"Off the Radar": Reflections of Lesbian and Gay Undergraduates on their Experiences within High School Music Programs

This study was intended to give voice to student musicians regarding the intersections of the rich culture of the high school music classroom and their own developing identity. The purpose of this study is to learn about the experiences of undergraduate lesbian and gay students who participated within their high school music programs. Within a collective instrumental case study design (Creswell, 1998), four undergraduate students from Midwestern universities who self-identified as lesbian or gay were interviewed and asked to reflect upon their experiences within high school music classes. Specifically, we sought to explore dimensions of lesbian and gay identity development (D’Augell, 1994) within the music classroom as related to 1) The domain of musical experience as an instrumentalist or vocalist, both private and shared; 2) The nonmusical, social, and institutional structures of the music classroom; 3) The influence of music educators and other role models; and 4) The experiences of being openly gay or closeted within the context of the music class. Results of cross-case coding show that participants sought out musical experiences as a way of fitting in with their peers, navigated the intersection of multiple identities such as sexuality, gender, race, religion, ethnicity, musicianship, and popular culture, found music to provide a sense of community for themselves as lesbian and gay teens, and found the opportunity for musical expression to be powerful. ESTABLISHING IDENTITY: LGBT STUDIES AND MUSIC EDUCATION May 23 through 26, 2010 Fitzpatrick & Hansen “Off the Radar” Page 3 “Off the Radar”: Reflections of Lesbian and Gay Undergraduates on their Experiences within High School Music Programs Within the heteronormative domain of public school music education, the experiences of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgendered youth have been largely ignored. Due to the work of such groups as The Gay, Lesbian, and Straight Education Network (GLSEN), The Human Rights Campaign (HRC), and leading researchers within the fields of art, physical, and general education (Crisp & Knezek, 2010; Grossman, et al., 2009; Pelton-Sweet & Sherry, 2008), there has been an increase in the amount of literature that documents the experiences of queer youth within schools. However, within the field of music, where often the stereotype is often that “all musicians.are faggots” (Brett, 2006, pp. 17-18), and especially within music education, there is little to no scholarly discourse or study. Troiden’s (1989) Model of Homosexual Identity posed that such an identity is “emergent: never fully determined in a fixed or absolute sense, but always subject to modification and further change,” (p. 68). Adolescence, in particular, represents a time of internal and external struggle alongside intense negotiation of this identity, as interplay emerges between sexual identity and social support within the high school experience (Mufioz-Plaza, Quinn, & Rounds, 2002). High school youth are coping with multiple influences that may also affect the development of their sexual identity, such as social, cultural, economical, racial, and religious. As one example, Blackburn and McCready (2009) suggest that “to work effectively with queer youth in urban communities, one has to embrace the complexities of their multiple identities and develop the capacity to understand the intersections among them” (p. 228). Due to the complexity of identity development within the culture of schools, research recommends studying student experiences and providing support beyond students’ high school career (Mufioz-Plaza, et al., 2002) as well as developing supportive LGBT policies and continuing education for all school personnel and surrounding community members (Grossman, et al., 2009). Within the field of music education, no research exists that examines the intersections between lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgendered adolescent development and student experiences within the music classroom. As the stories that students tell about their own experiences can provide powerful insight into the institutional, curricular, and cultural boundaries that can either squelch or empower ESTABLISHING IDENTITY: LGBT STUDIES AND MUSIC EDUCATION May 23 through 26, 2010 Fitzpatrick & Hansen “Off the Radar” Page 4 these young people (Talburt, 2004), this study was designed to give voice to student musicians regarding the intersections of the rich culture of the high school music classroom and their own developing identity. The purpose of this study was to learn about the experiences of undergraduate lesbian and gay students who participated within their high school music programs. Specifically, we sought to explore dimensions of lesbian and gay identity development (D'Augell, 1994) within the music classroom as related to 1) The domain of musical experience as an instrumentalist or vocalist, both private and shared; 2) The nonmusical, social, and institutional structures of the music classroom; 3) The influence of music educators and other role models; and 4) The experiences of being openly gay or closeted within the context of the music class.