Quote:The University of Oxford is reportedly considering removing sheet music from its music curriculum as part of sweeping changes intended to "decolonize" the program.

What are the details?
Professors within the university's music department branded musical notation as a "colonialist representational system" amid a revamp of their musical education offerings, the Telegraph reported on Saturday.

The notation, which has not "shaken off its connection to its colonial past" would be a "slap in the face" for some students of color, professors stated in proposal for change documents obtained by the news outlet.

Elsewhere in the documents, members of the music faculty reportedly questioned the current curriculum's "complicity in white supremacy."

They specifically took issue with the classical collection taught at the school — which includes works by Mozart and Beethoven — alleging it focuses too much on "white European music from the slave period."

Additionally, the faculty members proposed that certain classical musical skills such as playing the piano and conducting orchestral arrangements should no longer be mandatory, given that these "structurally center white European music," causing "students of color great distress."

What else?
Moving forward, the faculty members wish to address the supposed "white hegemony" by offering a more inclusive range of musical topics of study like "African and African Diasporic Musics," "Global Musics," and "Popular Musics."

One faculty suggestion even proposed allowing students to study pop culture events including "Dua Lipa's Record Breaking Livestream" and "Artists Demanding Trump Stop Using Their Songs."

Even though the university's music curriculum already includes "non-Eurocentric" course options, the professors proposing changes complained that the school's "almost all-white faculty" by default gives "privilege to white musics."

Professors also stated that the "vast bulk of tutors for [musical] techniques are white men."

Anything else?
The proposals were said to be driven in response to the Black Lives Matter movement.

In one of the documents seen by the Telegraph, professors state, "Arising from international Black Lives Matter demonstrations, the Faculty Board proposed making changes to enhance the diversity of the undergraduate curriculum."

Similar rebranding is ongoing in colleges, secondary, and elementary schools across the United States, as progressive educators and school board members push critical race theory ideas into classrooms.