Ep. 002 | Social Justice in Music Therapy

Today, we chat with returning guest, Vee Gilman, a board-certified music therapist, about how they incorporate social justice into their therapeutic paradigm.

LEARN MORE

Playing in the Borderlands: The transformative possibilities of queering music therapy pedagogy by Fansler et al. | Journal Article

Destabilizing Bodies, Destabilizing Disciplines: Practicing liminality in music therapy by LaCom & Reed | Journal Article

TRANSCRIPT

Erica: Welcome, friends! You’re listening to The Feeling is Musical — as presented by the Snohomish County Music Project. My name is Erica Lee, and today, we are talking about: Social Justice in Music Therapy, with board-certified music therapist, and returning friend of the podcast, Vee Fansler.

For those of you who have not yet met Vee, they are a board-certified music therapist working with children, youth, and families in transition. Additionally, with five years of clinical experience, they supervise music therapy staff and interns as senior music

therapist at the Snohomish County Music Project. In the final stages of their Masters in

Music Therapy, their work centers trauma-informed care and the political nature of

therapy, highlighting the ecological link between individual and communal well-being.

[Podcast intro music plays]

Erica: Well, thank you for joining us again!

Vee: Woo!

Erica: Um, if you missed last week’s episode, we talked about what is music therapy. Basically, it is music… and relationships, and some boundaries.

Vee: Wooo!

Erica: Wow.

Vee: Love it!

Erica: And we talked about all the ways that you music and you don’t even know it!

Vee: [Laughs] That’s right.

Erica: [Chuckles] Alright, so, today we’e talking about social justice in music therapy - what does it mean - what does it look like - how does a person’s personal narrative shape their therapeutic experience, or, if you’re the clinician, how does your narrative shape your philosophy on therapy.

Vee: Mmm, mmm.

Erica: Alright, so, let’s just jump right in, Vee —

Vee: Mmhmm!

Erica: What does social justice in music therapy mean?

Vee: Wow… Wow wow wow… [laughs] You ask me these questions —

Erica: [Laughs] So casually?

[Erica and Vee laugh]

Vee: [Laughing] As if they just have answers!

Erica: [Laughing] ‘Cause all I have to do is ask the questions.

Vee: Oh! Okay… So, I guess - sort of like we did with the what is music therapy, I wanna back up into… maybe some sort of like um underlying understandings.

Erica: Okay.

Vee: Okay. So, the first of that is gonna be that we bring all of who we are into therapy.

Erica: Mmm! Tweet that.

Vee: [Laughs] We bring all of who we are into therapy. And, regardless of the modality of the therapy, or the ideas that our therapist has, each of our experiences and identities come with us. And if those aren’t being acknowledged or celebrated in that space, they may be being extinguished, or silenced, or closeted. SO —

Erica: Wow.

Vee: Yeah. There we go! —

Erica: That was so eloquent. [Chuckles]

Vee: [Chuckling] That’s the episode.

Erica: That was so good!

Vee: Um… And… Therapy is also a dynamic where the therapist has more power… than —

Erica: Absolutely. Yes —

Vee: The client, or… whatever language you like to use when you’re - when you’re in a therapy space —

Erica: Participant  —

Vee: Right.

Erica: Yes.

Vee: So… in addition to the power hierarchies that already exist, like race and gender and class and disability and body size and sexuality… and —

Erica: List all of them —

Vee: All these things - ethnicity, oh my goodness. Okay!

Erica: [Laughs]

Vee: I’m sorry for whatever access of oppression I left out just now! But… You get the idea. So, in addition to all of those, there’s the added role definition - and hierarchy - of therapist and client —

Erica: Mmhmm —

Vee: And… marginalized identities tend to be over-represented in… clients, or therapy participants —

Erica: Mmhmm —

Vee: And privileged identities tend to be overrepresented… in therapists. So that means that… these - that power hierarchy is just even more layered on top of itself… so that… there is… um - a lot of potential for harm.

Erica: Mmm.

Vee: And… Honestly, there is a lot of existing harm.

Erica: Mmhmm!

