Dr. Deborah Bradley: Guest Lecture Reflection
Although I was only able to attend the first half hour of Dr. Bradley’s lecture due to a concert I participated in, I still feel that I retained a fair amount of valuable information regarding social injustice, and in particular, the subjects of non-racism versus anti-racism. Unfortunately, I had fallen a bit behind and hadn’t gotten to reading Deborah’s article prior to her coming in and elaborating on it, however I find that I still was able to learn a lot of important information while I was sitting in listening to her speak. Deborah spoke about “multiculturalism” in Canada and how it doesn’t always reach it’s potential. She then zoomed-in to a musical context, explaining that oftentimes when we as students perform music, we are only focusing on the music itself, not it’s cultural background or why we’re playing it. Dr. Bradley stressed that music should be equally a “social and cultural experience”, explaining that because all music comes from somewhere and means something, it is important to educate students/ musicians about this. She then explains “multiculturalism” to be a “non-racist” view of the world, and goes on to highlight the differences and significance between “non-racist” and anti-racist”. Deborah explains the non-racist perspective as being aware of the issues surrounding racism and realizing where things are unfair and unequal, but stopping there and not taking personal action to change anything. Being anti-racist on the other hand, was explained as holding people and ourselves in particular accountable for the racial issues we see in society, and taking physical action to better them. Deborah also explained being anti-racist as thinking about “how we can learn about different people and cultures (using music as our medium) and then talk deeply about it”. Lastly, the final thing we did in her lecture before I had to leave was we all sang a song about freedom which originated from the civil rights movement, and then Dr. Bradley connected the idea of the slaves who sang that song together as an example of being anti-racist; in a peaceful protest (action), through singing a message of inequality was conveyed strongly enough to make “thoughtful people think” and also act upon that inequality, which ultimately led to the laws regarding slavery to be changed. In conclusion, I’m very happy I could sit in on Dr. Deborah Bradley’s lecture to hear her explanations of the content in her article, and I am looking forward to reading her article now that I can transfer some of her perspectives I’ve gained at her lecture first-hand!