Irene: What do you hope for the program when you go?
Jenna: I hope that whoever gets the gig continues to accept them, you know, and nurture
them, and take good care of them, more than anything, you know, keep the
program going, and keep trying to get more into the...into the fold, you know. A lot
of kids come in, and they’re like, “I didn’t even know we had a choir,” and it’s
like...that’s a conversation for another time, but you found us, so good. But, that
they continue to have those kinds of experiences. You know, because I was in the
group, I think maybe I had a little more investment in where I wanted the group to
be because of the experiences that I received when I was part of the group. You
know, I got taken to Europe for three weeks my freshman year, or after my
freshman year, you know. I learned [about] working in the library to look at
literature that I liked and make note of those things. And, you know, that kind of
started this journey that I’ve been on for a long time. Crazy... [pauses] It’s hard to
believe, sometimes. It’s hard for me to even think about talking retirement, and
many of my circles are talking about retirement, or are retired already, and you
know, it’s kind of weird to have it all of the sudden sneak up on you, and go,
“Woah! You’re at retirement age! When did that happen? What the heck?”
Irene: Well, what’s influencing your choice to retire?
Jenna: What, what?
Irene: What’s influencing your choice to retire?
Jenna: Hmm...that’s interesting. Well, you know, if I go according to what the state
teacher’s retirement does, I would still...I would stay for three, four more years, if I
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topped out on the age thing, because I started teaching so young, and I don’t think
I’m going to do that, but one of the...and, the amount of work outside of the
classroom is a huge thing, committees, and, you know, baloney that’s coming from
administration and that kind of stuff. That will affect when I go, um, but not the
actual teaching. Not the actual teaching. So, I think I could do that for a long time,
so it’s more the external factors that are kind of...kind of have me thinking about it,
you know? Just...and, and, a couple of years ago, I was like, “You know what? I’m
out of here. I’m so done with this place. I’m not dealing with this kind of junk.”
Now it’s like, “Yeah, it’s good here. Next year...” and, we have two new
faculty members, and I’m the senior-most faculty member, so I have the most
institutional memory of how we’ve managed to operate in a positive way. And I
kind of feel obligated to make sure that everybody’s settled. And you know,
whoever the new person is in the spring, I kind of feel it’s my duty to, you know,
to my department, to the school, to make sure that people are well taken care of,
and, you know, somebody took care of me when I got there, you know? They
helped me along, and I kind of feel like I need to do that for them, although they’re
both pretty smart and have all kinds of ideas. She’s trying to do too much stuff
right now, but she’ll figure it out. Like, “Oh, hey, before you start ten things in the
first year, why don’t you spread those out a little bit?”
Irene: True.
Jenna: So, those are the things that are preventing me from retiring right now, you know,
because I kind of feel like...maybe it’s I feel like I’m...needed, I don’t know. If that
makes sense...as a colleague, you know, I feel like I’m on their side. And
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sometimes I don’t feel that way with other individuals over there, and so, I want to
make sure they’re settled in. We’re clear we made the right choices, you know,
good choices. I just want to help them get...there’s still a lot of questions when
you’re going through your first job trying to learn all of the ropes, and teach all of
your classes, and she does a lot of performing outside, you know, and it’s nice to
have somebody in there that will come to my door and go, “Can I ask you about
something?” I go, “Yeah, of course,” so...I kind of feel like the team mom now,
over there with the faculty, so. Yeah. I don’t know. I don’t...you know, everybody
says you’ll know when it’s time. And so, I’m thinking next year, but maybe,
maybe not, it kind of depends on how I’m feeling and how our life is going, and
how much fun my husband is having in his retirement, going whenever he wants.
So, we’ll see. I don’t know. (Interview 3)
Next year Jenna completes 20 years of teaching at Ashgrove College. Twenty years is a
conveniently rounded figure to quote when talking about one’s career. I can understand why she
may want to retire then. Jenna and her husband Martin are active members of Ashgrove’s
community. Both times that the three of us went out to restaurants during my visits, they were
stopped by former students and colleagues to chat. Ashgrove is a small enough town that Jenna
and Martin can continue to stay active and make a positive impact during their retirement.
I look around where we are sitting and see many gifts from former students scattered
around the room. Jenna gets up and searches for a music box that she wants to show me. She
takes out a small wooden box with an image of a gray fluffy cat engraved on top. I ask if it was a
gift that her students gave her: She responds:
Jenna: Yeah, from my first year of teaching. 1984.
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Irene: Wow. Aw, can I see it?
Jenna: Yeah.
Irene: It says, “We love you, mom.” [music plays] What song is this?
Jenna: “I’d like to teach the world to sing.”
Irene: That’s amazing.
Jenna: And, they knew I like cats.
Irene: Oh my goodness.
Jenna: And, I’m still in touch with one of those students. She lives in San Jose with her
partner. We’re Facebook friends, and Martin and I have gone over there and
stayed. But, yeah, they gave that to me my first year of teaching.
Irene: Wow.
Jenna: Isn’t that crazy?
Irene: That’s an incredible gift. What a thoughtful song.
Jenna: And, just all around love.
Irene: Pretty nutty.
Jenna: And, you just have that note in there, nothing else.
Irene: Yeah, and it stayed all those years. Oh, it’s beautiful.
Jenna: 35 years.
I pretend to fuddle with my recording equipment to avoid letting her see wetness in my eyes. The
moment was too sincere, the little music box song too moving for me to keep it together. Jenna
searches for something on her bookshelf. She found a screw in the music box and is looking for
where it may have come from. I stop the tape recorder and get up to give her a goodbye hug.
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Chapter Summary
In this chapter, I offered a narrative description of the primary participants in this study,
as well as Jenna Dahl, the Director of Choral Activities at Ashgrove College. I began the chapter
with a vignette about meeting Jenna on campus, followed by an excerpt from our first interview
in which Jenna shared her story of how she came to teach at the institution. The second part of
the chapter discussed Jenna’s teaching philosophy, as it emerged from my analysis of in-depth
interviews with her. I identified three key tenets of her teaching philosophy: (1) wanting to
provide students an experience, (2) lifelong learning and (3) teaching with compassion. Using
excerpts from the interviews, I illustrated how the aforementioned tenets play out in Jenna’s
approach to her work. In the next chapter, I will discuss how Jenna’s teaching practices intersect
with her student’s learning experiences, focusing specifically on exercises that Jenna has her
students engage in that facilitate perspective taking. Chapter six will also feature triangulation of
Jenna’s practices discussed in this chapter, along with a discussion on how her teaching
philosophy impacts the community of practice at Ashgrove College.
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Chapter 5: Findings and Discussion
Chapter Overview
As outlined in Chapter Three of this dissertation, I had two goals with this study: to
examine the community of practice of Ashgrove Singers, and to analyze how social perspective
taking (SPT) unfolds within this community of practice. In this chapter, I focus on the first aim
by using Wenger’s (1998) theory of Communities of Practice and elements of Lave and
Wenger’s (1991) Legitimate Peripheral Participation (LPP) theory to map out practices,
negotiation of meaning, identity formation and sense of belonging in Ashgrove Singers. Here,
my goal is to bring attention to certain mechanisms for social learning that occur in this choral
ensemble. By doing so, I hope to offer educators with some insights for thinking about choral
music education.
Next, I aim to answer my primary research questions, (1) How do participants describe
the process of taking each other’s musical and non-musical perspectives in the context of their
participation in choir? and (2) What consequences result from participants’ process of taking on
others’ perspectives? and discuss ways in which participants describe the process of taking each
other’s musical and non-musical perspectives in the context of participation in choir. I also
examine the musical and non-musical consequences that result from the participants’ process of
taking on others’ perspectives. To make my point, I use examples of three choral compositions to
highlight strategies used by participants when engaging in perspective taking and describing their
process of taking on the perspective of the character in each composition. Finally, I discuss the
role of the director in facilitating or hindering perspective taking in rehearsal between singers
and during interpretation of choral repertoire. To end the chapter, I discuss implications for
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practice of this research, focusing on teaching and learning practices within the field of choral
music education within the community college context.
Ashgrove Singers: Meet the Community of Practice
Ashgrove Singers is an auditioned SATB choir within the choral program at Ashgrove
College. Members of this choir are part-time and full-time students, who study a variety of
subjects. There were 22 singers in the group during the 2018-2019 academic year. In some years,
the choir experiences a high turn-over in membership. The implications of a high turn-over
within the choir is that this dynamic community of practice has a consistent influx of newcomers.
I include voices of some of those newcomers, as well as full participants in the description of the
choir’s practice.
Practice
Wenger (1998) identifies practice as a collection of routines, rituals, artifacts, symbols,
conventions, stories, and histories (p. 5). In this section, I draw on my observations, field notes,
and data from in-depth interviews to describe these elements of practice at Ashgrove Singers in
more detail.
Rehearsal culture. Ashgrove Singers meet twice a week, from 12:00 pm until 2:00 pm.
As the students entered the classroom, their routine consisted of greeting the conductor and each
other, putting down their belongings next to their seats, checking their phones and presumably
setting them to “inaudible,” and getting their music out. Jenna Dahl, the conductor, had a slightly
different routine. Since she is only able to enter the room minutes before class starts (as there is a
class in the lecture hall just before her rehearsal), she prepared all of the materials needed for
rehearsal in her office, which left her with only a few routine tasks to complete when in the room
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with the students. Some of these tasks included writing the order of compositions that the group
will rehearse on a large blackboard and putting all of her scores in order on the music stands.
Every student is expected to own a tuning fork and know how to use it. The tool is an
important artifact within this COP. Each rehearsal, students took out their tuning forks and
placed them where they deemed was most convenient–in their shirt pocket, inside their choir
folder, on their chair. Before starting to sing, each student took out their tuning fork and
calculated their starting pitches. This was a ritual that constituted specific practices of Ashgrove
Singers. One of the primary participants in this study, Gwen, shared that the expectation to use a
tuning fork does not apply to Ashgrove Choir, a non-auditioned choral group on campus. She
described the difference of demeanor and approach that the director, Jenna Dahl has toward both
groups:
She treats the Ashgrove Choir differently than she treats the Ashgrove Singers. For the
Ashgrove Singers, she's the stern mom. She's the one with the high expectations. In the
Ashgrove Choir on the other hand, she's more, she's softer, she's nicer, she's more
encouraging and less demanding. And for a while there it was kind of...I'll say a little bit
resentful, you know, because, you know, they got all their notes fed to them and we were
expected, you know, to be able to plug in our solfege and just know it, you know, that
sort of thing. Demanding that we get every pitch from the tuning fork, you know, some
people would have really trouble with that. She, you know, would have Aaron feed the
first notes to the Choir. Never let us have that, that sort of thing. (Interview 1)
As I did not observe Jenna’s rehearsal with Ashgrove Choir, I was not able to probe Gwen’s
opinion on the difference in Jenna’s disposition toward both groups. During field visits, I did
notice that Jenna treated the Ashgrove Singers much in the same way a conductor would treat an
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advanced collegiate ensemble–by setting a focused tone in rehearsal, giving constructive
feedback, and pushing the singers to get better with each attempt. Pushing the students to step
outside of their comfort zones and use a tuning fork was an identifying aspect to participation in
Ashgrove Singers. It was a symbol of high expectations within this community of practice, and
within the local community of the choral program at Ashgrove College.
Participant roles. Ashgrove Singers rehearsals created a participatory environment
where students engage in action (singing), discussion and reflection. There were well-defined
roles within this COP: Jenna Dahl was the conductor, Aaron as the collaborative pianist, there
were section leaders for each section, and remaining members. Members of the COP saw
themselves as a resource to others. An example of this was illustrated by a conversation during a
focus group with the study participants. David (pseudonym), a newcomer to the COP, spoke
about feeling insecure about his musical abilities as a newcomer to the choir. He had never sung
in an ensemble before:
David: The very first day we did sight reading, and I was just like, “What?” and then,
there was no words, it was just notes, so I just looked at everyone else, and they
were just doing it, like...
Irene: What did you think about them in that moment?
David: Just...I didn’t...well, for one, I didn’t expect this (light laughter), and that, “This
is what I have to do here? Like, what about all this music we have in this folder
with words in it?”
Irene: Was there anybody next to you that kind of shepherded you along, or somebody
that you could lean on?
David: All of the singers are shepherding me right now (light laughter).
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Irene: Yeah?
