DETERMINANTS OF MARGINALIZATION OF WOMEN IN THE KENYAN MUSIC EDUCATION SPACE

Abstract

Women music educators in Kenya have, for long-time, experienced inequalities while navigating the music education space. As pointed out by various feminist scholars in the west and Africa, the oppression of women is experienced in multiple ways on the basis of patriarchy, race, class and sexuality. Thus, this paper explores the determinants of marginalization of women music educators in the Kenyan music education spaces. It focuses on the experiences of women music educators to bring forth discourses of gender, class, western ideologies and sexuality within the music education field. The paper perpetuates two assertions. One, that women music educators are marginalized within the music education field and two, that these inequalities are differently experienced amongst them. Through the Foucauldian concept of power, the paper demonstrates how a dominant identity produces discourses that define the women music educators as subordinate.