Musiklärares handlingsutrymme – möjligheter och begränsningar

Abstract in English

Music teachers discretionary power possibilities and limitations. According to previous research in music education, during recent decades the working conditions for professional music teachers in schools have changed radically. The aim of this thesis is to investigate the working conditions of music teachers by focusing on their experiences of and ideas about discretionary power in their professional lives. This is accomplished by addressing the research questions: What does discretionary power mean to the music teachers? How and where is the discretionary power of music teachers created? What enabling and constraining processes in the creation of discretionary power can be identified? The theoretical framework rests on phenomenology and the assumption of the life-world as the complex, everyday world in which we live. In this study, the life-world is perceived as an intentional, lived and social world, and research is understood as the study of lived experience. The methodology is qualitative and the data collection was conducted as in-depth interviews. Student constructed three-dimensional models of what it means to be a music teacher were used as a key to the life world in the interviews. The meaning of discretionary power is shaped in the interplay between knowledge, action and motivation. The creation of discretionary power develops when the inner reality of a music teacher corresponds to the shape and nature of external reality. In relationships with pupils and colleagues different proportions of power, control, demand, social support and trust can be identified. These illuminate the social processes through which discretionary power is created, and they are also enabling and constraining in various ways. The results are discussed as three themes; the meaning of discretionary power in the relationships between (i) music teachers and their institutional settings, (ii) music teachers and their tasks and (iii) music teachers and others. The findings point out the tension between enabling and constraining processes in these three themes. Meaning is formed together with pupils and colleagues. In conclusion, the knowledge base of discretionary power and the creation of discretionary power consist of three dimensions: knowledge about discretionary power, knowledge through discretionary power and knowledge in discretionary power.