David: Yeah, Emmanuel is chief among them, because I’ve kind of come in for, like, his
tutoring for a bit. We’ve specifically worked on solfege, which, that’s what I find
out what it was. Because at first I was like, “soul-fudge?” What’s that? (laughter)
Emmanuel: That’s when we taught you to read the music, because like, we did in a day
because he picked up incredibly fast, and I was like, “Cool,” and the other time he
was like, “I need help,” and I’m like, “Cool!” and then he said, “I need help with
this,” [crosstalk], I’m like, “...cool.” I’m like, well, like, I’m not the section
leader, I’m not, but I am the voice, or part of the voices in my section, so it’s up
to me. I love helping people. (Focus Group 1)
In this dialogue, David and Emmanuel described how a singer’s role in a community might
intersect: Emmanuel was a resource to David, he was exchanging information with him and
shared new tips and ideas. David was making sense of the situation and ultimately, the two
students kept each other company and made their singing experience more enjoyable for each
other. We also saw how the use of language, specifically the term solfege, enabled David to learn
the way full participants speak in the COP. According to Lave & Wenger (1991), “didactic
instruction creates unintended practices” (p. 107) which means that “for newcomers the purpose
is not to learn from talk as a substitute for legitimate peripheral participation; it is to learn to talk
as a key to legitimate peripheral participation” (p. 107). In David’s case, learning how to use the
term solfege properly helped him transition from being a newcomer to becoming a full
participant.
On the opposite spectrum, full participants engaged in certain roles as they gradually
became experts in their community of practice. Gwen, as an example, has been in Ashgrove
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Singers for the entire duration of her associate degree at the college. She was a section leader,
and a student worker for the choral office. Her institutional knowledge of the choral program at
Ashgrove College, as well as innate leadership personality, identified her as a full participant in
the COP. Anayah, a singer in Gwen’s section in the choir commented on Gwen’s role with the
group, which was highlighted by an additional level of responsibility as section leader:
Anayah: So we have our alto group chat on Facebook and if there's ever an emergency that
involved Ashgrove Singers, the first thing that you have to do is message Gwen
because she's the section leader and she reports everything to Mrs. Dahl. So she if
doesn't know what's going on with us, then Mrs. Dahl doesn't know what's going
on with us and it’s just like a chain reaction that goes off to where it looks bad on
you, and then it can upset both of them, Gwen and Mrs. Dahl. And Gwen gets
very upset if we don't let her know what's going on because not only is she our
section leader, she pretty much is the mom of the choir when Ms. Dahl isn't
around. So, she looks after everyone.
Irene: Yeah, no, that makes sense. Gwen is the mom! (chuckles)
Anayah: She pretty much is. And it's sad because I think next semester will be her last
semester with us...But yeah, she really is the mom of the choir when Ms. Dahl is
not around. Like she keeps everything in line and provides information.
Someone's freaking out about something, she'll calm everyone down and just say
“It's fine. We'll deal with it when Mrs. Dahl gets here.” (Interview 1)
With student roles came the issue of power within COPs. Wenger (1998) states that power is
“always mediated by the community’s production of its practice” (p. 80). Gwen’s identity of
competence is partially shaped by her role as an expert within Ashgrove Singers. Students who
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are engaged as participants can sometimes abuse their power, however. In speaking about an
unidentified student in the choir, the accompanist for the choir, Aaron, shared:
I feel like there's some students that we're not reaching and I don't know quite what to do.
I know like that there is a student who has taken some leadership...and I feel like I'm
seeing some, a little bit of, how would you call that, tension? Between the students,
maybe a little bit of resentment within students in that section. And I've talked to this
leader and said, you know, um...I think I said, you know, just keep an eye on things
cause, um...you know, we want to stay positive and you know. We...I don't even know
what I said...But I talked to her and I've still got my eye on it. Um...I have faith that, you
know, we're gonna get through it, um...and it's...I just see the look in some students' faces
and then I, I don't know if there's, if they're having a rough time or not for sure, but you
know, I'm always kind of monitoring that. (Interview 1)
Aaron was also a key participant in this COP. His role was twofold: he provided musical support,
and also shared the responsibility of looking out for students as a faculty member. Over the
course of six years, Aaron went from being a newcomer to becoming a full participant in his
roles as well. In line with this, Wenger (1998) explains that “moving toward full participation in
practice involves not just a greater commitment of time, intensified effort, more and broader
responsibilities within the community, and more difficult and risky tasks, but more significantly,
an increasing sense of identity as a master practitioner” (p. 111). Aaron’s concern about the
power struggle within a section of the choir and the singers’ emotional wellbeing set him apart as
having broader responsibilities than the student members in the Ashgrove Singers’ COP.
Examples illustrated by the narratives of David, Gwen and Daniel highlight the idea that
“understanding and experience are in constant interaction” (Lave & Wenger, 1991, pp. 51-52)
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and that members of a COP continuously negotiated their roles. Roles constantly shifted as
members engaged with new tasks and functions in order to gain new understandings. This led to
mutual engagement, the kind of “community maintenance” as people’s roles evolved and power
structure shifted. Singers socialized, gained a reputation, made trouble, distinguished themselves,
and developed shared ways of doing things (see Wenger, 1998, p. 75).
Explicit and tacit rules. Explicit rules in Ashgrove Singers referred to the language used
by the ensemble director and the participants, the tools (e.g., tuning forks, music scores) used,
rehearsal norms (e.g., coming to rehearsal on time, notifying the director if absent), and artifacts
(e.g., concert programs, video recordings of formal and informal performances, notes that the
singers write to each other). Tacit rules referred to implicit conventions in the group (e.g., not to
speak during rehearsal unless asked), subtle cues (e.g., body language of students who are more
introverted or who are more willing to physically engage in other students’ space), underlying
assumptions (e.g., participation in Ashgrove Singers requires a significant time commitment) and
specific perceptions (e.g., Ashgrove Singers being the face of the choral program at the college).
Both types of rules manifested themselves within the rehearsal culture of Ashgrove Singers.
Negotiation of Meaning
Wenger states that “practice is about meaning as an experience of everyday life” (p. 52).
Thus, every social interaction, artifact, ritual, convention, or use of tool, generates new
circumstances and consequently, new meanings. In Ashgrove Singers, a singer in the choir
contributed to negotiation of meaning by being a member of a community and by bringing the
history of their participation with them. Choral compositions contributed to negotiation of
meaning by “reflecting aspects of practice that have been congealed in it and fixed in its shape”
(Wenger, 1998, p. 55). Each time that a singer rehearsed or performed a choral work, despite it
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being a repetition of text and music that has previously been sung, new meanings were
generated. Engaging with choral repertoire was, therefore, a dual process of participation and
reification.
Participation and Reification
According to Wenger (1998), meaning is negotiated through a duality of participation
and reification. Participation is always an active process, and can be collaborative or conflictual.
It shapes us, much in the same way that our participation in a COP also shapes that community.
Even when people leave the community, their participation is still active. Wenger states that
“participation is broader than mere engagement in practice” (p. 57). Albert, a graduate of the
Ashgrove College choral program who is now studying at a four-year institution, was an
example of a member whose participation in a COP of Ashgrove Singers can still be considered
active. In a phone interview, I asked him to compare his experience at Ashgrove College with his
current experience studying music education at the state university:
Irene: Speaking of your university, what would you say are the big differences between
your experience at Ashgrove College and there?
Albert: Yeah. I think it’s different. At Ashgrove College, rehearsals are much more of a
collaborative process. Um, I think there’s a lot of...like... there’d be times where
we’d go through a piece, and Mrs. Dahl would sort of stop and say, “What do you
think this piece needs?” and people would all just sort of put in their ideas, of
“Oh, this needs more dynamics,” or “This needs more expression in the text,” or
“We need to cut off in the right places for a breath,” you know, stuff like that.
Um, but, you know, it was a very collaborative process. If you had a note that you
wanted to add to rehearsals, you could pretty much always raise your hand and
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add it. And at my current university, he’s a very competent director, so, um, he
kind of...he kind of takes charge, and just sort of runs it himself. And that’s
totally fine, it’s just that...and, I don’t mean that in the sense that Jenna Dahl is
not a competent director because she absolutely is. But it’s just...it’s different.
I think she wanted a much more involved student presence, where people were all
free to craft the music themselves or decide what it needed. Everyone’s ideas
were very highly considered, sort of thing. At this university, it’s much more,
“This is what I want from you.”
Irene: Why do you think that is, the difference?
Albert: Um, I’m not really sure. He’s the head of the Choral Ed department at this
university, he’s the director of the choir, so I think there’s a lot of times when he’s
very careful to model good directorial behavior and explain, “This is what I want,
and this is how I’m getting it.”
Irene: That’s really interesting.
Albert: Um, I think...[short pause] huh?
Irene: That’s really interesting.
Albert: Yeah, I think whereas at Ashgrove College it was much more sort of...um, I think
it was much more, you know, soft on a student level. I’m not really sure why that
is. It might just come down to personality differences, but, um, she was very
interested in what all the students had to say.
Irene: So, who would you do it like? Would you do it like Jenna at Ashgrove–when
you get out there in the world and you’re conducting, or, would you take the
more, um, ‘directorial behavior’ approach?
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Albert: Um, I think I want to do it like Jenna. I think, um, it, um, it really...you know,
because you do run the risk of the same three students being the ones to raise their
hands to contribute every time, and some people sort of sit back, but at the same
time, you ask students to think for themselves and sort of, um, say, “Well, what
do you think this piece needs?” and you’re not necessarily looking for a right
answer. I think it really engages a lot of students, um, in levels that they might not
be if you’re just sort of telling them what you want. But, not only that, I think
because it engages their interest. It reminds people that sort of everybody brings
something different to that process, and that sort of is something to be celebrated,
a lot of people...that’s what makes the choir process beautiful, is a lot of people
working together with different ideas to produce this thing. (Interview 1)
Even though Albert no longer sings in Ashgrove Singers, the meaning that Albert negotiated for
himself while in the group continues to stay with him and impact his plans for his own teaching
practice. By choosing Jenna’s approach to rehearsing for himself, Albert aligned his identity as a
teacher with that of a member of his COP. This stance affected how he saw himself as a leader,
what he cared about, what he attempted to understand and what he wanted to ignore, and how he
wished to steer his trajectory. All of these elements comprised the process of negotiation of
meaning. What Albert observed in Jenna’s approach is her teaching philosophy in action. Her
approach to rehearsing reflects her beliefs about her COP, her students, and her own role as a
leader and educator. Over time, Jenna’s teaching philosophy was distilled through many
iterations of the process of negotiation of meaning.
Reification creates a “point of focus around which the negotiation of meaning is
organized” (Wenger, 1998, p. 59). It refers to a process as well as a product and can take many
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forms. A key example of how participation and reification combined to negotiate meaning
occurred in Jenna Dahl’s programming of choral repertoire. The pieces that Jenna chose were not
just tools for learning. Rather, each piece had to have special meaning for her personally.
Students who participated in learning the musical repertoire that Jenna had chosen, by extension,
reified that meaning in performance. Furthermore, the repertoire in which Ashgrove Singers
participated in reified cultural values of that COP. Silvia’s perception of Jenna’s intent in
choosing repertoire reified Jenna’s mission to make participation in Ashgrove Singers about
more than just singing:
When she picks music, it's not because something sounds pretty, it's because something
has a message in it. And like as she says, she, when she's looking at music for, you know,
new semesters and everything, she looks at the words first and the texts and everything.
She doesn't listen to it first. Majority of the people listened to it and then dive into the text
and see how they can relate it. She says if it doesn't speak to her then she doesn't want it.
No matter how pretty it sounds. (Interview 1)
Jenna confirmed this by stating, “I don’t pick any music that I don’t like” (Interview 3). Her taste
was vast, however. In looking at past concert programs dating back to 1999, I saw an eclectic
mix of repertoire that included works from the Western classical tradition and beyond. In fact,
every spring, Jenna programmed an “Around-the-World” type concert for her community. In it,
Ashgrove Singers performed a repertoire including choral traditions from around the globe, from
Estonia to Namibia. That is, Jenna practiced what I would call intentional programming: She
found repertoire that is meaningful to her, but she programmed with the students in mind by
thinking about what might be meaningful for them. Gwen’s narrative is an example of the impact
Jenna’s programming has on Gwen’s day-to-day life:
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This morning I was like “Ugh...do I, do I come to school today or not? Because I really
don’t feel good...” And then I said, “But oh no, I got to get to rehearsal,” you know what
I mean? I just kind of, like...appreciate the, the repertoire that we do. I mean there's
always a piece that's really fun to sing. There's always a piece that really shows off our
skills and there's always a piece that really challenges us. You know? And I mean last
year, last year it was like 90 percent challenge it felt like. Last year, last year we had a
really, really well focused group because most of us had been in it for at least two years
...so, um...we had a lot of, we had a lot of high level musicians in the group too, like
really experienced high level singers and so we hadn't really heavy repertoire but I...but I
feel like this semester is really well balanced. (Interview 1)
In Ashgrove Singers, repertoire became more than just a tool for learning. Repertoire shaped the
kind of participation that is required of the students, but it also realized the shape of the
experience. For Gwen, being a part of a choir with a “balanced” program was a point of pride, a
feature of the learning community that she was glad to be a part of. The interplay between
participation and reification then created its own meaning for each member of the COP of
Ashgrove Singers.
