“The School of Music launched its first collaboration with online education platform Coursera, an online class entitled ‘Music and Social Action,’ at Sprague Hall on Monday,” writes Ivona Iacob on the February 24 Yale Daily News (Connecticut). “The course, taught by music lecturer and MacArthur Fellow Sebastian Ruth … explores the roles and duties musicians have in society and how classical music can create social change.… Yale already has over a dozen courses offered on Coursera in the fields of economics, history of art and psychology. ‘The main goal was to simulate a discussion about the role of arts contributing positive change in our community,’ Ruth said. ‘Do we think of music experiences as leisure or are they a more fundamental part of public dialogue?’ … [The course] investigates philosophers’ ideas on education and aesthetics including those of education reformers John Dewey and Maxine Greene, looks at historical examples of social change exerted by musicians and highlights contemporary examples of this practice through conversations with community art leaders and eminent musicians.… Ruth is founder and artistic director of Community MusicWorks, an organization that connects professional musicians with urban youth and families in Providence, Rhode Island.”
Posted March 1, 2016
