19992024

Research activity per year

Personal profile

Chinese Name

何慧中

Biography

Wai-Chung Ho received her PhD in music education from the University College London Institute of Education. She is a member of the editorial board for Popular Music and Society, Rock Music Studies, Music Education Research, and Visions of Research in Music Education. She is also a frequent contributor to leading international research journals in the fields of education, music education, and cultural studies, and has been published in top-ranked journals, including Comparative Education, Popular Music & Society, Social History, British Journal of Music Education, International Journal of Music Education, and Music Education Research. Her book School Music Education and Social Change in Mainland China, Hong Kong and Taiwan (Brill, 2011) examined education reforms and innovations in school music education within these changing Chinese societies and compared, from a sociopolitical perspective, how music education in Shanghai, Hong Kong, and Taipei has adjusted to the forces of globalisation, localisation, and Sinicisation, as well as the complex relationship between cultural diversity and political change in these three localities. Her second book, Education, Society, and Cultures (Nova, 2016), addressed the overriding issues concerning the consequences of links between higher education and social change. The main objective of this book was to present information and scholarly research on the development of and challenges to social change, culture, and higher education in Hong Kong. Questions such as the extent to which students can be guided in recognising the formation of diverse cultures as a social accomplishment in a globalised world and acknowledging global citizenship education and other values education in higher education in a changing world were also raised. Her third book Popular Music, Cultural Politics and Music Education in China (Routledge, 2017) examined how social changes and cultural politics have affected the transmission of music in Beijing, Shanghai, and Changsha, which share a common historical culture but have more recently had diverse sociopolitical experiences. The empirical study presented in the book explored Chinese adolescents’ popular music preferences in their daily lives in these three cities, and to what extent and in what ways they preferred experiencing and learning about popular music, rather than more traditional music, in school curricula. It also addressed the power and potential use of popular music in school music education as a producer and reproducer of cultural politics in the music curriculum in Mainland China. Her fourth book, Culture, Music Education, and the Chinese Dream in Mainland China (Springer, 2018), focuses on the rapidly changing sociology of music and music education as manifested in Chinese society. It drew on the broad outlines of a theoretical framework that expanded traditional analyses of cultural politics, cultural memory, and cultural identity in response to the sociopolitical changes in China’s music education. Her recent book, Globalization, Nationalism, and Music Education in the Twenty-First Century in Greater China (Amsterdam University Press, 2021), adopted a multilevel-multidimensional framework and included questionnaire surveys and one-on-one interviews with school music teachers in Mainland China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan to facilitate an understanding of the current cultural politics of these three regions in relation to the recent development of school music education through the study of their respective education policies and practices. 

In her fifth book, Culture, and Music Education in China: Development and Challenges (Routledge, 2013), Wai-Chung provides readers with background materials to facilitate an understanding of Chinese culture, politics, creativity, education, and music education. The book also explores the sociopolitical perspectives that have contributed to informed discussions about key educational issues facing educators, curriculum planners, and policymakers in the changing Chinese society.

Research Interests

  • Citizenship education and music education
  • Creativity in Music Education
  • Education Reform in Chinese Societies
  • Sociology of Music Education
  • Sociology of Music
  • Values Education

Expertise related to UN Sustainable Development Goals

In 2015, UN member states agreed to 17 global Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to end poverty, protect the planet and ensure prosperity for all. This person’s work contributes towards the following SDG(s):

  • SDG 3 - Good Health and Well-being
  • SDG 4 - Quality Education
  • SDG 5 - Gender Equality
  • SDG 8 - Decent Work and Economic Growth
  • SDG 11 - Sustainable Cities and Communities
  • SDG 12 - Responsible Consumption and Production
  • SDG 16 - Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions

Education/Academic qualification

PhD, University College London

Master, University College London

Bachelor, University of Exeter

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