Vee: And, there are a lot of ways that therapy has been explicitly… activated for a tool for oppression - and that it is currently - still - activated as a tool for oppression, you know, explicitly —

Erica: Yes —

Vee: Not even accidental, unintended consequences. So, if we’re not thinking about social justice in therapy, we are likely —

Erica: Causing harm.

Vee: Right.

Erica: Yes.

Vee: Continuing the harm… that therapy can… do.

Erica: Yes.

Vee: Yeah.

Erica: I’m on board.

Vee: Yeah —

Erica: I so agree with you —

Vee: Yeah..

Erica: Yes, okay… So, that is that power dynamic in a therapeutic relationship —

Vee: Mmm —

Erica: So, how do then you, as a clinician, and well, I’m talking about you specifically —

Vee: Mmm —

Erica: Because you are really good at your own story —

Vee: Mmm

Erica: Um, everyone has their own story —

Vee: Okay, my own — [chuckles]

Erica: So we’re not gonna talk about other people’s stories. Um, how do you mitigate that… power… —

Vee: Mmm —

Erica: Dynamic —

Vee: Right —

Erica: or minimize it.

Vee: Right. So I think we can’t… undo the power hierarchies that exist - just by sort of… wishing them away, or avoiding them, or anything that - like nothing about really the content that I do in a therapy session can like… undo the fact that I’m white, you know?

Erica: Sure.

Vee: And so if I’m working with a person of color, that power dynamic… exists, right. And so… I guess one thing then is that - to ignore it I guess again is to erase those pieces of ourselves that we bring into it. And I wanna be able to activate my… full authentic self. Especially when I’m a client in therapy —

Erica: Yeah! —

Vee: Like, my therapist can have some boundaries or whatever, but I want them to be able to acknowledge their whole authentic self, right, and - even the ways that that self  changes in context, depending on who we’re with and what we’re doing.

Erica: Sure.

Vee: Um, but… I want to… cultivate spaces as a therapist - - in which… people are able to bring their whole selves with them - with the understanding that I already… understand them as whole, and that I’m coming with curiosity as to… what exactly  that is and how we can move to even more… growing understandings of how our wholeness can sort of expand outward - rather than coming from kind of a… a fixing mindset of —

Erica: Mmm —

Vee: What is broken about a person —

Erica: Mmm —

Vee: And how can I like… resolve that thing, right, that’s —

Erica: ‘Cause that’s a very colonistic —

Vee: Yes, so —

Erica: Colonial way of thinking about somebody else.

Vee: Right. Right, there’s so many ways - and I guess - I keep - I sort of touched on this, but… you know, for me as a queer person, if I - the ways that therapy is actively used to harm people and to extinguish ident - identities… is ever-present on my mind, partly because conversion therapy is such a strong example, where, in that case, queer people enter into… quote unquote conversion therapy, right —

Erica: Mmhmm, mmhmm —

Vee: And, the process is - it’s a systematic - it’s bas - it’s - essentially like a cul - cultural genocide project upon… LGBTQ community —

Erica: Mmhmm —

Vee: Where… the process of the therapy is an overt effort to extinguish these marginalized aspects of ourselves.

Erica: Mmm.

Vee: [Sighs] So…

Erica: Yeah.

Vee: There’s… and, I mean that.- like it - that happens with so many marginalized identities - in sometimes that - that explicit of ways —

Erica: And sometimes really —

Vee: Subtly —

Erica: Under the cover —

Vee: Right —

Erica: Covert —

Vee: Right —

Erica: Ways.

Vee: Yeah —

Erica: And ways that are right under your nose. Yeah —

Vee: Right. And ways in which, especially when, like I said, therapists have - are - privileged identities are overrepresented in therapists —

Erica: Mmhmm —

Vee: And privilege… makes us often unaware or able to not attend to… the reality of how power shapes our relationships.

Erica: Mmm.

Vee: That harm happens often in ways where the therapists themselves are not aware of the micro aggressions that they’re doing. And, actually I shouldn’t even say they. I should say… we.

Erica: Yeah, yeah.

Vee: Right, because I as a therapist also do these types of harm and micro-aggressions, and have things that I’m not aware of, in which, you know, my whiteness is sort of overtaking me —

Erica:Totally —

Vee: And despite whatever my intentions might be, I’m doing racism —

Erica: Mmhmm —

Vee: Right, I’m upholding racism in the space.

