Hearing my world: negotiating borders, porosity, and relationality through cultural production in middle school music classes

This article explores the ways in which a musical learning project acted as a space for critical artistic and relational engagements in two middle school (ages 11–14) music programs. Drawing from work on cultural production and border crossing pedagogies, this project invited students to create soundscape compositions that explored the question ‘how do I hear my world?,’ engage in ongoing dialogue, and critically reflect on the interconnectedness between how they saw themselves, their classmates, and the world. Data amassed from interviews, focus groups, and observations, suggest that both students and educators utilized this project to help them conceptualize social and symbolic borders as porous and crossable in the music classroom. Findings also indicate that understanding border crossing, cultural production, and composition as ongoing processes might help music educators design critical project-based learning opportunities that seek to bring young people into dialogue with others and the world.