From Shifting Sands to Disappearing in Dunes: Using critically reflexive autoethnography to rethink place, position and purpose in general classroom music teacher education

My role as a university-based, general classroom music (GCM) teacher educator in England has become unclear, exacerbated by a number of policies that have undermined the field of classroom music (CM) in schools and the role of universities in teacher education. This research provided an opportunity to interrogate my professional practice and to rethink my place, position and purpose in the contemporary world of GCM teacher education. Critically reflexive autoethnography was used as a propaedeutic investigation for future critically reflexive action research (Weil, 1998; Hughes and Pennington, 2017). Concepts from Bourdieu (1977; 1986), particularly field, habitus and capital, were employed as theoretical lenses (Brookfield, 2017) through which to analyse personal perceptions of practice. Initial data was shared through purposeful autobiographic narratives (PANs). Each PAN in turn was analysed with reference to relevant literature to move my perspective from the personal, internal and autobiographic towards the social, external and ethnographic. A process of critiquing personal perspectives using relevant theoretical literature continued through a second stage of analysis, considering the key concepts of place, position and purpose using theoretical frameworks derived from Bourdieu and Bernstein. Theoretical perspectives from Biesta and Shulman then act as critical catalysts to initiate the framing of a signature pedagogy for GCM teacher education. Figures are used within the final chapters to frame personal theorising or contributions to knowledge. The concluding section was a process of integrated crystallisation where the rethinking or reconstructing of personal conceptual perceptions were acknowledged in light of new knowing gained from the research process