Erica: Mmhmm.

Vee: Yeah.

Erica: Yes. Yeah, that is so true. Um, I even forgot what I was gonna ask you next because that just —

Vee: Yeah.

Erica: It doesn’t like blow my mind - like it’s not a new concept —

Vee: Mmm —

Erica: That that is what is happening… but I feel so heavily the weight of that —

Vee: Mmm —

Erica: And I had - recently have had some… personal events happen, where that is just —

Vee: Mmm —

Erica: On the forefront of my mind —

Vee: Yeah —

Erica: And keeping me awake at night.

Vee: Yeah.

Erica: And so… for… any person going into any human services —

Vee: Mmm —

Erica: Particularly any therapy modality —

Vee: Mmhmm —

Erica: It’s another reason that it’s so important - that you are getting your cultural competencies —

Vee: Mmm —

Erica: And that does not mean… that it’s only in racism —

Vee: Mmm —

Erica: Or only … I can’t even think of another one —

Vee: If you’re like, I work with… I don’t know —

Erica: I feel like racism, because of the Black Lives Matter movement, and because LGBTQ rites are really hot topics —

Vee: Mmm —

Erica: Right now, like, those 2 things immediately come to mind —

Vee: Mmhmm —

Erica: But, things that I feel like are a little bit more co - more covert —

Vee: Mmm —

Erica: In their erasure… is, um, disability-affirming work —

Vee: Mmm. Yeah. And, can I just actually come —

Erica: Sure —

Vee: To that specifically, because… Music therapy - I will say, is founded on ableism - to be… pretty… —

Erica: Clear — [Chuckles]

Vee: Frank. Yeah. TO be clear, music therapy is founded on ableism. So… in the majority of cases, music therapists - in the therapy space, if music therapists have diagnoses, or identify as disabled, that is not a highlighted part of their identity in the therapy space

Erica: Mmm.

Vee: And. Contrastingly… clients in music therapy are almost always defined by some type of diagnosis or disability or illness. SO, the disability access of oppression is almost always at play in music therapy sessions… —

Erica: Mmhmm —

Vee: Not always, but… —

Erica: Largely.

Vee: Often. [Chuckles] Yeah, and —

Erica: [Chuckling] Yeah, and, can I caveat that, when we are doing an intake for a client, we do ask like what are you wanting therapy for —

Vee: Mmhmm —

Erica: And so then we encourage… if the client or parent or whoever is talking to us… to give a diagnosis - if they want to… But what you’re saying is that the diagnosis is kind of used against —

Vee: Well —

Erica: The client? Rather than to be - because we - ‘cause our programming, specifically at the Music Project, is for disability-affirming —

Vee: Mmhmm, right —

Erica: And so, if you’re autistic, we’re embracing and affirming that identity —

Vee: Right - right —

Erica: Wheres… most music therapy programs - and new students —

Vee: It’s like, what’s the problem? What’s the goal area? —

Erica: Yeah, it’s like —

Vee: The problem is that I’m autistic… right [Chuckles]

Erica: It’s trying to assimilate somebody into the - a culture that’s privileged —

Vee: Yes! —

Erica: And not affirming —

Vee: Right —

Erica: And embracing who they authentically are.

Vee: Right. And even outside of like - work with - you know autistic children is a huge branch of music therapy work… in hospitals, the clients are being defined by the state of their illness —

Erica: Mmhmm —

Vee: Right, whereas the therapist is sort of presented as this healthy other, whose there to like - help or serve - which has power implications too… In… institutions like, you know, behavioral health, there’s diagnoses that come to define the space as well… Where, again, that is one piece of who someone is, that we want to amplify and not erase, and where we also don’t want to just define someone by that one aspect of —

Erica: Absolutely —

Vee: Who they are.

Erica: Yeah.

