Students with intellectual disabilities in rhythmics at the Academy of Music: subject positions, identity and knowledge formation

This article is based on a larger research project where the overall ambition is to critically discuss the encounter between students with intellectual disabilities and the Academy of Music. The aim of the article is to study the subject positions that are offered to the students, and how identity is constructed in interaction between the participants in teaching situations. The aim is also to describe the knowledge formation in a broad sense. The theoretical points of departure are the poststructuralist and the social constructionist theories, where the subject is considered as an agent that constructs reality in social interaction, but also as restricted by prevailing discourses. Discourse analysis is being used, with the aid of analytic tools developed within discursive psychology. Two different prominent discourses in rhythmics are identified: the protective therapeutic discourse, and the reproductive musical discourse. As a final conclusion, subject positions as well as knowledge formations contained in these discourses are discussed.2014-04-3