Identity Formation
Each member of Ashgrove Singers brought with them an individuality when they entered
the group. Wenger (1998) asserts that individuality is “something that is part of the practices of
specific communities” (p. 146). The topic of identity within Wenger’s theory addresses the
interplay between the “self” and the “collective” by looking at ways in which the two mutually
influence each other. He further states that “it is as misleading to view identities as abstractly
collective as it is to view them as narrowly individual” (p. 146) Wenger points out that there are
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common misconceptions about the “self vs. collective” debate, mainly, that the self is free and
the collective is imprisoning, or that the collective implies harmony while the self implies feeling
fragmented (see Wenger, 1998, p. 146). Analyzing the concept of identity within this theoretical
framework is more nuanced than just looking at a duality. Wenger outlines five characterizations
of identity within a COP: 1) identity as negotiated experience, 2) identity as community
membership, 3) identity as learning trajectory, 4) identity as nexus of membership, and 5)
identity as a relationship between the local and the global. These were clearly seen in the voices
of students and director, as seen ahead in this chapter.
Trajectories of participation. According to Wenger, identities can be shaped by
intersectional experiences (p. 154). These intersectional experiences form trajectories of
participation. Trajectories “incorporate the past and the future in the very process of negotiating
the present” (p. 155). One of the primary participants of this study, Silvia, illustrated this idea
when discussing her self-perception as a section leader in Ashgrove Singers. When I first met
Silvia during the focus group, she spoke about her role as a “newcomer” section leader. She
compared herself to a former section leader, Barbara (pseudonym), who had moved on to attend
a four-year university:
Silvia: I had a really great section leader last year. Her name was Barbara (pseudonym). I
remember before the first sectional we had, like, I remember messaging her and
asking her, because I’m also behind in music classes, ‘cause I just switched over,
like last semester. Um, so, I just remember, like, asking...I asked her a lot of
questions on like, “Okay, how would you do this?” because I only knew her
personally for a year, so I didn’t get to know her as well as say, Gwen did.
Gwen: She was one of my best friends.
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Silvia: Yeah, and, I have been asking her a lot on how to run a sectional, because we were
a really, really good section last year, and me being the only returner and it being
my first year as a section leader, like, it was really scary for me coming in this
year. And I was very hesitant to actually tell Mrs. D that [using a sheepish tone]
“Okay, I’ll be the section leader...” I was like, “Is there a way that we can like pass
it off to someone else?” and then I realized that no one else is a returner, and I was
like, “I don’t know if that’s going to work, I don’t know,” so, I’ve just been kind of
playing it by ear, but also thinking...
Gwen: You’ve stepped it up!
Silvia: Yeah (light laughter). So, I’ve just been kind of, like, just like Gwen, trying to
figure out what Barbara would do, because again, she left huge shoes to fill. (Focus
Group 1)
In my final interview with Silvia, she again brought up her role as a section leader when I asked
if she had anything to add before we closed the interview. She responded:
Silvia: I think that as a section leader, I have been striving to be like my previous section
leader. She came to our recent performance which was like two weeks ago now? It
was on the 20th. Um, she came to our performance then and...I was really, really
excited when I saw her. She always says she's a Hufflepuff, which is like a Harry
Potter thing. I don't know if you know that. But yeah, she's a Hufflepuff. So like
she's very, very, um...outgoing, so like anyone can be friends with her. Um, so I
always try, because I'm very shy, I always tried to kind of be like her. And she was
also an amazing musician–like huge, gigantic shoes to fill with like her leaving and
me like having to step up to be a section leader. I find myself in sectionals, like
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always kind of in my head like, "Well, what would she do in this situation? Would
she have us count-sing? Would she have us do this? Would she have–,” you know,
like I'm trying to figure out like what she would do in situations like that because
sometimes I just, I'm winging it and I have no idea what is going on. I have to
think like, "Well, what would she do? Because she would know what to do
because she has been doing music for quite some time now." And I just need to get
into the headspace of what would she do. I just, that's what I've been trying to do.
Irene: And how has that been like?
Silvia: It seems like it's going kind of well so far. It seems like it's kind of working
because sopranos, you know, generally know what they're doing now. You know, I
think I've found the flow. But now instead of like...I think I need to like stop
saying “what would she do?” and now start saying, “Silvia, what are you going to
do?” So now transitioning from “what would Barbara do?” to “what is Silvia
gonna do, how is Silvia going to fix this? How is Silvia gonna to make this her
own?” I need to like get that...mindset (giggle)
Irene: Yeah. That's huge!
Silvia: Yeah. I think I need to stop babying myself with that and think “how is Silvia
going to get this together?” Because Barbara, she's not here anymore. Like half of
the sopranos don't even know who she is. So it's kind of like “you need to stop
saying that. Say what would Silvia do? What is Silvia gonna do?” Yeah.
Irene: Cool.
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Silvia: Because we're pretty far into the semester now. Like halfway there, halfway being
done. And I'm still saying “what would Barbara do?” and that's my issue. I need to
say “what would Silvia do?” (Interview 3)
Silvia’s trajectory of being a section leader incorporated the negotiation of past, future and
present. First, her identity as a section leader was shaped by her experience of singing in the
section when Barbara was the section leader. Barbara is a “living testimony to what is possible,
expected, desirable” (Wenger, 1998, p. 156) within the COP of section leaders in Ashgrove
Singers. By observing Barbara teaching and solving different music problems, Silvia gained a
model for how to do the job of a section leader effectively and considered her proposed identity
(see Wenger, 1998, p. 156). She saw herself in the future as an effective section leader–someone
that, like Barbara, would be an effective teacher and leader. In the present moment, she
negotiated the point at which she needed to break free from being the “newcomer” and transition
to becoming the “expert.” Her desire to feel independent and masterful in the position was
obvious in our last interview: she wanted to recover a sense of independence and claim the
position as her own. Silvia’s trajectory of membership was governed in part by a desire for
autonomy. In her narrative, Silvia was in the process of merging her identity as a mentee with
her emerging role as a mentor, as well as her inner feeling of still being a newcomer with an
emerging sense of becoming an expert.
Nexus of multi-membership. According to Wenger (1998), “in a nexus, multiple
trajectories become part of each other, whether they clash or reinforce each other. They are, at
the same time, one and multiple” (p. 159). Jenna Dahl exemplified a nexus of multi-membership
in her role as a director of Ashgrove Singers. Of all of the participants in the study, she was the
one with whom I spent most of my time. Through our conversations, I have come to better
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understand how her identity was reconciled within a nexus of multi-membership in different
communities of practice.
Jenna’s identity encompassed multiple memberships. First, she was the Director of
Choral Activities at Ashgrove College. This identity entailed multiple trajectories. She was an
educator and as such, she directed the activity in which her students participated. In Wenger’s
theory, direction of effort is referred to as alignment. Alignment allows participants to coordinate
energies, actions and practices, becoming more connected. Wenger (1998) further states that
“alignment requires the ability to coordinate perspectives and actions in order to direct energies
to a common purpose” (p. 186). In her identity as an educator, Jenna coordinated the
perspectives of her students and guided their actions to sing and perform within a choral
education setting. She had “power over [her] own energy to exercise alignment and the power to
inspire or demand alignment” (p. 180). In the process of guiding alignment, Jenna was perceived
by all members in the COP in different ways. A recurring theme in the students’ voices was the
perception of Jenna as a parental figure. Several students commented on this throughout the data
collection:
Gwen: I think there should be more give and take than the kind of, you know, the
totalitarian regime that Mrs. Dahl runs. That that sounds really harsh, but it's not.
It's more motherly than anything else. Like a stern, very, very,
uh...very...demanding parent. Does that make sense? She, she, she wants the best
for us and she will take nothing but. (Interview 1)
Emmanuel: She goes, “I think it’s okay that you’re scared, but...stop being scared.” I was like,
“I get it.” I get what she’s saying, I get what she wants, like, she really wants me
to pursue what she sees for me, as well as making myself happy. (Focus Group 1)
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Silvia: We think of her as a mom figure because she obviously cares so much about us.
But I think it's just that aspect of being a role model–someone that we aspire to be
like. I want to be like Mrs. Dahl. I want to be a very talented director like Mrs.
Dahl. (Interview 1)
For the students, part of Jenna’s identity was being a caretaker; someone who they can trust, who
can offer guidance, and provide structure within their community. Perceiving Jenna this way
allowed them to make closer connections to her, which in turn impacted the way in which they
related to her.
As a Director of Choral Activities, Jenna was also an advocate for the choral program within the
school, as in Silvia’s words:
Silvia: Miss D., I feel, is truly like the heart of the music department, because she like
fights so hard, and it’s not even just for her choir classes. She wants everyone to
like enroll in all of these music classes, it’s not just like, her part. (Focus Group 1)
Silvia recognized that Jenna is exemplifying her commitment to a larger community of practice–
that of the music program at Ashgrove College at large. Ashgrove Singers and the choral
program were just two aspects of Jenna’s membership in a larger context. The intersections
between her role as a conductor, a colleague of other music faculty, and a senior professor at the
college all intersected and were noticed by the students.
Outside of Ashgrove College, Jenna’s nexus of multi-membership involved yet another
layer of meshed identities. First, she was an avid traveler. Not only did she go to several
conferences a year, tours with her groups, and vacations, but she loved to explore the world with
her husband in her leisure time. Most recently, they traveled to the Middle East as guest faculty
at a workshop on instrumental and vocal jazz. Second, she was an active member of her
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neighborhood. Jenna knew all her neighbors by name. She even helped to organize an annual
block party where people on her street got together. In our time together, Jenna has shared
numerous personal stories, both funny and melancholic, about her neighbors. Third, she was a
sister, a wife, a cousin, and an aunt to numerous nieces and nephews. Her family was important
to her, and although she and her husband did not have children of their own, she continuously
referred to her students as her “kids.”
Jenna’s identity as a colleague to her peers intersected with her trajectory as a professor.
Her warm personality and unpretentious demeanor converted many of her colleagues to friends.
These friendships helped situate Ashgrove Singers within a larger community of practice: the
choral community in Central California. This resulted in what Wenger (1998) calls a local-global
interplay (p. 162); the type of interplay that helps us figure out how we fit into the larger picture.
The impact that Jenna’s friendships had with her colleagues went beyond than just opportunities
for her students to work with those professionals. Being an active member in “global” and not
only “local” COPs provided Jenna’s students an opportunity to be members in those
communities as well. This aspect of Jenna’s identity also instilled pride in her students, who saw
their director as well-connected and well-liked, and felt a sense of belonging to something good
and recognized by others as valuable:
Gwen: She doesn’t stop when we leave Ashgrove College. She doesn’t stop. Like, she
forges connections with all of the other choir directors and voice teachers at all of
the other universities. Like, she and Dr. E, the choral director over at Ashgrove
University, they’re best friends. They’re best friends. Mrs. D helped her find a
house to buy that was near her (light laughter). She brought Dr. E to us early, like
she adjudicated for one of our festivals, and then we started doing, uh,
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collaborations together. And so Dr. E knows me by name, you know? And, she
comes up to me, and she goes, “So, when are you transferring?” (light laughter)
“When you’re transferring, you’re coming to mine, right? You’re coming to
Ashgrove University” So, she does, she does that for everyone–for everyone, and
it’s...she knows so many other, uh, musicians all across California. She’s been on
the committee for the ACDA forever, forever! She’s organized all these
conferences and she’s super into getting us to go to places like that. Like the
choral leadership academy for CMAC last year, we went to that. She literally
wants us to go further, you know? (Focus Group 1)
Section Summary
My goal in this section was to discuss the joint enterprise of Ashgrove Singers. First, I
offered an overview of the practice of the ensemble by describing their routines, rituals, artifacts,
and conventions. I provided detailed descriptions of the rehearsal culture, which included explicit
and tacit rules within the practice, and detailed examples of participant roles within the choir.
Next, I explained how the duality of participation and reification contributed to the process of
negotiating meaning for members of Ashgrove Singers. My conversation with a past member of
COP led me to conclude that participation extends beyond actual physical participation in the
group and extends into new COP of which members become part. In this section, I also discussed
how choral repertoire reifies the cultural values of Ashgrove Singers. I drew from excerpts of the
interviews with primary participants in this study as they shared what intentional programming
means to them, and how it shapes their learning experience. Lastly, I discussed identity
formation within Ashgrove Singers, focusing on trajectory of participation and nexus of multi-
membership.
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Social Perspective Taking in Ashgrove Singers
In this section, I discuss how the process of Social Perspective Taking (SPT) unfolded
within the community of practice of Ashgrove Singers and what consequences resulted from the
participants’ engagement in SPT. This section of the discussion is divided into two subsections.
In the first subsection, I discuss how students engage in SPT using texts within choral repertoire
by way of 3 compositions. In the second subsection, I provide examples of how the conductor of
the ensemble, Jenna Dahl, engages students in academic and interpersonal SPT through written
exercises, in-class discussions, and relationship-building activities.