Vee: And… even with music therapy being… really foundationally based on ableist ideas… of healthy, you know, sort of normative bodies —

Erica: What is good —

Vee: And brains —

Erica: Yeah —

Vee: Right, being —

Erica: Successful —

Vee: Being charged with quote unquote helping or serving… or fixing, right, or erasing, if we’re more direct… people with bodies that um don’t sort of fit that normative way - normative definition - bodies that are seen as um, what do you call it? Dis - [Blows air through closed lips] I can’t think of the word. Bodies that are seen as… uh, abnormal -, right - the idea being that the healthy other fixes the broken… you know… person? —

Erica: Sure.

Vee: There’s so much of a problem with that, right, and that is yet somehow so much of a foundation of our profession. Um, and even - even… that aside, just by the very nature of, again, overrepresentation of non-disabled people in therapist roles and disabled people in client roles —

Erica: Mmhmm —

Vee: It is jarring how little… which is to say almost never, disability studies is is part of music therapy education.

Erica: Mmm.

Vee: So, many music therapists enter into these spaces without a prior understanding of disability as an identity - simply thinking of disability as impairment.

Erica: Mmm —

Vee: Right, where impairment… is the idea of like, this is the thing that keeps me from doing things, and where disability as an identity is socially grounded. More like, okay, yes I’m in a wheelchair, - that would not be disabling to me if there were actually ramps and space for me to navigate through my world.

Erica: Absolutely, absolutely.

Vee: Yeah.

Erica: Yes. Yeah, the impairment connotation —

Vee: Mmhmm —

Erica: Of something lacking —

Vee: Mmhmm —

Erica: And, I think…. For people that are… able-bodied —

Vee: Mmm —

Erica: The word limits has a very like negative - like stopping —

Vee: Mmhmm —

Erica: Whereas, at least in… the community that I am a part of for disabled people… it’s more about like a safety - like, this is like the threshold —

Vee: Mmhmm —

Erica: Where I am safe and then where I am not safe.

Vee: Mmhmm. Right! And where, as therapists, what we don’t wanna do is say, okay, this is the person’s limit that they’ve, you know, s - expressed to me or that I’ve learned, right, and I’mma spend my entire time with that person trying to push that limit.

Erica: Mmhmm.

Vee: Right, so like, if I’m spending time with a person who has dementia, and I know that like, the thing that dementia does is make it difficult to remember things, I’m not - and it’s a degenerative disease like we’re talking about —

Erica: Yeah - yeah —

Vee: I’m not gonna really spend a lot of time - like sort of quizzing people about what they remember, I’m gonna use that time to build up - to acknowledge, right, that that part of the nature of where we are is that… we have memory loss in this space, right —

Erica: Absolutely, yeah —

Vee: But not to define it by sort of quizzing and trying to push past and saying, okay, people… Yup, like [chuckles ]just as I suspected, like people with dementia like could not remember these things…

Um, and there are unique things about music, where sometimes it does elicit memories, and it can be really beautiful in the things that come up. But the point… of the therapist is not to undo the dementia.

Erica: Absolutely.

Vee: At least in my paradigm, right. And there are things also where… impairments can be a real part of disabled culture, and identity, like… that sometimes - you know, even for me, I have asthma , right, and there are times when I’m like, yeah, this is definitely an impairment - and, just to clarify, like, I don’t identify as disabled because of that —

Erica: Mmhmm —

Vee: But, I do experience impairment —

Erica: Yeah —

Vee: Through my asthma, where sometimes I’m like, yeah no, I really just want to —

Erica: YOu’re really lacking breath.

Vee: [Chuckling] Yeah, like —

Erica: [Chuckles] Yeah —

Vee: Yeah, I just wanna be able to breathe.

Erica: Yeah.

Vee: And sometimes, you know, both - we can hold both of those things. Where, sometimes there are things where… a person may be like, I’m experiencing an impairment, like I had a traumatic brain injury and I used to walk and now don’t, and I want to build back toward walking. And music therapy can help that —

Erica: Yes.

Vee: But the risk is, that when we have so - such a - such a distance in power… that sometimes, those desires and those goals can be assumed. Because —

Erica: Mmm —

Vee: The sort of non disabled… helper figure can look at a disabled person and say… I bet that you - [chuckles] like you know, I bet that you want to be able to walk because I can see that you’re not walking, right?

