Proceedings, Oxford, UK (2002) - World Federation of Music Therapy

eframe themselves and interrupted the problem saturated cycle.
Choosing instruments for each other allowed for an insight into the
individual lens of both Kitty and Ruby, and an exploration of their
perception of each other. The same could be the case when choosing
instruments to represent the self. In doing so, each person’s expression
of ‘self’ can be acknowledged and validated. The validation allows
beliefs to be confirmed and each person to let go and rethink. In thinking
about ‘self’ this technique also explores how we want to be seen and how
we think we are being seen by others. In Music therapy the therapist is
an integral part of the music making and it was important for me to
consider my role in making the dyad of Kitty and Ruby into a triad
physically, verbally and musically.
Remaining on the theme of ‘self’ but in the context of social
constructionism, I was conscious of Kitty and Ruby’s notion of self
changing in the new environment of music therapy. Through looking at
strengths within their interactions within the sessions, I hoped to
encourage subjective discourses, to explore what other ‘things’ worked,
and to attempt to counter the dominant discourse of failure and loss
within the family, and the larger societal dominant discourse concerned
with learning disability and correct ways of behaving/parenting.
Learning Disability in itself is a Social Construction and I needed to
consider how much I was hide bound by my own beliefs of change with
this client group and by the beliefs of the school in which we were not
only holding our sessions but in which Kitty was seen as an infamous
part.
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