Social Perspective Taking (SPT) through choral repertoire
Choral compositions, unlike instrumental or solo works, feature text being sung by
multiple individuals at the same time. This unique aspect to the art form lends itself to
individuals presenting similar ideas and thoughts in ways that are unique to them, with their own
voice. Another aspect to the texts in choral compositions is that they convey the thoughts and
ideas of other people–the poet, or the character that the poet is trying to create. Arguably, there
are multiple perspectives happening at the same time: the students’ viewpoints, the viewpoint of
the composer in setting the text, the viewpoint of the poet whose text is used, and the viewpoint
of the character or narrator whose voice the choir conveys. My goal in this study was to find out
whether participants in Ashgrove Singers are aware of the layering of perspectives that occur,
and whether they consider this aspect at all when singing in their choir. Included in this section
of the chapter are my findings. Using three examples of choral compositions, I describe how
select students in Ashgrove Singers engaged in Social Perspective Taking by way of learning and
performing these works.
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“Witness,” an African American Spiritual arranged by Stacey V. Gibbs
Stacey Gibbs’ (2013) arrangement of one of the most popular African American
Spirituals, “Witness” took the choral community in southern California by storm when it was
performed at the 2018 ACDA Regional Convention in Pasadena. I was there for the
performance, and remember thoroughly enjoying the inventiveness with which Gibbs used
standard compositional techniques (e.g., ostinato and three-part upper voice writing) in his
arrangement. Jenna Dahl was at this performance as well and clearly, was also impressed by the
composition. She programmed it for Ashgrove Singers the following semester.
When I first visited Ashgrove College, I observed the choir rehearse “Witness.” Despite
tricky rhythms and many splits in the voice parts (i.e., at times, some of the students sang one-to-
a-part), the singers persevered. Jenna’s approach in this situation was to maintain a light and
encouraging tone with the participants. Instead of “buckling down” and perfecting every pitch
and rhythmic passage, she came up with ways to help the singers approach the composition in an
enjoyable way. At one point, she had the participants stand in a circle and make eye contact with
each other as they sang. Many students smiled at each other in the process and exchanged
knowing looks when they made errors in their part. The tension in the room subsided.
Participants also moved to the music while singing. Jenna did not specify how she
wanted the participants to move, but freely moved along to the music herself. Several students
picked up on what Jenna was doing and started to bop and sway while singing. Throughout the
20-minute rehearsal of the piece, Jenna would stop and ask the participants what they were
singing about, what the words meant to them and how they thought the piece should be
performed. Following rehearsal, I met with Anayah to ask her what she thought about “Witness”:
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Anayah: Even though I'm not religiously affiliated in any type of way, but music like that
still speaks to me, even though it does have religious meaning. It doesn't always
have to be related to some type of God. Like for me, the lyrics, when it says, “Be a
witness for my Lord.” Like for me, I take it as: who will be a witness to this life
that I'm living and what I'm putting out to the world?
Irene: And what does being a witness mean to you?
Anayah: So who's going to see that I'm actually doing well? Not necessarily like
recognizing that I'm doing good. But like, who's going to recognize the fact that
I'm here in this moment now? Like who's going to really witness that part of my
life? Or who’s just gonna, you know, walk by and think of me as a passing
thought. So that's why I think of it as whenever I sing it. (Interview 1)
Anayah found a way to relate to the text by connecting it to something in her own life. She was
not able to authentically approach the composition by relating to its religious message, so she
relied on a process that Gehlbach and Brinkworth (2012) refer to as anchoring and adjusting. In
this process, participants imaginatively project themselves into the speaker’s situation based on
known differences between themselves and the speaker (p. 13). The difference between the
speaker in the text and Anayah is their religious affiliation. Anayah put herself in the “shoes” of
the speaker and adjusted their message to apply to her. Anayah’s “anchor” was the need for
companionship and guidance that the speaker of the text also wanted, and her “adjustment” was
turning for that guidance to members of her family and friends instead of a spiritual entity. Thus,
she took the speaker’s perspective, and understanding its message, adopted it to something that is
relevant in her own life so that she could better relate to the speaker.
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Following my interview with Anayah, I spoke to Silvia about the repertoire that
Ashgrove Singers perform. We chatted about different ways of relating to texts in choral music,
and she brought up her experience of performing African American Spirituals:
Silvia: If we're doing a Spiritual, like a gospel piece, you know...I wasn't the slave. I
haven't lived that life of being a slave or anything like that. So that's where the
character aspect comes into play of where I want to figure out how to portray
someone who has lived that life and like how much frustration and pain that they
must have been going through in their life.
Irene: How do you go about that process? Like if you were to do a freeze frame of you
figuring out, like trying to get into that?
Silvia: Like this...It has to be when no one's home, it has to be when no one's home
because I want it to be completely quiet. I don't want any distractions or anything.
So when she tries to have us imagine that in class, I can't do it. I have to do it at
home to figure it out. Um, so it has to be at home and I have to think, you know,
just imagine myself, like say if I like to think of myself as I'm basically just having
like a job where you don't get paid. Like say if I were um, working at the job that I
have over at Fashion Fair mall, like, um, say if I were working there and I'm just
not getting paid for it and someone's just giving me orders all day. Like I kind of
like do that. Like where I'm, you're doing all of these things that you don't really
want to do, but you're forced to do say, like, dishes. No, I imagine myself say I'm
doing dishes for the rest of my life. I hate doing dishes. So I, I think of it as like the
feeling of that I have like doing the dishes and I don't want to do because it didn't
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make any of them like times 10 times, 30 times, however much that it needs to be.
That's kind of what I do.
Irene: And then walk me through how you have those thoughts surface up when you're in
rehearsal.
Silvia: Mhm. I have to think I, it's really weird, but it's like, it's once I feel it because I
read through the text as I'm feeling that moment and so I get into that headspace of
like "I'm feeling this way" and this is how I want to feel when I'm singing it. That's
when I'm looking and I'm reading the text instead of seeing it, I'm reading the and
that's like I read it a couple times and then once I get into rehearsal it's like you can
see the text. It's really weird and I've explained it to people and they're like, "that's
crazy." But um, I don't know if you've noticed in rehearsal, like I'll close my eyes a
lot and it's because in my head I can see the text and it for me seeing the text, but
when I was on my bed with my blanket behind, it reminds me of how I was feeling
at that moment, which is really weird. (Interview 1)
Here, Silvia describes her process for “putting herself in another’s shoes” when
performing a Spiritual and Gospel piece, such as “Witness.” Gehlbach and Brinkworth (2012)
stated that how SPT is executed depends on “complicated interaction between the perceiver’s
cognitive abilities and motivation, characteristics of the target, how well the strategy was
executed, and a host of cultural and situational factors” (pp. 22-23). Silvia’s narrative serves as
an example of this on several fronts. First, Silvia’s cognitive abilities and motivation were rooted
in her role as a performer. She thought of strategies that would enable her to approach Spirituals
in a way that would bring about an authentic performance. The experience of relating to the
music and understanding a deeper meaning behind the text motivated her to create a process
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through which she related to the perspective of the person speaking the text. Second, Silvia
recognized that the key characteristic of the target is that they were slaves, and she was not. Her
ability to understand the experience of a slave is defined by her lived experiences. Someone
reading Silvia’s words may be surprised by the types of lived experiences she draws on (e.g.
working at a mall, or perpetually doing the dishes) to relate to the speaker. Her examples are
informed by several cultural and situational factors (Gehlbach & Brinkworth, 2012): how slavery
is addressed in her social circles, what she has been taught about slavery, etc. Thus, Silvia’s
strategy engages SPT but this does not necessarily result in a more nuanced understanding of the
narrator’s lived experiences. To surpass that, she would need to have access to more information
about the history of slavery in the United States and to hear more about experiences of slaves.
More often than not, very little time is left for conductors to introduce this type of pedagogy into
the rehearsal. As a result, students are often left to draw on what they know at the time.
What is interesting about Silvia’s narrative is the level of detail that she used to describe
her strategy for adopting the speaker’s perspective. The setting in which she did it (e.g., quiet
room), the step-by-step reading of text and tapping into an emotion of that text–all of these
things contributed to an intentional and structured way of taking another’s perspective. More
importantly, she generated this process herself. Jenna did not tell her students explicitly to invent
a process like this. Silvia was motivated to reach this new level of relating to the speaker in the
song out of her own volition. In their study on perspective taking, Eyal, Steffel and Epley (2018)
found that “considering another person’s perspective does not seem to be automatic and
effortless, but instead requires time, motivation, and attentional resources to execute” (p. 438). In
Silvia’s strategy, we saw an intentional effort that required a lot of attentional resources to take
the perspective of the speaker in the music.
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“How Can I Cry?” by Moira Smiley
During the 2017-2018 academic year, Ashgrove Singers learned and performed a choral
composition titled “How can I cry?” by Moira Smiley (2006). Over the course of this study,
Jenna Dahl, as well as some of the primary participants, mentioned this piece and how they
learned to relate to its text. Anayah explained the message behind this work:
Anayah: The whole general construction of the song was “How can I cry about freedom
when I've lived a whole life in liberty,” and it kinda like, hit hard, because in
America we do complain about stuff. Like, “Oh we're not really a free country.
Like all this bad stuff is happening.” But that song was written for people who
live outside of the US who have it a lot worse than we do. Who live in war-
stricken countries. Who can't do anything that we can do over in the U.S. So it
kind of hit hard and like made you think about stuff. And I showed my mom the
song and she was like, “That's a really powerful song.” (Interview 1)
By relating to the speaker of the text in Moira Smiley’s composition, Anayah engaged in
perspective taking on several levels. First, she conveyed the words of someone who has taken the
comfort of their circumstances for granted. As she did this, she adopted their perspective by
becoming, if only for the time that she performs the piece, a character who is speaking the text.
In that process, she evaluated her own positionality and considered to what extent her views
aligned with the character’s. This type of reflection triggered certain personal realizations which
in turn, inspired Anayah to share the words of another person with a member of her family, thus
initiating a process of perspective taking and reflection with them.
The same composition elicited a similar process of perspective taking in Silvia. In
describing a performance of “How can I cry,” Silvia shared:
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Silvia: It was a powerful one. I just remember like looking in the audience of like, um,
and there were like just people sobbing and it wasn't even just African American
people. It was all kinds of races like just sobbing because they were so moved by
it.
When we were talking about it in class, someone had said, I think it was
Gwen, she was like, um, she kind of related into her own life. She was like, um, I
think she said something like, “How am I supposed to be sad when there were
people that were like going through slavery and like they lived their whole
basically being a slave?” And they are like, you know, minor things that we think
about. Like, “Oh, I'm, my phone died, and I had to go home with no GPS and I
got lost.” Like it's minor, small little thing that like, you know, like someone
would cry about or like oh, a kid would cry about like "I don't get the new iPhone
because my parents said no,” like you shouldn't cry about the little things like
that.
There are bigger things in life that have happened that now because it's so,
it's, it's kind of not that far away from where we are now. But like you know back
then like were kind of just brushing it off still just a little bit like where we don't
think about it anymore. But like we should think about it a lot more. Like, because
there's people that are homeless, they don't have a home, they don't, they don't
have a phone. Like why should you cry about a dying phone, why should you cry
about getting the new iPhone 10x or whatever. You know, when there's people
that are living without a roof over their head that are living in the winter without
any blankets or a jacket. (Interview 1)
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By engaging with the text of the composition, Silvia learned to better understand the experience
of people less fortunate than she is. As a result, she saw her own privilege and the privilege of
her peers from a new angle. Engaging with the text of “How can I cry?” gave her a new
perspective on how her position in society can be seen from the point of view of another person
such as someone who is homeless, or someone who suffers from oppression. According to
Gehlbach (2011), “hearing the perspective of others allows students to better understand their
classmates and help them evaluate the extent of their mutual connectedness on issues” (p. 317).
In this context, hearing Gwen’s perspective on the text helped Silvia generate her own example
of imagined others that are suffering. Furthermore, in this example, Silvia took the perspective of
her classmates, whom she hears complaining about issues that to her, as not that significant. She
did not seem to be overly compassionate toward them, however. Despite the fact that she may
herself had similar concerns, it is this moment of relating to others that Moira Smiley’s
composition is describing, Silvia adopted a different mindset. She stepped into an identity of
someone who has transcended those concerns and negotiated the meaning of her position in
society by relating to a larger community of practice–that of society as a whole.
In the COP of Ashgrove Singers, discussion about text was standard practice, which gave
students a chance to hear each other’s opinions. As seen in Silvia’s narrative, this type of joint
engagement resulted in bolstered student engagement as they become “more likely to resonate
with at least one or two of the views presented” (Gehlbach, 2011, p. 317). Silvia resonated with
Gwen’s perspective, while adopting the viewpoint of the speaker in the text. Considering the
thoughts, ideas, and feelings of real or imagined characters in choral compositions was a
characteristic of this community of practice. Gehlbach (2011) also states that “in today’s rapidly
globalizing world, social studies teachers must facilitate their students’ understanding and
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appreciation of the ideas, values, beliefs, and motivations of people from different cultures
and/or historical time periods” (317). By selecting “How can I cry?” as part of the curriculum in
Ashgrove Singers, Jenna Dahl facilitated her students’ understanding of their own beliefs,
values, and privilege.
