Posted by Deanna | Posted in Books, Music, Ph.D., Reading, Research | Posted on 07-10-2009
Tags: Books, education, ideal city, learning, Music, plato, readings, the republic
I have been reading Plato’s The Republic, and have had a few different thoughts bouncing around in my head. In the world of education, Platonic thinking seems to arise when you least expect it, and the more I read, the more I feel like I do not know enough. Five million questions came to mind when reading Plato, like whether or not he truly believed a perfect City could be achieved, or whether it was simply an idealistic fantasy. Either way, I know I have only started to brush off the surface of understanding what Plato was trying to say.
Nonetheless, here are the three main thoughts that arose from my reading Plato’s The Republic – Books 1 – 4:
Learning:
Persuasion is only possible when the other person is listening, as noted in the statement “But can you persuade, if we refuse to listen?” in book One. In the context of education and the shaping of impressionable minds, I find this statement to be noteworthy. If a student is not open to the concept of listening, and the possibility of growing their knowledge base, their opposition hinders the learning process.
The Ideal City and Music:
The education of the members of the ideal city focuses on following the rules, and a strictly censored learning and content. I found Plato’s stance on music education to be fascinating, as his belief that certain harmonies evoke certain emotions, virtue and a “good” soul, while “bad” harmonies or music can corrupt and “latch onto” the soul. Now in today’s society, and as a musician/composer myself, I find it difficult to wrap my mind around having my Art censored. Upon consideration within the “Ideal Just City”, I can completely understand why there would be specific restrictions on the types of music that will be a part of education, as creativity and thinking “outside-the-box” could be catastrophic to the organized structure of the just society.
An Interesting Side Note on “Bad Music”:
Throughout history, certain types of music have been banned for their potential to evoke emotions that were incongruent with the ideals of that time. The augmented fourth interval, also known as a tritone, has been used consistently as an example of a “bad” interval, with a historical connotation of being dissonant and “evil” (even used today in horror films to evoke “evil”).
As there are different overtones that occur from different intervals, it could be quite possible that certain harmonic scales could be particularly disturbing to someone who associates the tritone with “evil”, due to their societal music education. Overtones are the natural resonance of an instrument, as instruments emit harmonic frequencies in addition to their fundamental pitch.
There were so many themes and ideas that came out of my readings, yet I felt that these three topics were my favourites. Any thoughts?
Ciao
Deanna





