Impact of Music Participation on the Psychological Wellbeing of Refugees

Erin Bailey is a professor of Music Education at Brigham Young University. Her research, which is grounded in self-determination theory, focuses on the benefits of music participation on psychological wellbeing and mental health. The following is a revised summary of her remarks at the April and July Windsor Dialogue conferences.

Research on Music Participation and Refugees

Music participation is a broad umbrella term for purposeful interactions with music. Research on refugee participation in music generally falls into three main categories: (1) music therapy, (2) group music-making, and (3) music education. Therapeutic interactions include songwriting, group improvisation, or drum circles run by a professional music therapist. Music participation also includes community music-making, like community choirs or songwriting groups. Music education, such as programs in school environments, has been shown to nurture physical, intellectual, social, and emotional development.

(more…)

Continue Reading Impact of Music Participation on the Psychological Wellbeing of Refugees

The Promotion of Music, Mental Health, and Preservation of Culture and Religion to International Agencies

Dr Sr Maryanne Loughry is a Sister of Mercy and has been associated with Jesuit Refugee Service Australia since 1986. She is a visiting research scholar at the Center for Human Rights and International Justice, Boston College, and a research associate at the Refugee Studies Centre, University of Oxford. The following is an edited summary of her remarks at the July 2022 Windsor Dialogue conference.

The 2022 AMAR Windsor Dialogue focused on the link between music, mental health, and the preservation of culture and religion. This topic had evolved from earlier dialogues addressing the persecution of the Yazidis, with a particular focus on religious persecution.

(more…)

Continue Reading The Promotion of Music, Mental Health, and Preservation of Culture and Religion to International Agencies

Christianity, Human Rights, and Dignity: Squaring the Triangle

Brett G. Scharffs
Brett G. Scharffs

Brett G. Scharffs is Rex E. Lee Chair, Professor of Law, and Director of the International Center for Law and Religion Studies, J. Reuben Clark Law School, Brigham Young University

Andrea Pin is Associate Professor of Comparative Public Law, University of Padua, and Senior Fellow at the Center for the Study of Law & Religion Emory University

Andrea Pin

Dmytro Vovk is Director of the Centre for the Rule of Law and Religion Studies, Yaroslav Mudryi National Law University (Ukraine) and co-editor of Talk About: Law and Religion

This blogpost is modified from Scharffs, Pin, and Vovk’s Introduction to “Human Dignity and Human Rights—Christian Perspectives and Practices: A Focus on Constitutional and International Law,” in a special issue of the BYU Law Review.

Dmytro Vovk

Introduction

The relationship between Christianity and human rights is a matter of deep controversy, drawing the attention of theologians, historians, lawyers, and philosophers alike. The historical connections between various denominations of Christianity and human rights and the dialectics between Christianity and human rights are matters of endless academic debates. How much contemporary narratives of rights are owed to Christianity, what Christianity has borrowed from nonreligious modern and post-modern thinkers, the extent to which the contemporary language of rights clash with Christian values, and the theoretical foundations of such clashes keep scholars busy.

The topic, however, is all but confined to theoreticians. How Christianity understands or ought to understand rights is often discussed within legal and political circles. The public role of Christianity and Christians in contemporary societies surfaces whenever a policy that touches upon Christian values is discussed. Parliaments and courts, especially in countries born out of Christianity, are often busy trying to reconcile religious freedom claims put forward by Christians with rights that contradict Christian morality.

(more…)

Continue Reading Christianity, Human Rights, and Dignity: Squaring the Triangle