“Somewhere” from West Side Story by Leonard Bernstein arranged by Robert
Edgerton
One of the choral compositions that I enjoyed listening to Ashgrove Singers rehearse was
“Somewhere” from West Side Story by Leonard Bernstein (1957). There are many arrangements
of this work for choir. Edgerton’s arrangement is especially moving because of its intimate
opening section, emotional build-up to the climax of the piece, and classic cinematic harmonies.
Ashgrove Singers worked tirelessly to rehearse this composition, paying close attention to its
musical elements and its lyrical content. I spoke to Silvia about “Somewhere”:
Silvia: I haven't seen West Side Story and that's where that song comes from. I haven't
seen that. So I was having trouble trying to relate what it meant to me. And um,
Mrs. Dahl, she played the scene from West Side Story and that's what helped me.
It wasn't necessarily someone sharing their story because she didn't ask for it. She
showed us the scene and it's between the two characters. It's kind of a play off of
Romeo and Juliet. They're like star crossed lovers. The song is talking about how
like, it may not be right now and may not be next week, but sometime in the
future, there's going to be a place for us where it's going to be okay for us to be
able to love each other without any like repercussions.
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And with that, I always think of like the LGBT community because I have
a lot of friends that are either gay or transgender or things like that. So I always
think about how it was like before the law had passed of them being able to marry
the same sex and everything. So I always think how hard it must have been for
them. Or the people generations before me who weren't able to marry or be with
someone or feel like they weren't able to be with someone or even say that they
were able or, or even say that they, um, wanted to pursue relationships with a
certain kind of person. I always think it must have been really, really hard for
them.
My parents would tell me like, “Oh, in high school, if you were gay, they'd
beat you up in the bathroom.” And I'm like, “Well that is horrible!” You know,
like...that's still a person and they have feelings and they should have right to be
able to love who they want to love. So that's where my headspace goes when we
do “Somewhere” because I always think of those people that want to just love
who they want to love and be with who they want to be with. I have a boyfriend
and it's okay for me to have a boyfriend and marry him. But there was a time
where it wasn't okay. Say if I had a girlfriend and I couldn't marry her, like I
would be devastated because what if I really believed in marriage and I wanted to
marry her? Like spend the rest of my life with that person? And they couldn't do
that for a long time. (Interview 1)
In this case, hearing the perspectives of her peers was not what caused Silvia to engage in SPT.
She connected the textual content in the choral composition to an issue that was particularly
important to her: LGBT rights. Silvia could have thought about a relationship in which two
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heterosexual partners experience obstacles in being together. Yet, she chose to consider the
experience of gay individuals who have encountered oppression and violation of their rights
when it came to same-sex marriage.
As we learned from the vignette in Chapter Four, Silvia had first-hand experience of
standing up for someone when their gender identity had been outcast by a community. In high
school, she supported a transgender friend amidst their transition. As Gehlbach et al (2015)
found in their study, the more participants learn about a target of perspective taking, the more
likely they are to take their perspective. Furthermore, the study found that experiencing a target’s
perspective, as opposed to passively learning about it, resulted in more positive relationships.
Findings in this study support this claim: Silvia’s report of the experience with her friend Dayna
brought perspectives of persons encountering issues of LGBT equality to the forefront. Because
of Silvia’s ability to relate the text of “Somewhere” to current-day issues, the words in the
composition stayed relevant. Jenna did not instruct Silvia to think about members of the LGBT
community when singing this song. Silvia adopted the perspectives of people in the LGBT
community on her own. In the next section, I analyze how students like Silvia were able to
engage in SPT so regularly. To gain insight on this topic, I considered the role that Jenna Dahl
played in helping students engage in perspective taking in rehearsals.
The Role of the Director: Engaging Singers in SPT
According to Gehlbach (2011), teachers can engage students in two types of Social
Perspective Taking (SPT): academic and interpersonal. In this section, I discuss how Jenna Dahl
engaged the students in Ashgrove Singers in both of these types of SPT, and their outcomes.
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Academic SPT
Gehlbach (2011) refers to academic SPT as the process of “forming theories as to the
thoughts, feelings, and motivations of the targeted individual” (p. 314). In choral repertoire, the
individual singing takes on the role of narrator of the text included in the choral composition.
While many directors peripherally acknowledge that the singers must fulfill this role, the
pressure of preparing for performances and learning a lot of repertoire often prevent them from
exploring this aspect of choral singing further. In Ashgrove Singers, Jenna acknowledged that
singers take on the role of the narrator, and guided them to understand deeper implications for
doing so. Consequently, she engaged her students in academic SPT primarily in two ways:
through written exercises and in-class discussions.
Written exercises. During my second field visit to Ashgrove College, I observed Jenna
lead a written exercise in which students had to imagine that they were the author of the text that
they were singing. She handed out cue cards to each student and asked them to write down what
they, in the role of the poet, were thinking in the very moment that they composed the text. Later
at her home, Jenna shared some of the student responses with me. Each card was unique,
representing a moment in time in an imaginative and interesting way (e.g., one student described
themselves as a Medieval knight in an epic tale, which another imagined that they wrote the text
while thinking of their parents). In teaching “How can I cry?” (Smiley, 2006), Jenna asked the
students to complete a similar written exercise. Anayah shared this with me:
We were singing that song, ‘How can I cry,’ and you could tell there wasn't any
emotional attachment to it. So she had us write our own little poems, like, about how we
felt about it and then we all shared it with one another. It completely changed the
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dynamic and the tone of this song because everybody heard their own stories and what
they felt about the song. So it definitely helped everyone. (Interview 1)
In a previous year, Jenna created an exercise in which students had to paraphrase the meaning of
the text that they were singing. Line by line, they also had to share what each phrase meant to
them personally. Silvia described this:
There was a piece called “Winter Sun” and she wanted us to rewrite the words, you
know, the poem to it. And then after that she wanted in the next paragraph for us to write
what each line meant to us and what it symbolized for us. And I remember writing about
the first time that I went camping because that was a really big deal for me because I
really liked the outdoors when I was younger. (Interview 2)
When I met with Jenna to ask her about the pedagogical rationale behind these types of
exercises, she responded:
For a long time I’d go “Well, you know, you have to feel the...” you know, and I’d kind
of express what I felt about the song, and then they would buy into that. Then we would
perform it. But their investment is different when it’s their investment, and not my
inserting what I think the song is supposed to mean to them. (Interview 3)
Jenna’s observation on the different level of investment connected to Wenger’s theory of a joint
enterprise: a collective process of a negotiation of meaning in a community of practice. Members
of a COP negotiate meaning through a duality of participation and reification. In this case, Silvia
participated in singing of “Someday” and reified the text of the work as a symbol of hope for the
LGBT community. By engaging participants in a process of imagining themselves in the “shoes”
of the person who has written the text, or the person who is speaking the text in the choral work,
Jenna enabled participants to arrive at a collective theory about the feelings, ideas and
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motivations of the speaker. Thus, engaging in academic SPT became a characteristic of the COP
of Ashgrove Singers.
In-class Discussions. In every rehearsal that I observed, Jenna carved out time to have a
class discussion about one or more compositions that the group was rehearsing. After going over
a portion of a composition, she stopped and asked the students if they had comments, what the
passage meant to them, or what they were thinking about when singing this particular line of
text. Silvia remembered a time when a discussion occurred when the choir was rehearsing “How
can I cry?”:
She asked the question of like, “what are you mad about?” and someone said, “Because
I’m black, I have to be very careful walking down the street.” And everyone was like,
“you’re right,” you know, like we were kind of agreeing like, you know, like we
understand that you have to be careful because, you know, like some police and like
some people just in general, you know, like are still racist and rude. (Interview 1)
Creating a safe space where in-class discussion can face a difficult topic was an important aspect
of practice within Ashgrove Singers. The student who shared their lived experience of being
African American in today’s society engaged his or her peers in considering what that experience
would feel like for them. By opening the floor for discussion on a given composition, Jenna
understood that all opinions should be heard. She was a skillful educator, who helped students
navigate difficult moments in an in-class discussion. Through in-class discussions, Jenna
instilled a culture of respect in her students, where anyone could voice their thoughts and
opinions on the topic at hand.
Jenna also contributed to in-class discussion herself. She was not afraid to share
information about her own thoughts on the music. As a member of this community of practice,
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she could be vulnerable with her students just as her students could be vulnerable with each
other. In one of our conversations, she recalled a time when she volunteered her own perspective
on a composition:
The choir was doing “May Night,” you know, in English, you know, so, (sings), “When
the silvery moon shines through the fluttering winds...” and it’s this journey that this
person is on, looking for whatever. After we had a conversation about that, “Well, where
are you? Is the moon beautiful?” you know, “Well, I think it’s somebody missing one
another, they’re missing whoever,” so we kind of had that general discussion, because,
you know, they’re young. A lot of them haven’t experienced deep loss and, you know,
that wandering that comes with it.
And then I said, “You know, I’ll share with you what this song reminds me of. It
reminds me of my mom and dad, because my dad died suddenly, you know, we found out
in September he had cancer, and he was dead in December, and in between there, in
November, we celebrated their 50th anniversary, and then he was gone,” and I said, “and
it was like, devastating to me, and, um, but one time I talked to my mom about it, and she
said she felt like she had been drifting for ten years, and floating in a dream, kind of
thing,” and I said, “This song reminds me of that, her, you know, missing my dad after so
many years, and...and, you know, and how loss can be, and the memories are there and
they’re painful, but they’re not bad, and they’re not, you know...” and so, you know, my
perspective is a real life journey of two people that I loved very dearly, and, you know,
theirs is, you know, I said, “It could be your grandparents, or...it doesn’t have to be
people, even. It could be a dog, you know, a pet, or...” and so, I think sharing it with them
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after they’ve kind of started formulating some thoughts about the imagery in the text, um,
because that...that song, a lot of people talked about to me after they sang. (Interview 3)
In-class discussion are a place where trust was built, and different perspectives on a
single line of text could be heard without fear of judgement. Jenna built trust with the students by
offering them glimpses into her private world. Seeing their teacher be open and vulnerable
proved to the students that it is okay to also be this way. Fostering an environment that
welcomed self-disclosure through in-class discussions enabled students to not only get to know
what their peers were thinking about when they performed choral compositions, but also uncover
what they felt on a personal level. Furthermore, it modelled behaviors that were non-judgemental
and accepting. Gwen commented on this in our first interview together:
If you notice in the Ashgrove Singers' rehearsals, we stop and we laugh! Like Mrs. Dahl
will laugh with us. Like when she, when she bumped the piano with the music stand
accidentally, she looked around and was like, “Don't tell Mr. B!” you know? And we
laughed because it was funny. I mean she's comfortable enough with us to make
mistakes. We stop and we laugh at those mistakes, but we don't ridicule her about it. We
move on and we go “We laughed. Oh, it's funny.” But we laugh together. (Interview 1)
Within the community of practice in Ashgrove Singers, Jenna modelled self-acceptance, which
helped the participants feel comfortable.
The students were also used to Jenna moderating discussions on repertoire. All primary
participants stated that these types of exercises were very common; they were embedded into the
learning process of the choir. Jenna supplemented this process of engaging students in
interpreting and understanding different perspectives in the texts that they sang, by having them
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develop the ability to take the perspectives of one another. This is where her strategies for
developing academic SPT intersected with interpersonal SPT.
Interpersonal SPT
When engaging in interpersonal SPT, perceivers form theories as to the thoughts,
feelings, and motivations of another by considering their words, behavior and physical gestures
(Gehlbach, 2011). Jenna engaged participants in interpersonal SPT in several different ways.
During my third observation of a rehearsal with Ashgrove Singers, Jenna went around the
room and asked every singer to share one thing that they are looking forward to in the coming
weekend. As each student spoke, the other members of the choir shifted their bodies to face the
speaker. Not a single person in the room looked disengaged or uninterested. Some of the
responses included things like working on a solo album, going to a family member’s birthday
celebration, and playing piano for a fundraising event. One student shared how he was most
excited about sleeping in after a long shift at work on Saturday night. When Jenna asked that
singer where he worked, the singer shared the name of the factory, to which another student
stated that they worked in the same place. I observed the two participants stay after class to chat
after the rehearsal. When I asked Anayah her thoughts about Jenna’s activities, she offered:
We write each other notes or we just talked about what we did over the weekend and um,
it just felt like a way to keep each other involved and stuff like that. Because there was
like maybe three or four people that I knew before going into Ashgrove Singers and then
everybody else were complete strangers. All these exercises that we're doing...now I can
actually talk to people and I don't feel afraid to because everybody is generally nice.
(Interview 2)
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Getting to know what others experience in daily life was a way to understand their
identities outside of choir. The process of getting to know others’ musical ability also factored
into interpersonal SPT. When I asked Gwen what she thought about Jenna taking time out of
rehearsal to ask people about their weekend, she shared:
Gwen: I think it's really, it's really nice ‘cause you hear things about people that you don't
necessarily ...get to know when you're in a group that's just singing and just
showing up to make music, you know what I mean? It's, it's, it changes your
perspective about a person when you find out they played the flute, you know what
I mean?
