The STEAM Factory and the Music Education area of the School of Music welcome noted scholar Randall Everett Allsup, Teachers College, Columbia University. As part of his residency at Ohio State, Allsup presents "Art and Science, and STEM to STEAM: Some Distinctions and Convergences" at 400 West Rich Street in downtown Columbus.
If it is the case that works of art exist “in their own space,” and if it remains true that there is something about an aesthetic experience that is extra/ordinary (or even peculiar), then the inclusion of “Art” within the panoply of Science, Technology, Engineering and Math is hardly self-evident. Proponents, like the Partnership for 21st Century Skills (2015), argue that the sciences are enlarged by the arts, providing STEM subjects with the “4Cs” of art-making –- creativity, critical thinking, communication and collaboration. These are innovative skills that prepare students for the demands of citizenship, college readiness and careers in the new knowledge economy. But steam/STEAM has always been a too-convenient metaphor for any age. Freud found in thermodynamics the properties of self and personhood (the superego, of course, is the lid that contains the explosive properties of the steam-like id; the ego is steam’s control valve). Recall the steamboat, symbol of destruction, bearing down on Huckleberry and Jim as they float peacefully down the Mississippi. Invisible, deadly, steam/STEAM’s presence is unoften accidental and infrequently found in nature. Writes Karl Jaspers (1951), “any insight which for cogent reasons is recognized by all has become scientific knowledge.” The word logical, Dewey writes, “is synonymous with wide-awake, thorough, and careful reflection — thought in its best sense” (1910). In Heidegger’s essay The Question Concerning Technology (1977), science is called upon to make things evident, whereas art seeks to evoke. In this gathering, [Allsup] would like to struggle with the distinctions between scientific thinking and artistic thinking, looking for convergences where possible.
Randall Everett Allsup is associate professor of music and music education at Teachers College, Columbia University in the City of New York. Allsup earned degrees in music performance and music education from Northwestern University and Columbia University. His doctoral thesis, Crossing Over: Mutual Learning and Democratic Action in Instrumental Music Education was awarded “Outstanding Dissertation of the Year” by the Council on Research in Music Education. In 2009, he was awarded a Fulbright grant to teach and conduct research at the Sibelius Academy in Helsinki, Finland. Allsup is the recipient of the Outstanding Teaching Award at Teachers College.
Allsup has written over 50 research publications, including a recent book from Indiana University Press (2016) titled Remixing the Classroom: Toward an Open Philosophy of Music Education. Allsup has served on the editorial board of top-tier journals such as the Bulletin of the Council for Research in Music Education, Journal of Research in Music Education, Music Educators Journal, Music Education Research, Philosophy of Music Education Review and Research Studies in Music Education. He is former chair of the International Society for the Philosophy of Music Education. Randall Allsup is the proud sponsor of 27 completed dissertations at Teachers College.
Allsup also will present "Instrumental Music Education, Identity and Social Justice" at the Ohio State School of Music as follows:
- Tuesday, Feb. 26 at 9:30 a.m. — Weigel Hall 174 (MUS 4576)
- Tuesday, Feb. 26 at 12:40 p.m.— Weigel Hall 177 (MUS 4576)
All lectures are free and open to the public.
