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

1 What do you understand by Community Music Therapy?
2 What is your vision of Community Music Therapy?
(Rather than addressing each question, which would result in repetition
and overlap of ideas, this report presents the main themes of the Forum.
MP)
Community Music Therapy re-visits limits
Music therapy generally operates within a ‘consensual model’ (Ansdell
2002): i.e., informed by theories that are allegedly culturally ‘neutral’.
CoMuTh challenges this model, in the sense that social and cultural
contexts need to impinge on music therapy theory and practice.
CoMuTherapy’s challenge may involve re-visiting the limits of what
constitutes illness and health, healing and therapy, and notions of ‘music’
and ‘community’.
Music Therapy generally takes place within a boundaried space, created
by theory, professional standards, and therapeutic norms that include
time, physical space, confidentiality and the institutional context within
which music therapists work.
This boundaried space may be understood as ‘limiting’ in the sense of
clarifying what does and does not happen within sessions, both
protecting and enabling the therapist -client relationship.
The boundaried space also sets up dualities that include
• private and public space: what belongs ‘inside’ the session and the
work, and what belongs ‘outside’.
• Institution (within which the work happens) and society (outside the
institution)
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