Irene: How?
Gwen: Well, like for instance, when you walk into the choir, like the first day, you know
your experience, do you know your vocal talents and experiences, but you don't
know anything about the people singing around you. You know what I mean?
And...as, as you progress, as you hear one another, as you know, somebody steps
out and says does a solo and you're just blown out of the water. Like Carmen came
out and wailed on, on “Witness.” And I was like, “holy crap! Wow, she's
awesome!” And then like my perspective completely changed about her because I
thought she was really timid and quiet at first, you know? (Interview 1)
Jenna gives students opportunities to try solos within the context of the rehearsal. While
observing the choir rehearse “Witness” (Gibbs, 2013) during my visits, I saw Jenna inviting all
members of the choir to try the solo if they wanted to. This approach paved way for opportunities
such as the one Gwen described–chances to get to know the abilities and musical experience of
others, and by extension, who they are as human beings.
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Within the rehearsal, Jenna also encouraged students to stand in different formations. She
provided guidance as to whether the group should be in ‘mixed’ formation or not, but did not
specify who should stand next to whom. Furthermore, Jenna allowed students to get to know
each other by creating a safe environment for them to physically move to the music. By doing
this, Jenna facilitated interpersonal SPT by creating an opportunity for participants to observe
each other’s natural body movements. After witnessing a choral ensemble from a university
performance at a local festival, Silvia commented:
It doesn't seem like they connect to each other when they're singing. It seems like "here's
my space.” You go over a foot, “There's their space” and then you go over another foot,
“There's their space.” It doesn't seem like my space is blending into your space because I
know it can. And it doesn't seem like this person's space is coming into my space because
I'm okay with them. They're my friend. I'm okay with their space being here. I'm okay
with their presence next to me and behind me and in front of me. (Interview 2)
Physical proximity was another avenue for participants to relate to each other. Sharing
the space in which they sang, according to Silvia, was a way for them to show acceptance of the
person they are next to. Through these exercises, Jenna instilled a kind of mindset in the
students–they were required to connect to each other and the music in order for their
participation in the choir to be meaningful. Silvia shared this mindset with me in our first
interview:
If I don't relate to the music, I don't feel good about singing it. Like I'm kinda just like,
"well, why am I saying this if I can't relate to it?", you know, like if I can't portray it as
like say a character, like I can't figure out what, like how I'm supposed to be at this note
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or in this measure. If I can't figure it out, it frustrates me because I'm like, well, why are
we singing this if we don't have anything to connect to this song? (Interview 1)
On occasion, a conflict emerged between participants. Gwen described a time when she
was in a situation with a student with whom she did not see eye to eye, and talked about the
interpersonal strategies that she drew on to overcome the conflict:
Gwen: I find that that music bridges a lot of gaps between people. You know? Um...for
instance, um, there was a tenor in the group for a long time. He's not in it this year,
but um, his name was Roy and uh he had like a really big personality and he was
like one of those...manly men kind of guys and I had a lot...of problems with him
at first, you know, because he would say stuff, you know, just to say stuff and
sound stupid because, you know, he thought he sounded cool and...I don't know,
that kind of stuff rubs me the wrong way, you know? When people just pop off and
interrupt class for no good reason other than, than does sound clever, you know
...and that stuff really bothers me.
And he kept doing it and you kept doing it. He sat right behind me, you
know, and he kept doing it, can't do any, kept muttering, spouting off. And there
were many moments when I just turned around and looked at him and was like
...“Guy! Come on. I want to, I want to focus in on the, on the rehearsal here!” You
know? And it, it took ...two or three years. I mean, it, it got to the point where it
was like, “Gwen doesn't like Roy and Roy doesn't like Gwen.” And it took a really
long time of trying to find common ground with Roy. I literally tried actively to
find common ground with Roy for two years.
Irene: What kinds of things did you do?
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Gwen: Like uh...when we were on the bus together and uh, he wanted to put on some
headphones and play with the DJ thing on his phone and he forgot his headphones.
And I had a spare pair. He was like, “Somebody got a pair of headphones?” and I
said, “I do.” He says, “Uh...What kind are they?” Blah blah blah. And I showed
them to him. He was like, “Oh! Yeah! Can I borrow those?” and I was like “Yeah,
you can borrow them. I don't mind.” You know, small things.
Like when he would start singing a song I knew...if I could, I would start
harmonizing with him, you know, because it made him happy. And when we were
in France I would deliberately sit next to him sometimes to just hang out with him
...because I knew that if I just hung around him more in a less stressful setting of,
you know, focusing on “I need to learn my music, I need...We need to do
well”...And like trying to get to know him on a more social level and trying to get
over, like, “That's just Roy, he's being an arrogant a-hole,” you know, but...trying
to find the good parts of his personality, you know? Find jokes that I think are
actually funny and laugh at them. And then when he says something rude, go
“Roy...That's really rude.” And I think he did the same? You know? He tried to
find common ground with me. It was, it was a joint effort eventually.
Irene: And why was it important for you to do that?
Gwen: I knew that I wanted to sing with him! ‘Cause he had a gorgeous tenor voice, you
know, gorgeous, wonderful, soaring tenor and he had a really...really good instinct
for improvisation and I loved singing with him and I had to sing a duet with him
and, in the group.
Irene: I was going to say that you were already kind of singing with him. In the choir.
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Gwen: I had to sing a duet with him.
Irene: Outside of choir?
Gwen: No, no, it was, it was in choir. It was uh...it was a two-part solo on a song and I
didn't have that solo at first. And then the girl who had it before me got sick for a
long time. She was sick about a month so she didn't have the breath and the voice
to be able to do it. And um, I was kind of like of the one she nominated to do it in
her place and I really wasn't sure about it. And Roy was the other duettist and I had
to...I had to be able to interact with him in that duet and improvise around him.
And it was really hard for me when I didn't like him. Does that make sense?
Irene: So as soon as that situation came up, you knew how to do this. You were kind of
motivated to...do you think of that opportunity didn't come up that you would have
behaved differently?
Gwen: I think it wouldn't have happened as quickly as it did. When I say it took me two
years, I really kind of mean it took...I didn't like him for two years. You know?
Until we had to sing, sing duet together. And I did try and bridge gaps before that,
but it wasn't, it wasn't a priority for me until that duet. When I duet what came up,
I knew that I had to find common ground with Roy or I couldn't look at him and
smile and dream and sing Dream the World, you know?
Irene: So what ended up happening?
Gwen: Well, it just got to a point where I would give Roy a look sometimes when he'd say
things and he'd be like, “Sorry Gwen.” And like I just kind of walk up to him and
go [opens her arms wide as if gesturing for a hug]...and he’d give me a hug! And
I'd be like, “Roy, you're my friend. Yep. We're friends.”
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Irene: And the duet? How was that?
Gwen: It went really well! Like eventually we sang that song so many times that year that,
it, it...it kind of became engrained and it was really fun near the end of it. We sang
it at a festival and it was probably one of my best performances of it and I walked
away from it feeling really good and he looked over at me and was like, “Good
job!” you know? And it completely changed my feelings towards him and towards
the solo because I didn't want the solo. I really didn't. I didn't think, you know, this
whole vocal improv thing’s totally not my bag, you know ...and he, he, he really
genuinely thought I did a good job after that. And I was like, “Okay, Roy, Roy can
be a genuine person. I like this!” you know? So it ...it bridged, it bridged the gap
between us. Like I said, music bridges gaps. (Interview 1)
This interview excerpt supports Gehlbach’s (2004) idea that students who report taking
the perspective of others more regularly tend to choose more effective strategies for resolving
conflicts in classroom-based scenarios. Here, Gwen was able to resolve the conflict she had with
Roy by intentionally finding ways to connect with him and understand where he was coming
from in a specific situation. She was motivated to engage in SPT because of a performance that
she had with Roy. What is important to note here is that of all of the strategies Gwen could have
used to ameliorate the conflict with Roy, she chose to find “common ground” with him. As a
member of a joint enterprise that emphasizes interpersonal SPT and authentic connection
between participants, Gwen was motivated to contribute to this COP by using strategies that are
fostered and respected in the choir–strategies of valuing each person, understanding where they
are coming from, and putting yourself in their shoes to form a genuine connection even amidst
conflict.
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Gwen was particularly attuned to how interpersonal connections interweave in a choir. In
our last interview together, she spoke about the “great milestone in the interaction of a choir”
(Interview 2). I asked what she meant by this:
Gwen: The first milestone for a choir, in my opinion, is finding a blend within the voices.
It's all very technical. It's kind of when you finally get one to two pieces under
your belt and you feel like you can sing them really well together with these
people.
The second milestone happens within the section. It's a blending of voices
and personalities within a section that makes them grow closer together. Like, um,
I know as a section leader in the alto section the kind of sound and production that
I can expect from...my fellow altos and it's reassuring to me to know that I can
back off at a certain point that they're with me. And that kind of blend and trust
within a section is humongous.
Irene: What do you mean by they're with you?
Gwen: Like if, if...I turn and I say to Molly (pseudonym) and say, "Oh, that's...you're
singing in that really, really bright and I want you to not push so hard," then she
goes, "oh, okay." And she actually does it.
Irene: What about when you back off?
Gwen: When I back off vocally and I stop and listen, I notice that at least half of them
back off with me (light laughter). So, if I hear a lot of pushy sound, I'll usually
back off and get higher and brighter and get kind of more on top of the pitch
because when they push, they're flat. So, uh...they, they kind of stop and go, "oh
Gwen’s making that lighter sound. Maybe I should match her tone." You know.
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Irene: Okay, cool. Coming back to the milestones!
Gwen: The next milestone is when you find friends in other sections. You find voices and
other sections that you like or you dislike or you, you say, "oh, I blend really well
with this particular soprano." And, and it, it, it fosters kind of trust between the
different sections. Like when...the first time we sang in quartets. It was in our first
big piece that was “Set me as a seal”. We kept rotating people in and out and I
found that there were certain voices in the ensemble that I liked better than others.
Or the first time I'd even heard somebody sing, you know, like, "Oh wow.
Carmen’s (pseudonym) got really great production," you know, and I'm like, "she's
way over there. I haven't heard her, you know, before and since now." And it
forges connections across the chorus I think when you can rely on the different
sections and you can listen for particular voices at particular times.
Like...I have a bad case of distrust of tenors in general, just because I know
they're either too loud or they're rhythmically unsound or something is going
wrong. And so I never rely on a tenor to give me an entrance...until...I don't know,
until they've proven to me that they will be there at the right time. Um, same thing
with basses when basses come up and they do their thing.
Though, I have noticed that with this particular group of basses, Neal
(pseudonym) is always on. Neal is on like...I don't know, white on rice! He's right
there. Tonally, he's spot on. He's got perfect pitch. We have three people in
Ashgrove Singers that have perfect pitch and half the time that's bad to tell you the
truth. I mean 'cause if, if you've got somebody there with perfect pitch and they're
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really mule-headed about you know, fact that "oh, this chorus is, you know, dippin'
in pitch and I want us to go back up," then they can be really annoying (laughing).
Irene: Yeah. Mhm.
Gwen: But I haven't really noticed that from these three. You know? And I think it's
because we have someone with perfect pitch and the bass section. 'Cause if your
bass is on...on pitch and their tone, they're tonally sound, then you got the base of
everybody's sound. The only thing is, is production is a little weird, but it's like you
have to stick, so that's the thing.
But after that milestone, after forging connections between the different
sections, um...the last one is your first big performance. Your first big
performance, not necessarily for the public, but for your peers. The first time you
go out and you sing among other college choirs or other choirs that if you were
competing, you would be competing against them and you kind of compare your
sound and what you know, what you are doing to what they're doing.
Irene: So why do you say specifically peers is this milestone?
Gwen: Well, the public...When you sing for the public, they're just happy that you're
singing and 90% of the public are not musicians. They're not...they're not judging
with a full set of tools. When they judge your performances, it's completely
different than when you're performing for someone else who does what you do.
They look at and they go, "Oh, I know what they're doing!" and it's, it's completely
different. It has a completely different feeling and when you walk away from a
performance like that, feeling good about it, it's like "I'm standing amongst my
peers. These are all my equals and I deserve to be here." And then the vice versa is
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true. If you walk away from that performance going "Aw, dang! We missed that
entrance and this and this and this and this and this and this, and they all heard it,"
you know? Then it can, it can really tear apart a chorus. But when you walk away
from one feeling good about it and hearing good comments from the adjudicators
and having good responses from the audience among your peers, like someone
walking up to me, going "I just loved your face, you know, the whole time," stuff
like that. Then, then it feels good and you're suddenly like, "Yup, me and my
friends...we're great people!" (laughs)
Irene: Makes sense. Um, how is the first milestone, the "finding the blend" different from
the third milestone which is "listening for others", which to me may potentially
lead to a blend if you're kind of making friendships across sections? Could you talk
more about the difference between the two?