Erica: Yeah.

Vee: And, for - like forget the rest of, like, what, you know, what it means to be a person.

Erica: Absolutely —

Vee: Yeah —

Erica: Absolutely… Yeah… that’s so good. I think, in the social justice conversation… ableism gets lost.

Vee: Mmhmm.

Erica: We talk a lot about other marginalized identities —

Vee: Mmm —

Erica: But not necessarily…

Vee: And it’s so - at - in - with music therapy in particular, ableism is… so much - so much at play.

Erica: Yes.

Vee: Um, I wanna talk about another thing about how, I guess, or what it means to practice with a social justice paradigm.

Erica: Oh! Tell me! [Chuckles]

Vee: I - this is sort of a different topic, but… Um —

Erica: That’s okay.

Vee: So there’s one - we’ve been talking about like when you’re in the therapy space, you know, on a personal level, is your therapist amplifying or minimizing um, your marginalized identities. I think, for me also, what it means to practice with a social justice paradigm...is that therapy is not just a space where… we sort of bring all of our traumas that we have from existing in a society that’s violent toward us - whatever, you know - especially as that operates in terms of our marginalized identities. It’s not just a space where we bring in all that trauma and, like, let it go, and have someone validate us like, you’re right, that’s awful, and we sort of like, go back and just… face all of this —

Erica: Yeah, keep doing it, keep living —

Vee: Brutal nature of how, you know, hegemony and hierarchies, you know, operate against us. That can be part of therapy, but I think that… practicing social justice also means that… we, as therapists, and, you know, we, as a profession… are - working to sort of move this needle of social justice more broadly.

Erica: Mmm.

Vee: Where we have to recognize that individual health and community health are intimately tied —

Erica: Mmhmm —

Vee: They’re co-constitutive, right, they define each other. And so… if we’re only helping individual people to cope with injustices, that’s like… not bad, you know? [Chuckles]

Erica: Yeah —

Vee: But like, there’s more to that question of what it means to to do social justice in therapy. So, the question is - even beyond that, or in addition to that - how is this moving the needle of justice more broadly? And, maybe that includes also challenging, you know, the ways that… a person’s privileged identities might show up - challenging, certainly, how our own privileged identities show up - and uphold these power structures.

Erica: Mmm.

Vee: So… I would hope that, in this vision of music therapy and social justice —

Erica: Yeah —

Vee: that our music therapy would celebrate us in our marginalized identities, challenge us in our dominant identities, and move toward an expansive vision of healing - that is not only individual, but includes our whole communities.

Erica: Wow… I love that, Vee. That’s so good. We are going to do an episode in about - um, I think it’s in about a month or so —

Vee: Mmm —

Erica: That is talking about… how individual health effects communal health —

Vee: Mmm —

Erica: And we’ll explore this idea more. So, if this is something that interests you, as a listener, we encourage you to stay tuned and check out that episode. Um, we are coming to the end of our time for today. DO you, Vee, have any… resources, books, websites, etc that you can think of off the top of your head that you would encourage people to check out?

Vee: Umm…

Erica: If not, we will always include further resources on our website for each episode.

Vee: Hmm, so, there’s a book called Experiencing Race as a Music Therapist that has music therapists’ personal stories about race impacting their work. There is… a whole special issue in the Voices journal, which is free to access - for anyone to access - about queering - which is not just about LGBTQ identities, but is about queering as like destabilizing power things… So there’s a whole special issue on that, with like multiple articles - there’s one that I wrote with several of my friends and colleagues, so… go read that one…

Erica: Awesome!

Vee: Um, yeah!

Erica: Okay, well, we will put the links to those on the episode notes and on the webpage.

If you would like to find out more, the website for The Feeling is Musical is the same as our nonprofit. It is: S - C - Sam - Cat - Music Project dot org (scmusicproject.org). Uh, you can find the podcast page there, and then look for any resources that you would want to. If you would like to stay tuned -follow us on social media - we are on all the platforms at SCMusicProject. Next time we we’ll be talking about community music therapy with Cassie Fox. Stay tuned for that and we’ll talk to you next time.

Vee: Byeee!

[Podcast outro music plays]