Gwen: Well, at first when you're, when you're finding a sound amongst a group of people
I mean, you can't really, you can't really adjust your sound like that first two, three
weeks. You just kind of have to sing and go, “I hope this goes well!” you know,
and it, it takes a lot of moving around in a section even to figure out, "Okay, I need
this voice out on the end and this voice near the center I need..." And it takes some
time to feel out what kind of vocal production you personally need to make in a
chorus to make it sound the way she wants it to. And when she is satisfied with
sound, then you, you work on connections within it.
Because this is an auditioned group, if somebody just does not blend, it
does not work, then she'll move people out, and move people in. I mean with
Ashgrove Choir, it's different in Ashgrove Choir–it's all comers, "let's, let's all sing
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together" and it's a different feeling from a more elite group, a more focused group
like Ashgrove Singers. And I think our focus is, is a little bit different those first
three weeks. Those first three weeks it's all about technicality, it's about notes, it's
about words, it's about rhythm.
And when you're getting into the third milestone, it's more
about...interpretation. It's more about...the line. Shaping the line. It's more about
the small, um, expressive things you can do with the music and that's where you
learn and where you make connections with other people in other sections at that
point. You're not focused necessarily on, "this is my part and this is me singing it
well." You're closer to being a whole.
Gwen described four milestones: (1) finding a blend within the voices of the choir as a
whole, (2) finding a blend within your section in the choir, (3) finding voices with whom you
connect in other sections, and (4) the choir’s first performance in front of peers. Within each
milestone, Gwen described varying degrees of interpersonal SPT. The first milestone had the
lowest level of engagement with SPT: singers came to the ensemble and assert their own voices
in the choir without thinking about how to relate their voices to singers around them. In the
second milestone, singers are engaged in SPT at a slightly higher level, as they listened around
them to perceive how much or how little members of the choir were adjusting to what they hear.
(In my own choral singing experience, I remembered many instances where I imagined what the
other singers in my section were thinking while we were rehearsing and tried to adopt their
perspective for the betterment of my section.) In the third milestone, the level of SPT in which
singers engaged raised still, as they determined which members of the choir behaved and sang in
a way that resonated with them. Without speaking, they used their singing voices to find what
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Gwen referred to as “blend”. What each person interprets by the word “blend” might be slightly
different. From Gwen’s interview, I understood “blend” to mean “connection” more than a
technical term for finding unison.
The final milestone that Gwen described was performing in front of peers who can
adequately assess your output, demanded the highest level of interpersonal SPT for it required
singers to imagine what their peers may feel about their performance on both technical and
emotional levels. For Gwen, it was especially important that the audience consist of peers in this
milestone and not just the general public. Peers are capable of putting themselves in her shoes
and appreciating the work that is she put into a performance. The general public, likely having
very little experience with choral singing, would not be able to engage in perspective taking as
easily. A depiction of the milestones and the level of engagement in SPT is shown in Figure 2.
Figure 2. Milestone in the interaction of a choir with corresponding level of SPT
204
Gwen was a seasoned chorister. She had been a member of a barbershop group for more
than a decade, had competed in this setting and had been a member of Ashgrove Singers the
entire time that she had been at Ashgrove College. These facts about Gwen are important to
consider when trying to understand the nuance with which she perceived interpersonal
interactions within a choir. Still, I cannot help but wonder whether if she was in a different
choir–one with a director who did not build into rehearsal time for interpersonal perspective
taking–her observations would be different. Having spent years singing in Ashgrove Singers,
Gwen portrayed a process that she had witnessed year after year, being completely familiar with
it. This process demanded a high level of interpersonal awareness, and constant evaluation of
one’s position within a community of individuals. As they reached milestones, members of the
choir got increasingly more opportunities to learn how to imagine what their peers are thinking,
paying attention to the musical choices that they make moment-by moment. Jenna’s pedagogy,
specifically her emphasis on helping students engage in interpersonal SPT, made this process
possible.
Returning to the Research Questions
1. How do participants describe the process of taking each other’s musical and non-
musical perspectives in the context of their participation in choir?
Participants engaged in the process of taking each other’s non-musical perspectives when
Jenna Dahl initiated activities centered on developing interpersonal SPT. Over time, participants
shared themselves and their life histories through their engagement in these activities.
Participants engaged in each other’s musical perspectives by participating in discussions and
writing exercises on the repertoire that they were singing, and rehearsing in different standing
formations.
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2. What consequences result from participants’ process of taking on others’
perspectives?
Participants indicated that it was very important for them to relate to the music by way of
understanding the perspectives of both the narrator in the choral work and the peers that perform
the work with them. The consequence of engaging in perspective taking consistently resulted in
deeper understanding of choral repertoire, interpersonal bonding, and sincere appreciation of the
conductor’s leadership style and autonomy-fostering pedagogy. Within the realm of
interpersonal bonding, participants exhibited greater openness, acceptance of others, and stronger
persistence to work through interpersonal differences.
3. What strategies do participants use to develop their ability to take each others’
perspectives?
The primary strategy used by participants in taking each other’s perspectives is to openly
engage in perspective taking activities initiated by their conductor. By deciding to engage in
these activities fully, participants learned new things about their peers. A depiction of the how
the relationship between SPT-driven activities and the development of perspective taking occurs
within the COP of Ashgrove Singers shown in Figure 3.
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Figure 3. Development of perspective taking ability within the COP of Ashgrove Singers
Vulnerability, specifically the decision to be vulnerable and share things about yourself
that may be personal with your peers was a strategy for signaling to others that it is okay for
them to do the same. In an environment like Ashgrove Singers, being open and vulnerable is a
highly valued aspect to participation in the choir. As trust between members of Ashgrove Singers
continued to develop, participants saw Jenna Dahl’s perspective taking activities as opportunities
to develop their ability to understand and relate to their peers.
4. How do participants describe their process of taking on the perspective of the
conductor in their interpretation of choral repertoire?
Participants in this study did not describe the process of taking on the perspective of the
conductor because they were asked to generate this process themselves. Jenna Dahl occasionally
shared her interpretation of the choral repertoire that the choir worked on, but only as part of a
general in-class discussion on the topic with her students. The participants did describe their
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conductor’s mission to program repertoire that is meaningful to her, though not necessarily
discussing what they perceived to constitute meaning to her. They shared that Jenna’s
enthusiasm, deep love for teaching, and connecting to choral music as a whole resulted in what
they perceived to be a genuine and meaningful interpretation of choral repertoire.
5. What role does the conductor play in facilitating or obstructing perspective
taking between singers?
In this study, the conductor played a crucial role in facilitating perspective taking
between singers. Through carefully crafted interpersonal, team-building activities, Jenna Dahl
enabled students to hear each other’s point of view on different subjects. Additionally, Jenna
established a safe and inclusive learning environment, where students were not afraid to make
their opinions heard or be vulnerable in front of their peers. Building and maintaining such an
environment played an important role in setting the stage for perspective taking to happen.
6. What role does the conductor play in facilitating or obstructing perspective
taking between the singers and the text of the composition?
This study found that the conductor plays an integral role in developing participants’
ability to take the perspective of the narrator in choral compositions. Jenna Dahl not only
discussed the texts of choral compositions with her students, she designed specific learning
activities with the intentions of helping them take the perspective of the character or narrator in
the choral works that they were learning. Whereas in her initial years as a director, Jenna
suggested how perspective taking should occur with a choral composition herself, at the time of
this study, her approach refrained from “spelling out” the process of perspective taking to her
students and relied more on harvesting the students’ own perspectives on the text that they were
singing.
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Conclusion and Implications
As I completed my interviews with Jenna Dahl and the students at Ashgrove College, it
became clear to me that I was witnessing something unique in choral music education. The
director’s teaching philosophy was the foundation on which so many aspects of the choral
program stood: it informed her approach to her work, her interactions with students and
colleagues, and her vision for the community at large in which the program exists. I came across
a program where social bonding and perspective taking is an integral part of day-to-day
interactions. The director of the program took great care to craft an experience for her students
that was not just focused on providing excellent instruction and transfer of musical knowledge.
The choral program at Ashgrove was also concerned with teaching students how to interact with
others in the world. By consistently challenging her students to consider the perspective of the
speaker or imagined character in a choral composition, Jenna Dahl gave her students tools to
consider others’ thoughts, ideas, feelings and motivations. Students who engage in perspective
taking this way were more likely to consider issues beyond them, to think about other people.
Arriving at one’s teaching philosophy and articulating its tenets to others can be a
challenging task for some educators. To make matters more difficult, choral educators, especially
at the community college level, are pressed by limitations in resources, funding, and time. To
cope with these pressures, the simplest thing is often to focus on teaching the repertoire, not the
person. A teaching philosophy that is centered on content is different from a philosophy that is
centered on teaching the individual, however. The latter demands educators to consider their own
humanity and examine their teaching from the perspective of how their actions make their
students feel and rather than think. In the choral context, diving in to discuss texts requires
courage and a vulnerability on the part of the director, as there is no way to determine where a
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conversation may lead and simply acting as a moderator can appear inauthentic. Some choral
educators may hide behind their roles as directors or administrators in order to avoid being
vulnerable in front of their students. The myriad of tasks, responsibilities and performances may
distract students from seeing what is really there: a lack of trust to be open with them. It is true
that some educators may feel more comfortable than others to be open with their students, and
this is understandable. Jenna Dahl is an example of someone who is not afraid to share her
thoughts and lived experiences with others. Regardless of how comfortable one feels, as the
findings in this dissertation suggested, engaging students in social learning often requires the
educators to model the exact concept that they are trying to teach. For Jenna Dahl, this meant
adopting the perspectives of her students by programming repertoire that she believed would
speak to them, caring for each individual, and creating a learning experiences that her students
otherwise would not have. These three things constitute a distinct teaching philosophy that
manifests itself through Jenna’s everyday actions and words. In the process of living out her
teaching philosophy, Jenna allowed her students to get to know her personally, modelling the
benefits of being vulnerable: trust and acceptance.
As we understand more about social learning theory, and as the next generation of
students becomes more bold and self-aware, it becomes the educator’s responsibility to offer
pedagogy that resonates with developments in educational psychology and social sciences.
Theoretical works such as Community of Practice theory (Wenger, 1998) can help educators
gain a deeper understanding of the learning experiences that are happening in their choirs.
Through Wenger’s theory it is possible to consider choral education in broader terms: as the
negotiation of meaning. Through a COP lens, day to day events like coming to rehearsal,
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meeting others, and going on trips, for example, can turn the choir into an evolving organism that
is guided by the experiences of many people, not just the conductor.
Choral repertoire is a vehicle through which social learning can occur. Unfortunately,
many choral educators choose compositions that have very little significance to them personally.
The pressures of choosing pedagogically sound repertoire, paired with budgetary constraints and
other challenges, force many choral educators to resort to what is available rather than what is
meaningful to them. Jenna Dahl faced all of the aforementioned constraints, but diligently chose
every composition that moved her in some way. This approach to choosing repertoire was
embedded into her teaching philosophy. She took time to look up each piece, to read about it,
and to consider its poetry. If the piece sparked her curiosity in some way, she jotted a note, and
did some research, prior to sharing it with her students. On the podium, the students saw a
director who made an intentional decision to program pieces of music that were filled with
meaning. Jenna could share those reasons at any moment, because they were genuine and not
forced by any mandate. Her choices were always student-centered as well, as she wanted to
convey a life lesson, a philosophy, an outlook or opinion through the texts in the selected
compositions. While she did not always agree with what the texts had to say, she still
programmed the works if she thought that the message was important for her students. This type
of approach emphasizes a teaching philosophy that accounts for content but that is first and
foremost centered on the individual: Jenna believes in the personal growth that each person in
her choir can experience if they begin to connect the message in the choral music that they sing
to their day-to-day lives.
Experiencing this approach was eye-opening for me personally. I have often considered
choral repertoire with an “obvious” message as not worthy of programming. Many of my
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colleagues criticize pieces with such “obvious” messages, calling them “fluff”. Writing this
dissertation today, my opinion has changed. Compositions with a straightforward, clear message
have the power to make a lasting impact on students just as much as works that carry a more
artistic value. Witnessing so many students at Ashgrove College describe their feelings and ideas
on choral pieces that meant a lot to them showed me that this kind of repertoire can be powerful
in its own right.
An important piece to programming is actively engaging students in dialogue about the
compositions. Simply putting a composition that has a “good message” without hearing the
students’ perspectives on it may weaken or even hinder the potential for social learning. Jenna
Dahl elected to program less repertoire every semester, and spent more time engaging students in
the learning of each piece. The end result is that her students had a deeper understanding of the
content of the repertoire, its historical significance, and its meaning for their peers, with whom
they performed the work. Choral directors who cultivate their students’ perspectives and allow
them to hear their peers’ views in rehearsal are actually training their students to view this type
of interaction as normal. When students face situations in their day-to-day lives where people
have different viewpoints, they can draw on past experiences of acknowledging, listening, and
adopting others’ perspectives that they have had in choir. As choral educators, we want our
students to exit our programs not just as better musicians, but as better people. This desire should
inform and shape our teaching philosophy. Studies such as this one highlight the importance of
accounting for this in real-time–through rehearsal planning, brainstorming, and creative
teaching–to build in time for our students to connect what they are doing as choral singers to
what they experience in the “real” world.
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Limitations of the Current Study and Directions for Future Research
As outlined in the study methodology, data collection for this study occurred over a 3-
month period. Ideally, an entire academic year would generate adequate data to access a complex
topic such as perspective taking. More observations and in-depth interviews would yield a more
nuanced understanding of how students engage in perspective taking over time. Since all
members in Ashgrove Singers make a year-long commitment, it would benefit the study to
investigate how relationships within the choir evolve over an entire academic year. Additionally,
the sample size for the study can expand to include more study voices. While some of students
mentioned each other in our interviews, I did not have a chance to investigate how perspective
taking occurs within a larger group of primary participants.
A more in-depth study can include nonparticipant observation and journal-keeping. The
former would help triangulate my findings and enrich the understanding of non-verbal
interactions in the choir. Journal-keeping would be an effective way to examine whether the
students’ engagement in choir affects their day-to-day life. It would also allow for participants to
interact with the researcher on and one-on-one basis outside of the rehearsal. Whereas the private
Facebook group created for this study was designed to help participants keep in touch with me
while I was not on site to collect data, it was still a public forum where other students could see
each other’s posts. Adding a journal-keeping component to this study will enable students to
share their thoughts privately, which would potentially result in a more in-depth understanding of
how they use perspective taking strategies outside of rehearsal.
Although this study was conducted within a community college setting, the research
questions did not address this educational setting directly. Future research could examine how
aspects of the educational context affects engagement in perspective taking in more detail. A
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slightly different angle on the research could compare students’ engagement in perspective
taking in a community college environment with a four-year university environment.
Furthermore, this study could be replicated with a group of students who attended Ashgrove
College, but have now transferred to four-year institutions. This type of research can shed light
to what extent the students’ experience at Ashgrove College impacts their learning experience in
university.
In the near future, I would also be interested in conducting a study that looks at the
“milestones” of an interaction within a choir. Gwen’s description of such “milestones” was very
interesting because it pointed to a trajectory of perspective taking and social bonding. A follow-
up study could examine how different students perceive milestones to occur within their choirs,
and whether participation in choral singing translates to their awareness of such milestones in
group interactions that they may have outside of rehearsal. By interrogating these milestones, it
might even be possible for one to arrive at a theory of perspective taking specific to choirs.
Finally, the issue of students with disabilities surfaced many times in my discussions with
Jenna and the participating students. Future research could investigate how students with
learning disabilities navigate community college music programs. What is the experience like for
students with learning disabilities? Do they graduate? Do they require extra sources of support
and if so, which ones? Do music professors go out of their way to offer such support, and if so,
does this affect the demands on them as opposed to professors of other disciplines? While this
topic is not related to perspective taking directly, it is a research avenue that I became interested
in since visiting Ashgrove College.
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Final Thoughts
Conducting this research has enabled me to engage in perspective taking on a personal
level. Meeting Jenna, the participants in this study, listening to their stories, hearing them
describe their process of interpretation and relating to choral repertoire–all of these things have
enriched my own understanding of how others perceive choral music-making. Imagining the
participants’ day-to-day experiences and putting myself in their shoes as community college
students has been invaluable in my own trajectory as a director, researcher and person. I walk
away from this study having gained a deeper appreciation for choral art, and the people who
engage in it with their whole being.
215
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APPENDIX A: Information Sheet for Non-Medical Research
THROUGH THEIR SONG: A CASE STUDY IN PERSPECTIVE TAKING
WITH A COMMUNITY COLLEGE CHOIR
PURPOSE OF THE STUDY
The purpose of this study is to observe and study social learning with a community college choir. Little is
currently known about how choristers relate to each other in the context of their participation in choir,
specifically in a community college setting. Knowledge of such information is important because it may
help us design rehearsal practices to account for the role of social learning in choral education.
PARTICIPANT INVOLVEMENT
To participate in this study, you will be asked to participate in a focus group interview. Select participations
will also be asked to participate in a one-on-one interview. The interview will be recorded in audio format,
and I can turn the microphone off, if you ask me to do so. You do not need to respond to any questions that
you may uncomfortable answering. I will also record rehearsals with Ashgrove Singers on video. These
data will be collected for research purposes only and will not be distributed. Lastly, you will be invited to
participate in a private Facebook group as a follow-up to the study. The group will be a place where you
can share updates and upload media to keep me apprised of activities of your choir. Once I complete this
study, the group will be removed from Facebook and data collected from the group will be destroyed.
Participation in the Facebook group is completely voluntary.
CONFIDENTIALITY
During the interview, I will ask you to talk about your past and present musical experiences, as well as your
experiences relating to others in Ashgrove Singers. Although you will be sharing musical and non-musical
aspects of your life with me, there will be no identifiable information obtained in connection with this study.
Your name, address or other identifiable information will not be collected.
Only the members of the research team will have access to your interview data, and that is only for the
purpose of transcribing the interview data. The University of Southern California’s Human Subjects
Protection Program (HSPP) may also access the data. The HSPP reviews and monitors research studies to
protect the rights and welfare of research subjects.
INVESTIGATOR CONTACT INFORMATION
Irene Apanovitch-Leites
DMA Candidate, Department of Choral & Sacred Music
USC Thornton School of Music
Tel (424) 542-2003; apanovit@usc.edu
IRB CONTACT INFORMATION
University Park IRB, Office of the Vice Provost for Research Advancement, Credit Union Building, 3720
South Flower Street, CUB # 301 Los Angeles, CA 90089-0702, (213) 821-5272 or upirb@usc.edu
227
APPENDIX B: Participant Recruitment Email
Dear member of Ashgrove Singers,
My name is Irene Apanovitch-Leites and I am carrying out research for my dissertation at the
Thornton School of Music, University of Southern California, supervised by Dr. Beatriz Ilari and
Dr. Jo-Michael Scheibe. My research examines how singers in a community college choir
engage in social learning and relate to one another in musical and non-musical ways.
As a member of Ashgrove Singers, you are invited to take part in this study. Participation in this
study is completely voluntary. There are no costs related to participation. Additionally, no
compensation is offered to participations.
Participation in this research involves being a part of focus groups. In a focus group, 3-5
members of Ashgrove Singers will come together to answer and discuss 5-6 questions that I will
raise. Each focus group will meet once for 60 minutes. Once the focus groups have been
conducted, up to five select members of these groups will be asked to join me for one-on-one
interviews at a later date.
Once interviews in focus groups have been completed, I will launch a private Facebook group
for those of you who may be interested in keeping in touch with me and sharing information
about your choir’s activities. Participation in this Facebook group is completely optional. Data
posted on this Facebook group will be used for research purposes only and will not be
distributed. The Facebook group will be removed once I finish writing my dissertation.
Participants in this study will not be identified. I will use pseudonyms for your names, as well as
the name of your conductor and your choir. During the data collection phase, I will audio-record
all of the interviews and video-record your choir rehearsals. Both the audio and video recordings
will be used for research purposes only. In the case that I may need to use clips of audio
recordings from the interviews, I will use software to anonymize your voice on the recording so
that you are not identifiable.
Thank you for considering being involved in my study. If you have any questions about the
research, please get in touch with me via apanovit@usc.edu
I look forward to meeting many of you when I visit campus for the first phase of data collection
in the Fall semester!
Respectfully,
Irene Apanovitch-Leites
Principal Researcher
228
APPENDIX C: Focus Group Protocol
Participants: 3-5
Duration: 60 minutes
Question 0: Tell me about yourself.
When did you start singing in choir?
Tell me about your experience of singing in Ashgrove Singers:
o When did you start singing in the group?
o Why did you decide to join this choir?
Question 1: Do you think perspective taking plays a role in choral singing? If so, how?
1a. What are the different musical perspectives that you need to consider when learning a
piece of music in choir?
1b. How would you describe the interaction of viewpoints of the composer, the lyricist,
the conductor and you, the singer?
1c. Do you think that taking other people’s perspectives relates to intonation in a choral
setting? If so, how?
Question 2: Can you describe an experience that you may have had while singing in Ashgrove
Singers where you had to put yourself in another singer’s ‘shoes’?
2a. If not your personal experience, then a situation where another person did that?
Question 3: In what ways is it important to come to a ‘common ground’ while making music
together as a choir?
Why? How so?
For clarification, prompt musical, social aspects
Question 4: Does what you do in choir, specifically how you relate to others or observe others
relate to each other, affect your day-to-day interactions with family and friends. If so, how?
Question 5: Is there anything else that you would like to share about this topic or about your
experience of singing in Ashgrove Singers?
229
APPENDIX D: Student Interview Protocol
Participants: 1
Duration: 45 minutes
Question 1: Tell me about your experience of singing together with a group of people
representing diverse ethnic, cultural and socioeconomic backgrounds.
1a. How has it impacted the way in which you relate to your peers in the choir?
1b. Do you think that you have met people that you may not have otherwise have had a
chance to meet?
Question 2: What is your process for negotiating the conductor’s perspective on the music that
you are learning with what you perceive to be the composer’s intent?
(Conversational version: let’s talk about a situation when conductor has a perspective A and you
interpret the composer’s intention in a different way–what do you do in those situations? Can
you give me an example?)
2a. To what extent do you see the conductor’s interpretation of the music to be the ‘final
say’?
2b. How important is it for you to add your own perspective on the music when you sing
in Ashgrove Singers?
Question 3: To what extent has singing in Ashgrove Singers impacted the way in which your
family and friends view you?
Can you share a story of a time when their perception of you had changed?
Question 5: Is there anything else that you would like to share with me about your experiences
in Ashgrove Singers?
230
APPENDIX E: Director Interview Protocol
Participants: 1
Duration: 60 minutes
Question 0: Can you talk about your journey of working with Ashgrove Singers.
0a. Tell me about your experience of working at Ashgrove College in general
Question 1: What would you say are the core tenets of your teaching philosophy?
Question 2: What role, if any, do you see empathy play in your work with Ashgrove Singers?
2a. Can you define empathy for me?
Question 3: Can you describe an experience when you helped students engage in perspective
taking?
Do you have another experience of doing that within the context of music-making?
Outside of music, have you facilitated this process socially between students?
Question 4: What strategies do you use to help students develop perspective taking within your
choir?
Question 5: What do you consider to be your role in mediating the perspective of the composer
with the perspective of the lyricist, and ultimately, the singers?
Question 6: Is the anything else that you would like to tell me about this topic or about your
experience with Ashgrove Singers?
231
APPENDIX F: Accompanist Interview Protocol
Participants: 1
Duration: 45 minutes
Question 1: Can you talk about your journey of working with Ashgrove Singers.
1a. Tell me about your experience of working at Ashgrove College in general
Question 2: How do you perceive your musical role to be in this community?
2a. Do you think of yourself as fulfilling other, non-musical roles in this setting?
Question 3: Can you describe an experience when you helped students engage in perspective
taking?
3a. Do you have another experience of doing that within the context of music-making?
3b. Outside of music, have you facilitated this process socially between students?
Question 4: What do you consider to be your role in mediating the perspective of the composer
with the perspective of the lyricist, and ultimately, the singers?
Question 5: Is the anything else that you would like to tell me about this topic or about your
experience with Ashgrove Singers?
Abstract (if available)
Abstract
The purpose of this case study was to investigate the process of perspective taking within an SATB-mixed choir at a community college in southern California. Using Wenger’s Communities of Practice (1998) theory and Gehlbach’s (2004) Social Perspective Taking research as theoretical lenses, I aimed to answer two research questions: (1) How do participants describe their process of taking each other’s musical and non-musical perspectives in the context of their participation in choir
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Asset Metadata
Creator
Apanovitch-Leites, Irene
(author)
Core Title
Through their song: a case study in social perspective taking with a community college choir
School
Thornton School of Music
Degree
Doctor of Musical Arts
Degree Program
Choral Music
Publication Date
04/28/2019
Defense Date
04/26/2019
Publisher
University of Southern California
(original),
University of Southern California. Libraries
(digital)
Tag
choir,community college,community of practice,COP,education,Empathy,OAI-PMH Harvest,perspective taking
Format
application/pdf
(imt)
Language
English
Contributor
Electronically uploaded by the author
(provenance)
Advisor
Ilari, Beatriz (
committee chair
), Parker, Elizabeth Cassidy (
committee member
), Scheibe, Jo-Michael (
committee member
), Sparks, Tram Innes (
committee member
)
Creator Email
apanovit@usc.edu,ireneapanovitch@gmail.com
Permanent Link (DOI)
https://doi.org/10.25549/usctheses-c89-152939
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etd-Apanovitch-7321.pdf (filename),usctheses-c89-152939 (legacy record id)
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Apanovitch-Leites, Irene
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The author retains rights to his/her dissertation, thesis or other graduate work according to U.S. copyright law. Electronic access is being provided by the USC Libraries in agreement with the a...
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Tags
community college
community of practice
COP
education
perspective taking